Edmonton is seeing steady improvement in homicides, even as its population grows, according to the latest Statistics Canada data.
The city’s homicide count has dropped every year for the past five years, falling from a high of 51 in 2021 to 32 in 2025.
This mirrors a national decline, with Canada’s total homicides decreasing from 802 in 2021 to 672 in 2025.
Major cities like Toronto and Winnipeg also recorded sharp drops, with Toronto’s homicides cut roughly in half.
With a population slightly smaller than Calgary’s, Edmonton recorded 32 homicides in 2025 compared to Calgary’s 15.
University of Alberta criminology professor Temitope Oriola noted the progress but said Edmonton still has work to do. With a population slightly smaller than Calgary’s, Edmonton recorded 32 homicides in 2025 compared to Calgary’s 15.
“We should not be topping or doubling the homicide numbers from Calgary,” Oriola said. “We still have a lot of work to do.”
When broken down further, the data reveals troubling patterns:
- Indigenous overrepresentation: Indigenous people are eight times more likely to be homicide victims than non-Indigenous people, and these numbers have risen.
- Gender disparity: Men make up 74% of homicide victims. In cases where the killer is a spouse, women are overwhelmingly the victims — men were the victims only 5% of the time.
Oriola called the Indigenous victimization rate “a really disturbing trend” that requires focused national attention.
“We should not take that as the natural order of things,” he said.
Edmonton Police also reported a rise in overall incidents, surpassing 100,000 in 2025 — up from 87,000 in 2021 and 6,000 more than in 2024.
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