We all want the finer things in life. Love, comfort and safety are at the top of everyone's list.
For a lot of people who live in America, safety isn't a problem, but we don't all get to live in the safest cities -- unless of course you live in Cary.
The purpose of this post is to determine where the safest cities to live are in America. Those places where crime is usually something you hear about on Facebook, but not from your neighbor.
After analyzing 277 cities in America with a population of more than 100,000, we came up with this list of the safest cities in America for 2021:
Read on below to see how we crunched the numbers and how your city ranked. We have a long infographic to show you individual crime data for each of the safest cities.
If that's not up your alley, for more reading on safe places to live, check out:
Population: 172,525.0
Rank Last Year: 2 (Up 1)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 66 (2nd safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 904 (3rd safest)
More on Cary: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Cary, North Carolina? Now, since I live so close, I figured I might as well investigate and see what's going on and why Cary is so safe.
Cary is quite a gem. And so safe. You have only a 1 in 1,500 chance of being the victim of a major crime when you live here. There's been 8 murders here since 2002, which is very low for a city that's nearly 200,000 in population. You have only a 1 in 93 chance of being robbed here. For comparison, in Memphis, Tennessee, America's most dangerous city, you have a 1 in 30 chance of being robbed every year. That's three times higher.
You hardly ever see a Cary police car driving around. We spotted two sitting in a vacant lot for some reason.
As you drive through Cary, it seems safe enough. The supermarket looks safe. The laundromat feels safe. So does the pottery place. The African and Caribbean Market? Safe. Walmart feels safe. Even the Park N Shop looks safe. The mall is...empty. People in Cary must be Prime members or something.
The thing about Cary that is annoying is the people here are pretty rude, snobby and self entitled. They're mostly wealthy, and come from the northeast - places like New York, Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Draw your own conclusions.
Statistically, the number of crimes that happen in this Raleigh suburb is off the charts low. Like, nothing ever happens here but peace and quiet low. Is it boring? Perhaps. But can you leave your door unlocked at night? You betcha.
Population: 127,811.0
Rank Last Year: 6 (Up 4)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 68 (4th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,089 (11th safest)
More on Thousand Oaks: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Thousand Oaks certainly has a reason to feel safe. We could make a thousand jokes about how safe Thousand Oaks is. But I will say for perspective, in nearby Los Angeles, you'd have a 1 in 131 chance of being the victim of a bad crime. Here in Thousand Oaks, your chances would be faaaar less - closer to 1 in 750.
Plus, if you lived in LA, you'd probably have bad guys for your neighbors.
Crime has been steadily falling in Thousand Oaks for the past few years, too, which puts it towards the bottom when it comes to the number of crimes that take place here. This is certainly the type of place where you can sleep well at night. However, we have to talk about what happened here in 2018 when a man went into the Borderline Bar and Grill and wiped out 12 patrons. That was in Thousand Oaks. If it wasn't for that, Thousand Oaks would be in the top 3 on our list. It was considered a truly random crime.
Population: 105,961.0
Rank Last Year: 10 (Up 7)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 83 (6th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,089 (10th safest)
More on Allen: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Welcome to Allen, Texas, the 3rd safest city in America. So peaceful/ Allen is another Dallas suburb. It's basically right next door to Frisco. Here, you have a 1 in 1,200 chance of being the victim of some sort of crime. When someone gets rubbed out here, it's like a huge deal. There's only been five people wiped out here since 2002.
In Allen, neighbors support their local sports teams. People pitch in to help one another. And you can bet that residents in Allen are proud of their accomplishments. You and I have to worry about all sorts of stuff people in Allen don't. You know, like having our car stolen when we're at the club. Or, getting beat up because we talked to the wrong girl.
Seems like Allen is just the opposite of that lifestyle. If you live there, consider yourself lucky!
Population: 292,673.0
Rank Last Year: 3 (Down 2)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 64 (1st safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,306 (18th safest)
More on Irvine: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
If you want to see a real safe and sound place, head on over to Irvine, California. Statistically, there's hardly any incidents of crime happening in this nook of the state. Good for them! It's likely a group effort keeping this place so safe.
Irvine actually ranks as the tenth safest city in the WORLD in a study done by the Daily Mail.
