Break in the series between 2018 and 2019. DWI arrests fall from 35,265 in 2018 to 14,808 in 2019. The reports attribute the lower share of residents covered (96.5% to 88.4%) to agencies moving from the Summary Reporting System to the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS). The drop in DWI arrests is far larger than the change in coverage, and the reports say nothing more about it. Compare years on the same side of the break, not across it.

The lighter bar is 2024, printed once so far. Every earlier year came out higher in the next year’s report, so 2024 may too. The table has each count as first printed.

Adults are people 18 or older and juveniles people under 18, as the Bureau’s table counts them. The share covered is the part of the state’s residents who live where the reporting agencies work; arrests by agencies that did not report are not in the counts.

Counts are the DWI arrests that North Carolina law enforcement agencies reported to the State Bureau of Investigation: arrests, not people, and only the agencies that report are counted. They are not a measure of how much impaired driving there is: enforcement effort shapes them. The Bureau publishes no county figures for arrests, so the chart has none.