Registry statistics
Across all published reports. Click a year below to drill down.
Thefts by year
⚠ The decline since ~2013 most likely tracks the registry's traffic and popularity over time, not Chicago bike theft itself. Read it as "reports filed per year," not a crime trend.
Seasonality — thefts by month
All years combined, by incident month.
By bike type
What the bike was locked to
- Locked to bike rack. 4209 · 33%
- Bike not locked. 3535 · 28%
- Locked to a metal pole, pipe, or fence. 1549 · 12%
- Other situation, please describe below. 1326 · 10%
- Locked to street sign. 850 · 7%
- Locked to a wooden pole, railing, or fence. 796 · 6%
- Bike was locked only to itself. 554 · 4%
- Locked to a parking meter. 24 · 0%
- Bike not locked, or locked only to itself. 1 · 0%
Lock effectiveness — how each lock was defeated
Each row reads "given this lock type, here's how those thefts happened." Row-normalized so you can compare lock types regardless of how common each is.
| Lock type | Cut | Picked / opened | Anchor failed | Bike + lock taken | Not locked | Other | n |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| U-lock | 19% | 3% | 6% | 59% | 5% | 8% | 2691 |
| Cable lock | 29% | 1% | 1% | 64% | 1% | 3% | 3995 |
| Chain | 24% | 1% | 5% | 58% | 6% | 6% | 387 |
| Other | 4% | 2% | 22% | 25% | 11% | 37% | 2324 |
| Lock type | Cut | Picked / opened | Anchor failed | Bike + lock taken | Not locked | Other | n |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| U-lock | 498 | 81 | 160 | 1599 | 137 | 216 | 2691 |
| Cable lock | 1143 | 49 | 56 | 2565 | 56 | 126 | 3995 |
| Chain | 94 | 4 | 20 | 223 | 22 | 24 | 387 |
| Other | 99 | 45 | 501 | 574 | 249 | 856 | 2324 |
This is conditional on a theft and a report being filed — read it as "among reported thefts of bikes on this lock, the share defeated each way," not your odds of being hit. Cable users may also park differently than U-lock users, so this mixes lock strength with behavior. "Bike + lock taken" usually means the bike was lifted off or never secured to a fixed object.
What recovered bikes had in common
Comparing the 221 recovered bikes against all reports — a nudge toward registering details.
When thefts happen — hour × weekday
Darker = more thefts. By incident time (the ~2% with no time recorded are excluded).
| Mon | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tue | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wed | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Thu | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Fri | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sat | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sun | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 12a | 6a | 12p | 6p | |||||||||||||||||||||
How long the bike had been locked up
Of reports that recorded a duration. The "quick errand" risk is easy to underestimate.
Most-stolen colors
Counts reflect popularity as much as targeting — black is the most common bike color, so being most-stolen isn't evidence dark bikes are targeted more.
How close to a landmark?
Of 10749 geocoded thefts — 7444 locked, 3305 unlocked; 1759 downtown, 10221 outside. One Chicago block ≈ 1⁄8 mile (~200 m).
Thefts by ward
Geocoded reports binned into Chicago's 50 wards, ranked. Raw counts (no per-capita — population data not loaded).