This goes to show that just because people are packed on top of one another, it doesn't mean they have to act uncivilized.
In Irvine, you'd have a 1 in 1,400 chance of being a victim of a really bad crime, and a 1 in 87 chance of being the victim of a property crime. That's crazy low. It's probably the high home prices keeping bozos like this out of the place.
Irvine is in Orange County, but it's nothing like nearby Anaheim, where you definitely have to watch your back when out for a stroll.
Irvine is the third California city to make this list. Is the legal weed chilling people out? After all, it would be hard to commit a crime if you were stoned all day.
If you live in Irvine, when you come home from work here, it's likely the pets aren't trying to hurt themselves either.
Kudos to the Irvine police for cracking down on crime as soon as it rears its ugly head
Population: 199,445.0
Rank Last Year: 8 (Up 3)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 80 (5th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,198 (14th safest)
More on Frisco: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Welcome to Frisco, Texas. Now if you talk to Frisco residents, they'll probably tell you they should be atop this list. If you walked around here, there's no way you'd see neighborhood bullies running around. And there's practically no chance you'd get robbed by this idiot walking around at night, that's for sure.
You only have a 1 in 1,000 chance of being the victim of a terrible crime here. That's low.
Frisco is a posh, Dallas/Fort Worth suburb. Like League City, it's growing really fast - in fact it's just about the fastest growing city in the US. And somehow, despite the fact people are flocking here in droves, people have managed to remain civilized. Hmm. Imagine that, here in America. Average home prices here are about a half million. Likely, the criminals and creeps can't afford to live here, so they stay away. Are we seeing a pattern here? Fancy rich suburbs are safe? Who'd have thunk it?
Former Miss USA Courtney Gibbs is from Frisco.
Population: 126,025.0
Rank Last Year: 21 (Up 16)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 115 (14th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 942 (5th safest)
More on Simi Valley: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Everyone is trying to get in on the quality of life in Simi Valley, the 6th safest city in America.
The town of some 126,000 people will have to try and continue to keep Simi Valley a secret, lest crime starts going up simply because of people breaking down the doors to get into town.
See what we did there Simi Valley?
Population: 116,413.0
Rank Last Year: 5 (Down 2)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 66 (3rd safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,298 (17th safest)
More on Murrieta: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Next on our list of safest places to live in America brings us to the ostentatious community of Murrieta, California. Whatever ostentatious means. It sounded like the right word.
Murrieta undoubtedly has a very bored police department. If you spent a year in Murrieta, you'd have only a 1 in 250 chance you'd be the victim of even a basic property crime. In fact, most years, there's only a handful of violent crimes reported within city limits.
Murrieta calls itself the future of California. That's quite a stretch - I grew up near here, but I will say if driving two hours to work each way each day is the future of living in California, than maybe their motto is spot on. But, Murrieta's the type of place that If you need a ride to work one day, someone will give you a lift. Heck, if your dog shows up missing, it's probably just at the neighbor's house.
Next time you see a Murrieta police officer, thank em!
Population: 133,377.0
Rank Last Year: 18 (Up 10)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 125 (19th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 854 (2nd safest)
More on Sterling Heights: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
The eighth safest city in America for 2019 goes to Sterling Heights. Let's see why.
There were only 167 violent crimes here last year -- which is basically 0 for the average citizen. And there were only 1,140 property crimes to boot.
Population: 253,619.0
Rank Last Year: 7 (Down 2)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 96 (8th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,202 (15th safest)
More on Gilbert: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
Welcome to Gilbert, Arizona, the 9th safest place you can live in America. Sure, there are far fewer people jam packed in Gilbert than in nearby Phoenix, so you might expect more of a sleepy place.
But look at New Mexico. There's hardly anyone in that state, and it's one of the most dangerous places in the whole country.
In Gilbert, you'd have a 1 in 1,200 chance of being a victim of a major crime. That's the 4th lowest number in the US. This smallish city has also seen its crime numbers go down over the last few years, which is a good thing. There's hardly any thefts, robberies, break-ins or other random crimes lately. The only thing you'd have to worry about is someone breaking down your door to move in with you - Gilbert's population is exploding.
Back in 1980, Gilbert had 5,000 people. Now? Two hundred and fifty five thousand.
