Mortality

Leading Causes of Death in the US

Leading causes of death ranked by year (1999–present) with deaths, crude rate, and age-adjusted rate, plus trends over time, a sex/race/age breakdown, and broad ICD chapters back to 1968.

Looking for one cause? Browse a page for each leading cause, or see what kills people your age.

In 2025 the leading causes of death in the United States were Heart disease (about 695,898 deaths), Cancer (623,191), and Accidents (186,344). This page ranks the top causes for any year from 1999 to 2025, with crude and age-adjusted rates, trends over time, a breakdown by sex, race, or age, and broad ICD chapters back to 1968. Every chart has a data table and CSV.

Metric

Names

Breakdown

Leading cause of death, 2025

Heart disease

695,898 deaths/yr

Leading Causes, Ranked

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Period comparison starts at 1999 because the 113-cause list doesn't exist earlier. For pre-1999, the Trend chart takes 11 major causes back to 1968, and "Broad Chapters" covers every chapter from 1968.

Periods

–

Deaths · mean annual value per period

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Data table

Cause	2025
Heart disease	695,898
Cancer	623,191
Accidents	186,344
Stroke	171,516
Chronic lung disease	148,561
Alzheimer's disease	116,856
Diabetes	95,369
Flu & pneumonia	56,617
Kidney disease	55,435
Liver disease	51,997
Suicide	49,071
Parkinson's disease	43,537
High blood pressure	43,422
Blood infection (sepsis)	40,534
Malnutrition	27,004

Top 15 rankable ("113 Selected Causes") categories by 2025, shown as the mean annual value for each period. National, 1999–2025.

Source: CDC WONDER (wonder.cdc.gov): Underlying Cause of Death, national (API is national-only).

Trend Over Time

Causes Heart disease

Deaths · 1968–2025

Data table

Year	Heart disease
1968	726,597
1969	722,659
1970	720,295
1971	729,088
1972	742,146
1973	744,109
1974	725,913
1975	705,033
1976	713,039
1977	708,290
1978	719,036
1979	697,048
1980	724,080
1981	718,149
1982	720,096
1983	734,274
1984	729,546
1985	735,034
1986	729,815
1987	724,512
1988	728,906
1989	698,483
1990	684,695
1991	685,062
1992	681,329
1993	706,079
1994	694,329
1995	697,928
1996	692,421
1997	685,856
1998	682,015
1999	725,192
2000	710,760
2001	700,142
2002	696,947
2003	685,089
2004	652,486
2005	652,091
2006	631,636
2007	616,067
2008	616,828
2009	599,413
2010	597,689
2011	596,577
2012	599,711
2013	611,105
2014	614,348
2015	633,842
2016	635,260
2017	647,457
2018	655,381
2019	659,041
2020	696,962
2021	695,547
2022	702,880
2023	680,981
2024	683,491
2025	695,898

The grey segment before 1999 is an approximation: WONDER's pre-1999 data doesn't carry the 113-cause list, so this sums the closest ICD-8/9 sub-chapters (no comparability adjustment, see "Broad Chapters" below). Heart disease runs a little low pre-1999 (hypertensive heart disease can't be split out). Read the trend, not the exact step at 1979 or 1999.

Source: CDC WONDER (wonder.cdc.gov): Underlying Cause of Death, national (API is national-only).

Broad Chapters, 1968–2025

The same deaths as the ranked view, rolled all the way up to the ~19 ICD chapters, the one grouping that runs unbroken across every ICD revision (ICD-8 1968–1978, ICD-9 1979–1998, ICD-10 1999 on), so a chapter's line is continuous where the 113-cause list only reaches back to 1999, with small classification seams at 1979 and 1999 where the revisions change. Uses the metric selected above.

Chapters Circulatory system Neoplasms (cancers) Nervous system & sense organs Respiratory system

Deaths · 1968–2025

Data table

Year	Circulatory system	Neoplasms (cancers)	Nervous system & sense organs	Respiratory system
1968	1,040,292	323,495	16,661	123,440
1969	1,029,363	327,769	17,134	116,457
1970	1,024,501	335,558	17,307	112,578
1971	1,033,811	342,356	16,149	108,068
1972	1,052,966	350,574	16,978	116,136
1973	1,055,196	356,068	17,019	117,537
1974	1,028,575	365,532	17,480	109,303
1975	988,073	370,640	16,851	111,982
1976	991,487	382,031	16,901	121,105
1977	978,527	391,611	17,562	110,476
1978	982,122	401,955	18,236	122,057
1979	963,037	409,299	20,637	111,547
1980	993,348	422,702	21,856	128,828
1981	977,694	428,329	22,676	131,329
1982	972,552	440,255	23,027	127,754
1983	986,132	449,469	26,115	142,835
1984	978,171	459,928	28,395	149,686
1985	982,739	468,262	31,038	166,189
1986	972,917	476,106	33,042	170,938
1987	968,434	483,497	35,982	172,834
1988	973,969	491,783	37,088	187,006
1989	936,157	502,853	38,557	187,008
1990	920,245	512,074	39,444	192,205
1991	920,482	521,651	40,080	195,433
1992	917,908	527,648	40,504	194,312
1993	952,210	537,345	45,084	212,020
1994	944,775	541,827	47,961	211,523
1995	955,591	546,214	51,290	215,081
1996	954,407	547,180	53,878	220,368
1997	948,412	547,236	56,310	227,942
1998	944,962	549,465	57,829	238,999
1999	954,339	563,065	84,195	229,863
2000	941,526	566,637	91,140	231,079
2001	926,999	567,444	96,636	230,009
2002	923,339	570,570	103,173	234,629
2003	907,180	570,465	109,753	235,935
2004	865,863	567,468	111,855	227,093
2005	860,843	573,022	120,816	239,680
2006	827,741	574,010	123,078	226,661
2007	810,257	577,079	127,107	227,307
2008	808,525	579,939	136,738	245,099
2009	784,742	582,233	134,270	238,636
2010	784,454	589,660	141,224	237,433
2011	783,475	591,688	145,046	248,742
2012	787,431	597,679	146,311	246,311
2013	800,937	600,113	151,898	261,071
2014	807,775	607,739	165,524	258,333
2015	836,546	612,207	190,638	271,229
2016	840,678	613,832	202,482	266,037
2017	859,125	614,932	216,474	278,673
2018	868,662	614,914	225,083	282,641
2019	874,613	615,191	233,861	271,026
2020	928,741	618,579	262,482	270,506
2021	931,578	621,450	251,696	250,835
2022	941,652	624,405	264,600	263,381
2023	915,973	629,491	263,795	261,113
2024	922,403	636,120	277,800	264,752
2025	940,660	639,628	290,506	278,672

Chapter labels are normalised across ICD revisions (e.g. "External causes" covers ICD-8 "Accidents, poisonings, and violence", ICD-9 "External causes of injury and poisoning" and ICD-10 "External causes of morbidity and mortality"). ICD-10's separate eye and ear chapters are folded back into "Nervous system & sense organs"; "Special-purpose codes" is mostly COVID-19 (U07.1), which is why that line appears in 2020. The rules for assigning a death to a category changed at each revision, so pre-1999 figures aren't a strict 1:1 match to the ICD-10 ones, so read the shape of a line, not the exact step at the 1979 or 1999 seam.

Source: CDC WONDER (wonder.cdc.gov): Underlying Cause of Death, national (API is national-only).