Cities nationwide are moving towards NIBRS reporting as their records management systems become capable of supporting the data requirements. The NIBRS produces more detailed, accurate, and meaningful data than the traditional summary reporting. There are several differences between NIBRS and the current Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) methodologies:
- NIBRS counts all victims of person crimes (UCR counts the incident)
- NIBRS counts each crime in an incident (UCR counts only the most serious crime)
- NIBRS records the date of occurrence (UCR records the date the incident is reported)
- NIBRS organizes reports by crime type (UCR organizes by level of severity)
- NIBRS more accurately groups offenses (UCR often splits crime types; e.g. serious sex offenses and less serious sex offenses)