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Sexual Violence Statistics

What national research tells us about sexual violence in the United States, where each number comes from, and what it can’t tell us.

Last checked: What’s new: CDC's 2023/2024 national survey added online sexual violence for the first time.

How these numbers are kept current: every figure links to its original report. An AI-assisted check compares them against the sources every month, and any change is fact-checked and approved by Stacy Willis before it’s published. See the sources

How common is sexual violence?

The CDC asks a national sample of adults, privately, about their whole lives. These answers include the assaults that were never reported to anyone.

45.1%

of US women have experienced contact sexual violence in their lifetime. That’s about 57.7 million women.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024. Includes rape, attempted rape, sexual coercion, and unwanted sexual contact.
21.0%

of women have experienced completed or attempted rape.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024
16.9%

of men have experienced contact sexual violence. More than 1 in 6.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024
1 in 18

women experienced contact sexual violence in just the past 12 months (5.5%).

CDC NISVS 2023/2024
28.2%

of women have experienced sexual violence through technology, like unwanted explicit images or their own images shared without consent.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024, first time measured
6.9%

of women have survived an attempted forced rape. This is the closest any national survey comes to counting a near miss, and it only covers attempts that turned physical.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024, attempted forced penetration

It depends a lot on where you live

Share of women who have experienced contact sexual violence, by state.

  • Alaska (highest)
    69.9%
  • United States
    45.1%
  • Hawaii (lowest)
    35.1%
CDC NISVS 2023/2024, Table 2. State samples are small, so state figures have wide margins of error. Even the lowest state is more than 1 in 3 women.

Sadly, sexual violence starts young

For many survivors, the first time happens before they’re old enough to vote. This is why the project starts at age three.

49%

of women who have been raped were first raped before age 18.

CDC NISVS 2016/2017. The newest survey hasn't published age data yet.
Nearly 2 in 10

high school girls experienced sexual violence in the past year. More than 1 in 10 have been physically forced to have sex.

CDC Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 2023
25.9%

of undergraduate women experienced sexual contact by force or while unable to consent since starting college.

AAU Campus Climate Survey, 2019, 33 universities

Who is responsible for committing the act?

The stranger in the parking lot is real, but less common. Most people are harmed by someone they know, which is why noticing and stepping in matter so much.

When girls are raped before 18, the person is usually someone they know

CDC NISVS 2012, female victims of completed or attempted rape before age 18.
Most

victims of every form of sexual violence knew the person who harmed them, usually an acquaintance or a current or former partner.

CDC NISVS 2016/2017
8.2%

of women have been raped when they were too drunk, high, drugged, or passed out to consent or stop it. That’s about 10.5 million women.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024, completed alcohol or drug-facilitated rape

Where sexual violence usually happens

Most assaults happen behind a closed door, often at home. But the moment someone could step in usually comes earlier, in front of other people.

Where sexual assaults happen

  • At or near the victim’s home
    55%
  • Open areas or public transportation
    15%
  • At or near a friend’s, relative’s or acquaintance’s home
    12%
  • Commercial place, parking lot or garage
    10%
  • At school
    8%
BJS, Female Victims of Sexual Violence, 1994–2010 (2013). National Crime Victimization Survey, 2005–2010, female victims.

What survivors were doing

  • At home, sleeping or doing something else
    48%
  • Traveling, running errands or out for leisure
    29%
  • Working
    12%

Most survivors were going about an ordinary day.

BJS, Female Victims of Sexual Violence, 1994–2010 (2013). National Crime Victimization Survey, 2005–2010, female victims.
23%

of sexual assaults had a moment beforehand when a bystander could have stepped in.

Haikalis et al., Violence Against Women, 2018. 427 women aged 18–25. Alcohol was common in these settings, for everyone involved.
The window
Others are around. Someone can step in.
  1. At the party or bar
  2. Leaving together
  3. Alone

The bystander’s moment is rarely the assault itself. It’s earlier, when someone notices a person who is too drunk being steered away.

