El Salvador Homicide Rate: From the World’s Most Violent Country to a Regional Security Model

Thus far in 2025, El Salvador homicide rate is at 0.20 per day or 1.23 homicides per 100,000 people. Furthermore, this year, the country has achieved 113 days with no murders.

These figures mark a slight improvement from the same period in 2024, further solidifying the country’s ongoing security transformation.

The country’s low homicide trend is continuing in 2025.

From January 1 to May 18, 2025, the Salvadoran National Police (PCN) reported 28 homicides for a 0.20 daily rate, 20 less than the 48 recorded in the same 2024 period. At this rate, El Salvador is projected to conclude 2025 with 74 homicides, equal to 1.23 homicides per 100,000 people.

The homicide stats for 2019 to 2025 do not include the deaths of alleged gang members who have died in confrontations with Salvadoran security forces, as well as murders involving bodies found in mass graves.

SEE ALSO: El Salvador Excludes Key Data From Homicide Tally: Implications for Crime Statistics

2024: El Salvador’s Safest Year in Over Five Decades

El Salvador ended 2024 with a historic milestone in public safety: just 114 homicides. That’s an average of 0.31 homicides per day for a rate of 1.89 murders per 100,000 people, a 26.9% decrease from 2023 (40 fewer murders recorded).

This achievement made 2024 the safest year in El Salvador in over 50 years, a dramatic shift from 2015, when the country was labeled “the murder capital of the world.”

The progress seen in 2024 is not an isolated improvement. The current figures for 2025 suggest that the country is on track to break its record once again.

The sustained low homicide rate demonstrates a continuing shift toward greater security and stability.

SEE ALSO: Days Without Homicides in El Salvador: A Positive Trend in National Security and Public Safety

What’s Behind the Transformation?

The Bukele administration attributes this dramatic drop in homicides to two major security initiatives: the territorial control plan and the State of Exception.

The government launched the Territorial Control Plan security measure in June 2019; its purpose has been to crack down on the country’s violence and gangs.

Then, in March 2022, the Bukele administration introduced the controversial State of Exception, a direct attack on Salvadoran criminal gangs; it granted authorities the power to arrest suspected gang members and expanded security operations nationwide.

The government has widely credited these measures for turning around El Salvador’s decades-long struggle with gang violence and criminal impunity.

Bukele’s Administration and the Homicide Decline

Since President Nayib Bukele took office in June 2019, homicide rates have consistently dropped year over year:

• 2020: 3.67 homicides per day (21.2 per 100,000 people), the lowest in decades at the time.
• 2021–2024: Each year broke the previous year’s record low, culminating in 2024’s unprecedented numbers.
• 2024: 0.31 homicides per day (1.89 per 100,000 people), the lowest in over five decades.

The administration has hailed these results as proof of the success of its security policies. However, critics, both domestically and internationally, have raised concerns.

Gang Truce Allegations

President Bukele and his administration credit the homicide reduction to their security measures.

However, some members of the opposition, along with the U.S. government, allege that this reduction resulted from a secret truce between gangs and the Bukele administration.

On December 8, 2021, the U.S. Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions on two members of Bukele’s cabinet, alleging secret negotiations with criminal gangs.

“Osiris Luna Meza (Luna) and Carlos Amilcar Marroquin Chica (Marroquin) led, facilitated, and organized a number of secret meetings involving incarcerated gang leaders, in which known gang members were allowed to enter the prison facilities and meet with senior gang leadership. These meetings were part of the Government of El Salvador’s efforts to negotiate a secret truce with gang leadership.” U.S. Department of the Treasury.

Those accused of negotiating with criminal gangs to reduce homicides have not publicly responded to the claims.

A Look Back: El Salvador’s Homicide Crisis Since 1991

For decades, El Salvador was among the most violent nations in the world, not at war.

The country entered the top 20 highest homicide rate rankings in 1994, quickly claiming, and often reclaiming, the top spot:

• 1994–2000: Consistently among the most violent globally.
• 2009–2010: Returned to first place before Honduras overtook it.
• 2015: Once again, El Salvador topped the global homicide charts.
• 2015–2019: Held that grim title until significant changes began under the Bukele administration.

By late 2021, the country finally left the list of the world’s top 20 most violent nations, a feat many once thought impossible.

El Salvador Homicide Rate: A Historic Turnaround

El Salvador’s security turnaround is one of the most significant societal shifts in its modern history.

Whether credited entirely to government policies or subject to more complex dynamics, the numbers speak for themselves: a nation once gripped by violence is now writing a new chapter, one marked by safety, recovery, and hope.

As 2025 progresses, all eyes remain on El Salvador to see how far this transformation can go.