NYPD Vehicle Stops Data

NYPD officers stop hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers in vehicles every year. One reason for the enormous number of vehicle stops is that courts have ruled police officers generally have the authority to stop any vehicle as long as they can claim a traffic or vehicle infraction. This standard is so low – especially since it is difficult to drive without violating one of the numerous traffic laws – that it makes it difficult to challenge stops that are made for impermissible reasons, including racial profiling.

Until recently, the NYPD revealed little about the outcome of traffic stops and who the department was pulling over. Now data obtained by the NYCLU after a lawsuit against the NYPD reveals troubling information about how the NYPD polices New York City drivers.

The data shows that NYPD officers are more likely to stop, arrest, search, and use force against Black and Latinx drivers. There are also geographic disparities that show drivers in certain boroughs and particular neighborhoods are more likely to face NYPD scrutiny.

Key Findings

• According to an original analysis of NYPD traffic stop data from a four-year period, 2022 to 2025, the NYCLU found the following:
• The NYPD made more than three million traffic stops. The NYPD issued about 1.9 million tickets as a result of traffic stops, made around 100,000 arrests, searched vehicles close to 79,000 times, and seized vehicles approximately 36,000 times.
• Eighty-five percent of people arrested during a traffic stop were Black or Latinx.
• Black drivers were searched at a rate roughly nine times greater than the rate that white drivers were. Latinx drivers were searched at a rate roughly six times greater than the rate that white drivers were. The NYCLU currently represents the NAACP New York State Conference, along with two Black New York drivers, in a lawsuit seeking to end this ‘stop-and-frisk on wheels’ policy and practice because it violates the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments, as well as state and local law.
• Vehicle searches and seizures, arrests, and use-of-force resulting from traffic stops all increased by 60 percent or more from 2022 to 2025.
• Police made over 71,000 more traffic stops in 2025 than in 2024.

Traffic Stops, Vehicle Searches, and Resulting Arrests Increased at an Alarming Rate in 2025

Traffic stops increased dramatically in 2025. The NYPD made 927,781 traffic stops in 2025, an 8 percent increase from the number made in 2024 (856,171). The NYPD also made over 2,000 more arrests in 2025 than in 2024.

The increase in the number of traffic stops from 2022 to 2025 was greatest in Queens (+67 percent) and the Bronx (+44 percent) and was the smallest in Staten Island (+1 percent). The number of arrests more than doubled in all boroughs but Staten Island. The increase in arrests was greatest in Brooklyn, where arrests increased by 174 percent from 3,982 in 2022 to 10,911 in 2025.

Traffic stops make up a significant and increasing portion of the NYPD’s policing work. In 2025, approximately 18 percent of all arrests started with a traffic stop, up from approximately 10 percent in 2023 and 8 percent in 2022.¹

Summing Up the Data

Every year, the NYPD stops drivers over half a million times. The NYPD made 3,145,044 vehicle stops from 2022 to 2025, leading to a variety of outcomes including at least 1,888,448 summonses (“tickets”) and tens of thousands of arrests, vehicle searches, and vehicle seizures. See the table below for a summary of traffic stop outcomes. Note that multiple outcomes can occur at the same time. For instance, a single driver may be stopped, searched, and arrested. While police sometimes issue more than one summons in one stop, here we count the number of stops that resulted in at least one summons.

Approximately 88 percent of vehicles stopped were passenger vehicles (cars and SUVs), four percent were motorcycles, two percent were trucks or buses, one percent were taxis or limousines, and two percent were bicycles.

Racial Composition of Drivers

A driver’s race appears to play a critical role in who is stopped in New York City. Black and Latinx drivers are disproportionately stopped, accounting for 29 percent and 28 percent of traffic stops, respectively, while Black drivers are 22 percent of the driving population and Latinx drivers are 24 percent. White people are vastly underrepresented in traffic stops, accounting for 20 percent of traffic stops, yet making up 40 percent of the driving population. Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) drivers make up 12 percent of drivers stopped.

Where People Are Stopped

A New York driver’s chances of being stopped depends on where they’re driving. The NYPD made 30 percent of recorded traffic stops in Brooklyn (942,575), 25 percent in Queens (774,569), 21 percent in Manhattan (662,209), 17 percent in the Bronx (535,947), and seven percent in Staten Island (229,744). Traffic stops disproportionately occurred in Brooklyn and the Bronx compared to its share of New York City car commuters. Fewer stops occurred in Queens and Manhattan than one would expect given the number of drivers who live there.

