Jails Report Series

The Bureau of Justice Statistics provides key jail statistics prior to release of the annual jails report. The statistics below include the number of persons held in local jails, by inmate demographics and conviction status; the number of admissions to jail; and jail incarceration rates, from 2013 to 2023.

Statistics from 2023, the latest data year, are preliminary and may be updated once BJS publishes the final data in Jail Inmates in 2023 – Statistical Tables, which is scheduled for release in late 2024.  

Key findings

• At midyear 2023, local jails held 664,200 persons in custody, similar to the year before (663,100).
• Jails reported 7.6 million admissions from July 1, 2022 to June 30, 2023. While this represents a 4% increase over the 7.3 million admissions the year before, annual admissions were 35% lower than 10 years ago (11.7 million).
• Local jails held 95,100 females at midyear 2023, accounting for 14% of the confined population.
• At midyear 2023, 70% of the jail population (467,600) was unconvicted and awaiting court action on a current charge or being held in jail for other reasons. The remaining 30% (196,600) was convicted and either serving a sentence or awaiting sentencing on a conviction.