All Fermi answers
Fermi #51 · Question 1

How many bank robberies happened in the United States in 2023?

Explore the official answer and the simple reasoning behind this Fermi estimate.

1QUESTION 1 OF 3

Answer & explanation

The official answer, with Fermi’s reasoning step by step.

Answer & explanation

Official answer

1,263

robberies

How to estimate it

Fermi’s official “Napkin math”

There's a bank on nearly every main street, so call it 100,000 branches across the US. How often does one branch get robbed? Hardly ever. Maybe once a century.

US bank branches
≈ 100,000
Robbed once every
÷ 100 years
100,000 ÷ 100
≈ 1,000

Rounded assumptions may give a slightly different estimate. The official answer above is the game’s reference value.

Source calculation & reference
Commercial banks
1,112
Credit unions
126
Other institutions
+ 25
≈
1,263

Reference cited by Fermi: FBI Bank Crime Statistics annual report

How close was your guess?

Your comparison will appear here.

Compare by ratio: divide the larger number by the smaller one. The closer to 1×, the better.

Skip to main content