Who Gets Arrested After a Stop

Almost 100,000 arrests were made as a result of a traffic stop. Black and Latinx drivers were arrested during traffic stops at a rate four times greater than white drivers. Nearly 85 percent (84,063 of 99,445) people arrested were Black or Latinx. Roughly one in twenty traffic stops in the Bronx led to an arrest (26,466), a much higher rate than other boroughs.

Who Gets Searched and Where Searches Happen

Black and Latinx drivers were searched at much greater rates than drivers from other racial groups. Black drivers were searched at a rate roughly nine times greater than white drivers. Latinx drivers were searched at a rate roughly six times greater than white drivers.

The NYPD conducted searches at relatively high rates in the Bronx and central Brooklyn, predominantly Black and Brown neighborhoods. Searches are very rarely conducted in south Brooklyn, Lower Manhattan, Staten Island, and parts of Queens. Roughly one in 24 traffic stops in the Bronx led to a vehicle search (22,331), a much higher rate than other boroughs. Four of 78 precincts had a search rate of seven percent or above, meaning that seven percent of stops or more led to a vehicle being searched: St. Albans, Springfield Gardens (PCT 113); Brownsville, Ocean Hill (PCT 73); University Heights, Morris Heights, Fordham (south) (PCT 46); and East New York, Starrett City (PCT 75). See map below for more details:

Vehicle Seizures

When the NYPD takes temporary possession of a vehicle, that constitutes a “seizure.” The NYPD can seize a vehicle for a number of different reasons—including in the context of an arrest for “safekeeping,” or as evidence of a suspected crime, or even because they intend to take permanent possession of it through civil forfeiture².  Depending on the context, it can be difficult or impossible to get it back. According to our data, vehicle seizures occurred in roughly one percent of stops citywide. The rate of vehicle seizures in a handful of precincts is significantly higher than others. The NYPD seized a vehicle in roughly three percent of traffic stops in Midtown (PCT 18); Hunts Point (PCT 41); University Heights, Morris Heights, Fordham (PCT 46); and Concourse, Highbridge (PCT 44)—three of which are in the Bronx and one in Manhattan.

When Stops Turn Violent

The NYPD reported use-of-force in 2,225 traffic stops. Approximately 86 percent of drivers subject to such cases were Black or Latinx. Of the 2,225 stops where the NYPD reported use-of-force, 1,105 drivers were Black, 812 were Latinx, 111 were white, and 85 were AAPI.

Thirty percent of use-of-force incidents (673 of 2,225) took place in the Bronx, even though only 17 percent of stops took place in the borough.

Sixty-four percent of NYPD precincts (50 of 78) reported less than 30 use-of-force incidents each. But 11 precincts, most of them majority Black and Latinx, reported more than 50 use-of-force incidents each.

Checkpoint Stops

Nearly seven percent of vehicle stops (226,858) originated at an NYPD checkpoint. Checkpoint stops in Brooklyn and Staten Island accounted for a greater percentage of total stops than in the other three boroughs, nine percent and eight percent, respectively.

Checkpoint stops accounted for ten percent of stops (37,918) where the driver was AAPI and seven percent of stops (66,017) where the driver was Black. By comparison, about six percent of stops (39,063) where the driver was white occurred at a checkpoint.

Stops by Age and Gender

Nearly 55 percent of all drivers stopped were between the ages of 20 and 39. People aged 50 or older accounted for only 20 percent of drivers stopped.

A vast majority of drivers stopped by the NYPD were men (82 percent of traffic stops).

About the Data

The data includes all vehicle stops made by the NYPD and the resulting enforcement or action taken, including summonses (tickets), arrests, vehicle searches, etc. The data are broken down by race, gender, age, and precinct where the vehicle stop took place. This data was obtained through a FOIL request to the NYPD.

The NYPD traffic stop dataset is missing various information at times:

The race of the driver is missing in 277,917 (nine percent) of NYPD stop records. The age of the driver is missing in 172,426 (six percent) of NYPD stop records. The gender of the driver is missing in 20,271 (one percent) of NYPD stop records.

A Note on Estimating NYC Drivers

No available source tracks who is driving on a given day in New York City, and therefore, who may be subject to an NYPD traffic stop. The proxy used in this project is the number of New York City car commuters. The population statistics were compiled using the US Census Bureau American Community Survey, table S0804. An estimated 1,050,000 New York City residents commute by car. Of car commuters, 40 percent are white, 22 percent are Black, 24 percent are Latinx, and 14 percent are AAPI.

Footnotes

<sup>1. Calculated by dividing the arrests from our FOIL data by all NYPD arrests using the NYC Open Data dataset.
2. Civil forfeiture is a legal process wherein police seize property of people suspected of committing a crime.</sup>