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Crime rate by city in England and Wales: police recorded offences per 1,000 residents

Crime rate by city in England and Wales from ONS police recorded crime, year ending March 2026: the lowest rates, the largest cities and how to read them.

4 min read
Last reviewed 4 November 2026
By Your Property Check team

Part 1 of 6

How the rate is measured

General information, not advice. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publishes police recorded crime for each Community Safety Partnership area, which mostly matches a local authority. The rate is the number of offences recorded by police, excluding fraud, divided by the resident population and multiplied by 1,000. We use the year ending March 2026 edition, with mid-2024 population estimates rounded to 100 by ONS. For all of England and Wales the rate was 84.7 per 1,000, from 5,235,213 offences and a population of 61,806,700.

We matched 75 of the 94 cities in our city list to an ONS area by name. The rest did not match one authority cleanly (for example Halifax or Torquay) and are left out. Maidstone is also left out because ONS says crime data for five Kent areas have been recorded under an unassigned group since 2024, so its published count of 33 is not a real total. Rates cover the whole local authority, not the city centre.

Part 2 of 6

The ten lowest rates among the 75

Rank	City	Offences per 1,000	Total offences	Force area
1	Woking	62.3	6,585	Surrey
2	St Albans	64.2	9,700	Hertfordshire
3	York	65.7	13,752	North Yorkshire
4	Swindon	69.6	16,965	Wiltshire
5	Chelmsford	70.4	13,293	Essex
5	Warrington	70.4	15,156	Cheshire
7	Guildford	72.1	10,913	Surrey
8	Lancaster	72.9	10,564	Lancashire
9	Telford	73.0	14,301	West Mercia
10	Swansea	74.2	18,647	South Wales

Twenty of the 75 cities are below the England and Wales rate of 84.7. The median among the 75 is 95.1. The highest rates in the same set are in Middlesbrough (150.0), Blackpool (145.8) and Manchester (142.7) (see the limits below before comparing them).

Part 3 of 6

The ten largest cities

City	Population (mid-2024)	Offences per 1,000	Total offences	Force area
Birmingham	1,183,600	114.2	135,120	West Midlands
Leeds	845,200	114.6	96,875	West Yorkshire
Manchester	589,700	142.7	84,130	Greater Manchester
Sheffield	582,500	96.9	56,459	South Yorkshire
Bradford	563,600	117.0	65,941	West Yorkshire
Liverpool	509,000	124.1	63,156	Merseyside
Bristol	494,400	131.0	64,759	Avon and Somerset
Leicester	388,300	110.0	42,724	Leicestershire
Cardiff	383,900	93.8	36,006	South Wales
Coventry	369,000	88.4	32,606	West Midlands

Larger cities tend to have higher rates here, but the table shows exceptions: Sheffield, Cardiff and Coventry sit near or below the median of 95.1.

Part 4 of 6

Reading the two tables together

The first table is about small and mid-sized places, mostly in the south and east of England, and the lowest rate there is 62.3. The second table is the biggest cities, where rates run from 88.4 in Coventry to 142.7 in Manchester. A rate is a count divided by a population, so a rise in visitors can raise it without any change for residents. The totals also matter in a different way: Birmingham's 135,120 recorded offences are spread across 1,183,600 residents. No single figure says how any street feels to live on, and none of these numbers should be read as a ranking of safety.

Part 5 of 6

Why crime figures do not compare fairly

ONS gives its own warning. It says caution is needed with the crime rates of city centre areas because of their very small resident populations, and that the transient population that moves in each day for work or leisure is not reflected in the resident count. A busy city centre therefore shows a higher rate than the number of local victims would suggest.

Other limits apply:

Only recorded crime. The figures are crimes the police recorded. They exclude fraud, which ONS says is recorded by Action Fraud and left out of local breakdowns.
Recording changes. ONS notes that police forces have changed how they record some offences and that data before April 2019 is not directly comparable with later years.
A whole authority, not a street. A low rate for an authority can hide a street with many offences and the reverse.
A newer edition exists. ONS had published a year ending June 2026 edition on 22 October 2026. We use March 2026 for consistency with our city pages.

Part 6 of 6

Using this when you buy or sell

Do not read a rate as a verdict on a place. Use it as a starting point, then check the street itself. Our crime rate by postcode tool shows recent local reports, and the area guides put the numbers beside prices. Include crime in your checks alongside the ones in our guide to what to check before buying a house.

This page is general information, not advice.

Our take

A city rate is not a verdict on your street

Our view: ONS rates are a good starting point and a poor verdict. Woking has the lowest rate among the 75 cities at 62.3 offences per 1,000 (year ending March 2026), but ONS warns that city centre rates are affected by people who visit and do not live there. The common mistake is reading a whole-authority rate as a statement about one street.

Our crime rate by postcode tool shows recent local reports for a postcode. Before you offer on a home, OfferCheck is a plain-English risk report on any UK address: crime, flood, planning, tenure and more, every figure sourced.

Check sold prices

Our opinion, drawn from the facts on this page: not advice and not a forecast. We earn from OfferCheck reports and from introducing sellers to cash buyers, so weigh it with that in mind (see our disclosure). We are not authorised or regulated by the FCA.

Questions, answered

Frequently asked questions

Which English city has the lowest crime rate?

Among the 75 cities we could match, Woking has the lowest police recorded rate at 62.3 offences per 1,000 residents in the year ending March 2026. This says nothing about a particular street.

How is crime rate measured?

ONS divides police recorded offences, excluding fraud, by the area's resident population and multiplies by 1,000. Population figures are mid-2024 estimates rounded to 100.

Are big cities worse for crime?

Rates are often higher in the largest cities in our table, but not always. Sheffield (96.9), Cardiff (93.8) and Coventry (88.4) are close to the median of 95.1 among the 75 cities.

Do crime figures compare fairly between areas?

Only roughly. ONS warns that city-centre rates are inflated because visitors and commuters are not in the resident population. Recording practice also differs between forces.

What is the England and Wales average?

84.7 offences per 1,000 residents for the year ending March 2026, excluding fraud, from 5,235,213 recorded offences.

Where this comes from

Sources

Last reviewed 4 November 2026 by the Your Property Check team. This page is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. For your own situation, speak to a conveyancing solicitor or another qualified professional.