How to Look Up Galveston County Jail Population Data
The Texas Commission on Jail Standards, or TCJS, is the official source for county jail population data. Each county jail reports its numbers, and TCJS publishes a current population report along with related reports on jailer turnover, paper-ready inmates, pregnant inmates, immigration detainers, and incarceration rate. The workbook updates on a monthly cycle, so the figures reflect a specific report date rather than a live count.
The report breaks the population into legal-status buckets instead of one total. That structure is what makes it useful. A reader can see how many people are pretrial felons, how many are sentenced, and how many are held on warrants or holds. TCJS also warns that counties submit their own data, that agencies are responsible for accuracy, and that figures may be modified later, so each number should be read with its report date.
The current report page hosts the workbook. The TCJS current population reports page is the official source for Galveston County jail population data.
Because TCJS data can change, the figures below are cited to the May 1, 2026 report date.
Galveston County Jail Capacity Overview
The Galveston County Jail at 5700 Avenue H is the county's single reporting facility. On the May 1, 2026 TCJS report, its rated capacity was 1,223 and its total population, counting local, contract, and federal inmates, was 1,085. That puts the jail at about 88.7% of capacity, below the limit but high enough to leave little slack.
| Facility | Rated Capacity | Population (May 1, 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Galveston County Jail | 1,223 | 1,085 |
Note: TCJS lists the May 1, 2026 utilization at 88.7% of rated capacity, so the jail had limited open beds on that report date.
Recent Population Levels
Recent TCJS rows show the jail running near the 1,000 to 1,100 range. The April 2026 report listed 1,069 inmates against the 1,223 capacity, and the May 1, 2026 report listed 1,085. Earlier in the multi-year record the totals sat lower, in the high 800s and 900s, before climbing into the 1,000s. The county does not publish a separate live average-daily-population figure on the pages reviewed, so the monthly TCJS totals are the best official measure.
Population by Sex
The TCJS workbook reports population by status and sex rather than by race or age. On the May 1, 2026 report, men made up the large majority of the jail population. The percentages below are derived from the TCJS status categories for that date.
| Group | Count and Share |
|---|---|
| Male | About 905, roughly 83% |
| Female | About 179, roughly 17% |
Note: the parsed TCJS workbook does not break the Galveston County population down by race or age, so only sex and legal-status detail are reported here.
Pretrial vs Sentenced Population
The most striking part of the data is how much of the jail is held before trial. Adding the TCJS pretrial categories for May 1, 2026, roughly four out of five inmates were pretrial rather than serving a sentence. Local pretrial felons alone numbered 646, with 541 men and 105 women, the single largest group in the jail.
| Status | Approximate Share |
|---|---|
| Pretrial | About 77% (roughly 831 inmates) |
| Sentenced | About 13% (roughly 138 inmates) |
| Holds and warrants | About 11% (roughly 115 inmates) |
These shares are derived by grouping the TCJS status categories for the May 1, 2026 report and do not come from a single published percentage.
The holds-and-warrants group is worth a closer look, because it explains why a jail count is more than just pretrial and sentenced inmates. On the same report date, the jail held about 24 people on local bench warrants, 34 on parole-board blue warrants, and 35 parole violators with a new charge. These categories mean someone can be in the county jail without a new local conviction, waiting on another court or the parole board to act. A pretrial state jail felony group added another 136 inmates, split 108 men and 28 women.
Misdemeanor vs Felony Population
Felony-class inmates dominate the Galveston County jail. On the May 1, 2026 report, pretrial felons (646), pretrial state jail felons (136), and the various sentenced felony categories together accounted for the large majority of the population. Misdemeanor counts were far smaller, with about 47 pretrial Class A and B misdemeanants, 7 convicted misdemeanants, and only 2 pretrial Class C misdemeanants.
This pattern fits the jail's role. Felony cases take longer to resolve and often carry higher bonds, so felony defendants make up most of the pretrial group. The TCJS report also tracked 88 inmates who were convicted felons or parole violators already sentenced to TDCJ divisions but still held locally, which is why a county jail count includes people on their way to state prison.
State jail felonies are a separate Texas category, and they show up across the report. Beyond the 136 pretrial state jail felons, the May 1, 2026 data listed 13 convicted state jail felons sentenced to county jail time and 25 sentenced to state jail time. A reader scanning the workbook will also see a small "convicted felons sentenced to county jail time" group of 5. Each label points to a different stage, so the count is best read category by category rather than as one number.
Mental Health and Medical Population
TCJS publishes several report types beyond the headline count, but the parsed Galveston County workbook did not include a specific mental-health or medical population figure, so no exact count is stated here. What the local record does show is that the county runs a Mental Health setting in its court system, which appears in the Odyssey hearing-search courtroom list.
That setting handles cases on a mental-health track rather than a standard criminal docket. For a verified count of inmates receiving mental-health or medical care, the Sheriff's Office or TCJS would be the source, since those numbers were not in the public workbook reviewed. Mental-health and medical needs in a jail population matter for staffing and cost, which is one reason TCJS tracks several specialized reports alongside the headline count. A reader who needs that detail should request it directly rather than estimate it from the status table.
National and State Context
County jail data is easier to read with context. The federal Bureau of Justice Statistics publishes national jail-incarceration figures, and the Vera Institute tracks county-level trends, which place a single county next to state and national patterns. The Galveston County numbers should be read alongside that broader research rather than on their own. Exact per-100,000 rates for the county, the state, and the nation were not part of the source data here, so they are not stated.
Federal inmates are a small slice of the local count. The May 1, 2026 report listed just 3 federal inmates in the Galveston County Jail. Galveston County sits in the Southern District of Texas, where federal cases are prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney's Office. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas covers federal matters that the county jail count only touches at the margins.
Most of the Galveston County jail population is local, not federal, so state context from TCJS is the closest fit.
Population Trends Over Time
The TCJS record for Galveston County spans several years, and it shows a clear climb. In September 2022 the jail held 854 against a 1,187 capacity, roughly 72% full. By 2025 some months pushed past 1,000, and the spring 2026 reports landed near 1,070 to 1,085 against a higher 1,223 capacity. The table compares three report dates.
| Report Date | Capacity | Population | % of Capacity |
|---|---|---|---|
| September 2022 | 1,187 | 854 | About 72% |
| April 2026 | 1,223 | 1,069 | About 87% |
| May 1, 2026 | 1,223 | 1,085 | About 89% |
Because TCJS warns its data may be modified, treat each row as accurate to its report date rather than as a live figure. The capacity figure itself changed over the period, rising from 1,187 in the earlier rows to 1,223 by 2026, so the percentage of capacity reflects both the population and the available beds. The overall trend points one direction: a fuller jail driven mostly by a growing pretrial felony group.
Searching for Galveston County Inmate Records by Name
This page covers aggregate jail population data, not individual lookups. To search for a specific person in the jail by name, use the live roster on the Galveston County inmate records page, which runs through the Sheriff's P2C inmate inquiry. Population data and name searches answer different questions.
Where the Data Comes From
The population figures here come from the Texas Commission on Jail Standards current population workbook, with national and state context from the Bureau of Justice Statistics and the Vera Institute. TCJS collects data submitted by each county jail, so the agency notes it cannot guarantee the quality or timeliness of downloaded data. That is why the figures on this page are cited to the May 1, 2026 report date and earlier rows.
For the live jail roster, the Galveston County Sheriff's P2C system is the source. The two work together: TCJS gives the aggregate picture, and the Sheriff's roster gives the current, name-level detail. Anyone citing these numbers should name the report date, because a Galveston County jail population figure from one month is not the same as the next.