Washington — U.S. law enforcement agencies recorded an estimated 189 anti‑Sikh and 32 anti‑Hindu hate‑crime offences in 2025, according to newly released FBI statistics that do not provide a separate count for crimes specifically targeting Indian Americans.
Breakdown within religious bias categories
The FBI's Reported Crimes in the Nation summary separates hate‑crime incidents by bias motive. For 2025, agencies reported 2,703 single‑bias religious hate‑crime offences. Anti‑Sikh bias accounted for about 7% of that total, equivalent to roughly 189 offences, while anti‑Hindu bias represented about 1.2%, or approximately 32 offences.
Anti‑Jewish bias constituted the largest share of religiously motivated hate crimes at 62.3%, followed by anti‑Islamic/anti‑Muslim bias at 9.6%. The FBI separately reported 2,798 victims of anti‑religious hate crimes: about 193 of them were recorded as victims of anti‑Sikh bias (roughly 6.9%), and about 34 as victims of anti‑Hindu bias (about 1.2%).
Race, ethnicity and ancestry biases
On the broader question of race, ethnicity and ancestry, the FBI said there were 7,200 single‑bias hate‑crime offences motivated by those categories. Anti‑Asian bias accounted for roughly 5.8% of these incidents, or about 418 offences; among 7,427 victims of race/ethnicity/ancestry‑based hate crimes, approximately 438 (around 5.9%) were targeted because of anti‑Asian bias.
The national summary does not disaggregate the Asian category by national origin. Consequently, the FBI notes that Indian‑origin victims may be classified under anti‑Asian, anti‑Hindu, anti‑Sikh or other bias categories depending on how local authorities record the offence.
Aggregate figures and reporting caveats
Overall, agencies reported 10,881 hate‑crime incidents in 2025 involving 13,026 offences. Those incidents involved 13,438 victims and 9,509 known offenders, according to the FBI summary.
The FBI emphasises that the number of victims can differ from the number of offences because a single incident may include multiple offences or affect more than one person. The agency's categorisation relies on how local law enforcement agencies classify motive and victim identity, which can lead to variation in national counts for specific communities.
- Religious hate‑crime offences (2025): 2,703 single‑bias incidents
- Anti‑Sikh offences: ~189 (7% of religious bias cases)
- Anti‑Hindu offences: ~32 (1.2% of religious bias cases)
| Category | Offences | Victims |
|---|---|---|
| Religious bias (total) | 2,703 | 2,798 |
| Anti‑Sikh | ~189 | ~193 |
| Anti‑Hindu | ~32 | ~34 |
Implications for Indian‑origin communities
The FBI's reporting practice of not listing Indian Americans as a distinct racial or ethnic category means the national summary does not disclose how many Indian Americans were victims of hate crimes in 2025. The agency's approach leaves the exact impact on Indian‑origin communities unclear, since victims of Indian origin could appear in several bias categories depending on local classification.
Law enforcement counts are influenced by reporting by local agencies and by victims' willingness to report. Differences in classification practices and the absence of a national breakdown by national origin limit the ability to draw precise conclusions about directional trends for specific ethnic communities from the available summary figures alone.
The FBI's 2025 hate‑crime summary provides an overview of motive‑based incidents across the United States, and highlights the distribution of offences by religious, racial, ethnic and other forms of bias. The data underscore that while anti‑Sikh and anti‑Hindu offences represent a minority share of religiously motivated hate crimes, they remain present in the national figures for 2025.
