Metro’s rail system has grown substantially from a daily ridership of 103,000 in 1977 to 723,000 in 2007. In recent years, however, Metro has had ups and downs, with several safety incidents and lack of regular maintenance on an aging system causing a significant downturn in ridership. This is despite the Silver Line expansion in 2014. Much of the drop can be attributed to the year-long maintenance initiative SafeTrack in 2016–17.

The addition of the new 7000-series cars, which have fewer maintenance issues, and removal of older-series cars, as well as continued system repairs in the past year bode well. It remains to be seen whether this will improve performance enough to coax riders back riding Metro.

The graph below shows the average weekly passenger boardings for each year, broken down by metrorail station.