Highest Vehicle Theft Days Ranked

On an average day in 2017, there were some 2,228 vehicle thefts in the U.S., but on New Year's Day there was a whopping 2,469, according to new data on annual holiday vehicle thefts released by the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB).

New Year's Day ranked number one for the most holiday thefts in 2017 followed by President's Day with 2,312 reported stolen vehicles, and Halloween with 2,297. Memorial Day (2,290 thefts) and Labor Day (2,180) also ranked among the top five holidays for stolen vehicles.

Christmas Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas Eve had the lowest number of vehicle thefts of the holidays with 1,548, 1,682, and 1,737 thefts respectively. Auto thieves may have a soft spot for Christmas, as Christmas Day was also the day with the least number of thefts of any day in 2017.

While thieves are clearly undeterred by the majority of holidays, the three days in 2017 with the highest overall number of thefts were the ordinary days of Sept. 1, Feb. 1, and July 17.

The data shows that a total of 22,770 vehicles were stolen on the 11 holidays covered in the report.

The report also evaluated holiday thefts by state. California took the top spot with a whopping 5,142 holiday vehicle thefts in 2017. Texas ranked second with 1,988 holidays thefts. Florida, Washington, and Georgia also made the top five list with 1,396, 819, and 812 holiday vehicle thefts respectively.

While California experienced the most thefts on President’s Day, Texas, Florida, Washington, and Georgia followed the national trend and experienced the most thefts on New Year's Day.

NICB gathered the data for the report from the National Crime Information Center’s stolen vehicle file. Read the entire report here.