77%

of college students who saw a drunk person heading for a sexual encounter did nothing. That’s out of 44.4% of all students who had seen it happen.

AAU Campus Climate Survey, 2015. The 2019 survey asked these questions differently.
23.5%

of students who saw it did nothing because they weren’t sure what to do. They’re who this project is for.

Learn how to step in

Most assaults happen at or near home, by someone the survivor knows. Being somewhere private, or with someone you trust, is never a mistake. That’s why this project teaches all three paths: protecting yourself, checking yourself, and stepping in.

What gets reported

Most assaults never reach police. Of those that do, very few end in a conviction. This is the part of the picture the justice system sees.

23.6%

of rapes and sexual assaults were reported to police in 2024, down from 46% in 2023. This figure swings a lot from year to year because the sample is small.

BJS, Criminal Victimization, 2024

Out of every 1,000 sexual assaults

  • Assaults
    1,000
  • Lead to arrest
    50
  • Felony conviction
    28
  • Incarceration
    25
RAINN estimate combining FBI NIBRS 2012–2016 and NCVS data. It's an estimate built from several sources, not a single study.

Not reporting is a choice survivors make for real reasons, including fear of not being believed, of retaliation, or of the process itself. These numbers describe the system, not the people in it.

What can stop sexual violence?

This is the near-miss evidence. Studies show assaults can be prevented, and that ordinary people, with a little training, change the outcome.

46% fewer

completed rapes, and 63% fewer attempted rapes, among first-year university women who took a four-session resistance program. The effects lasted at least two years.

Senn et al., New England Journal of Medicine, 2015. Randomized trial, 893 women, Enhanced Assess, Acknowledge, Act (EAAA)
17–21%

less sexual violence in high schools that trained students to step in as bystanders, compared with schools that didn’t.

Coker et al., American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 2017. Five-year randomized trial in 26 Kentucky high schools, Green Dot
Acting back works

In federal crime survey data, most protective actions, forceful or not, lowered the chance an attempted rape was completed, without raising the risk of other injury.

Tark & Kleck, Violence Against Women, 2014. NCVS 1992–2002

Freezing is a normal, involuntary response to danger. Someone who froze, or couldn’t get away, did nothing wrong. Responsibility always belongs to the person who caused harm.

What we don’t know

Every number on this page has limits. Being honest about them is part of the point.

Near misses: ?

No national survey asks whether something almost happened and what stopped it. Attempted rape is counted only when it turned physical. The friend who noticed, the bad feeling someone trusted, the door that was locked aren’t counted at all.

Who’s left out

The CDC survey doesn’t reach people in prisons, nursing homes, or other institutions, or people experiencing homelessness. Those groups face high risk, so the real numbers are likely higher.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024, Limitations
Don’t compare across years

The CDC changed how it asks these questions in 2023. The 2023/2024 numbers can’t be compared directly with older ones, so a change doesn’t necessarily mean things got better or worse.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024, Limitations
Men are undercounted

Samples are often too small to publish reliable numbers for men by state or by type of assault, and men may be less likely to disclose.

CDC NISVS 2023/2024

Sources

We check every figure against the original report. When a source releases new data, we update the number, note it at the top of the page, and change the “last checked” date.

An AI-assisted check compares every figure with its source each month and proposes any updates. Stacy Willis fact-checks and approves every change before it’s published.

Spot something out of date? Tell us.

Update history
  • 2026-10-02: “Where it happens” now cites the Bureau of Justice Statistics report its figures come from (Female Victims of Sexual Violence, 1994–2010), instead of RAINN, whose statistics page no longer shows them. The figures are unchanged; some labels now match the report’s categories exactly.
  • 2026-10-02: Confirmed the report links for the CDC 2016/2017 sexual violence report, the 2019 and 2015 AAU campus climate surveys, and RAINN’s location statistics.
  • 2026-10-02: Added "Where it happens": location of assaults, bystander opportunity, and how often college bystanders act.
  • 2026-10-02: Page launched. All figures verified against original reports.