Defensive Gun Use Clock
How often do Americans use a gun for defense? Explore how the answer changes with the question researchers ask.
The federal crime victim survey asked people about attempted or completed crimes, then how they protected themselves.
The 2026 National Firearms Survey asked gun owners directly about defense of people or property, including encounters with animals.
Each interval is an annual survey estimate expressed as an average pace.
Firearm defense during crimes covered by the victim survey
Included in this total
Separate estimate from gun owners
Each tick represents one use at the study’s average pace. The clock projects survey estimates and cannot identify when an actual incident occurred.
Compare the clocks
The first two categories below make up the crime victim survey total. The owner survey measures a broader set of encounters.
| Measure | Uses / year | One use every |
|---|
Violent crime clocks
Each countdown shows how often a crime would occur if the annual estimate were spread evenly across the year. Whether someone could lawfully use force depends on the immediate threat, the circumstances and the applicable state law.
Violent offenses known to police
Start with the national total, then see its four component offenses. A single incident can involve several offenses. BJS and FBI estimates, Table 1 ↗
Included in this total
Violence described by victims
This survey includes crimes both reported and unreported to police. It counts nonfatal victimizations among people age 12 or older, including threats and attempts. These preliminary estimates overlap with the police figures. Each total stands on its own. 2025 National Crime Victimization Survey, Table 1 ↗
The survey combines rape and other sexual assault. Subtracting the police rape estimate would mix two different measures. Crime totals also cannot establish how often a victim used a gun or how often a particular response was justified.
Last updated November 5, 2026 · Added hourly, daily, and weekly averages and distinguished police offenses from survey victimizations in clock titles.
Behind the clocks
What did the crime victim survey count?
McDowall and colleagues analyzed National Crime Victimization Survey interviews. After describing an attempted or completed crime, respondents explained how they protected themselves. Researchers counted incidents in which a victim threatened or attacked the offender with a firearm. Crimes could be reported to police or go unreported.
The 2016–2021 estimates average six years of data. Across four periods spanning 1987–2021, annual averages ranged from about 61,000 to 65,000. Sampling uncertainty matters, especially for rare events. The published category averages differ from the total by one due to rounding. Read the peer-reviewed study and Table 1 ↗
What did gun owners describe?
William English’s 2026 National Firearms Survey working paper drew on an online survey of 51,398 adults, including 16,688 classified as gun owners. Its annual estimate draws on owners’ recollections of using firearms to defend themselves, property, family or household members.
Of incidents described, 76.3% involved no shot fired and 8.4% involved animals. These percentages describe respondents’ accounts. They do not establish how many crimes were prevented or lives saved. Read the working paper ↗ · Author’s summary ↗
Why do the estimates differ so much?
A gun owner who displayed a firearm to deter a perceived threat may describe that encounter in the owner survey. The crime survey first requires an attempted or completed crime and then asks about protective actions. It can miss incidents that respondents never describe as crimes. The owner survey relies on people’s memory and judgment about what counted as defense. Neither survey independently verifies every incident. Averaging or adding the two figures would obscure what each measures.
How does the clock keep time?
We divide 31,536,000 seconds in a standard 365-day year by the annual estimate. The countdown shows the time to the next whole modeled use in the selected window. Today and This year start at midnight U.S. Eastern time. The clocks follow New York’s daylight saving schedule, including 23-hour and 25-hour days. The visit window covers the first 24 hours after opening the page and ends at zero remaining. Each card starts with the whole number of events implied by its rate for the period. Each modeled tick moves one event from still expected to elapsed. Victimizations count experiences, so the same person can be counted more than once. Pausing freezes the display and resuming catches up to the current time. A full leap year includes an extra day at the same pace.