But man, how hot is it here? Who wants to put on a mask and rob someone when it's like 100 million outside. Not us. Nuh uh.
Population: 218,103.0
Rank Last Year: 12 (Up 2)
Violent Crimes Per 100k: 127 (20th safest)
Property Crimes Per 100k: 944 (6th safest)
More on Santa Clarita: Real Estate | Crime Report | Cost Of Living
And just making it into the top ten for 2021 is Santa Clarita.
But we know they don't take this spot for granted -- Santa Clarita residents can attest that their home town deserves to be the on list.
In total, there were 277 violent crimes and 2,059 property crimes in Santa Clarita; that's really good for a place of 218,000 people and definitely something to be happy about looking forward into 2019.
For example, there were a total of 1674 crimes committed in Cary which had a reported population of 172,525. That means the number of crimes per capita is 0.0097 which translates into a 1 in 103 chance of being the victim of a crime.
We only looked at cities that have populations of more than 100,000 people reported to the FBI in 2019. This left us with a total of 277 of the biggest cities in America to rank.
We ranked each city for each criteria from 1 to 277 where 1 in any particular category is the safest.
Next, we averaged each places two criteria to create a Safety Index. We crowned the place with the lowest overall Safety Score "The Safest Place In America".
The safest city, based on our criteria, is Cary. The most dangerous city in America? St. Louis, where residents had a 1 in 12 chance of being the victim of a crime.
Note: This report is not an analysis of the effectiveness of local police departments, nor does it reflect the fact that people from out of town may come into a community and cause a crime. It simply looks at where crimes occurred most frequently, based on a city's population.
Looking at the data, you can tell that Cary is as safe as they come, according to science and data.
But as most people would agree, almost every place here has its safe and not safe parts. So just make sure you're informed ahead of time.
Here's a look at the most dangerous cities in America according to the data:
Rank | City | Population | Violent Crimes Per 100k | Property Crimes Per 100k | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Cary, NC | 172,525.0 | 66 | 904 | |||||
2 | Thousand Oaks, CA | 127,811.0 | 68 | 1,089 | |||||
3 | Allen, TX | 105,961.0 | 83 | 1,089 | |||||
4 | Irvine, CA | 292,673.0 | 64 | 1,306 | |||||
5 | Frisco, TX | 199,445.0 | 80 | 1,198 | |||||
6 | Simi Valley, CA | 126,025.0 | 115 | 942 | |||||
7 | Murrieta, CA | 116,413.0 | 66 | 1,298 | |||||
8 | Sterling Heights, MI | 133,377.0 | 125 | 854 | |||||
9 | Gilbert, AZ | 253,619.0 | 96 | 1,202 | |||||
10 | Santa Clarita, CA | 218,103.0 | 127 | 944 | |||||
11 | Cape Coral, FL | 194,183.0 | 116 | 1,120 | |||||
12 | Port St. Lucie, FL | 199,433.0 | 146 | 850 | |||||
13 | League City, TX | 109,401.0 | 110 | 1,359 | |||||
14 | Mckinney, TX | 200,615.0 | 143 | 993 | |||||
15 | Surprise, AZ | 140,962.0 | 97 | 1,477 | |||||
16 | Meridian, ID | 111,196.0 | 159 | 1,068 | |||||
17 | Provo, UT | 117,189.0 | 115 | 1,507 | |||||
18 | Pearland, TX | 126,206.0 | 89 | 1,640 | |||||
19 | Glendale, CA | 202,601.0 | 114 | 1,631 | |||||
20 | Orange, CA | 139,830.0 | 128 | 1,561 | |||||
21 | Elgin, IL | 112,112.0 | 198 | 1,274 | |||||
22 | Olathe, KS | 141,371.0 | 205 | 1,134 | |||||
23 | Round Rock, TX | 132,747.0 | 124 | 1,683 | |||||
24 | Stamford, CT | 130,678.0 | 202 | 1,379 | |||||
25 | Alexandria, VA | 162,258.0 | 177 | 1,551 | |||||
26 | Miramar, FL | 143,334.0 | 216 | 1,358 | |||||
27 | Plano, TX | 291,611.0 | 147 | 1,683 | |||||
28 | Coral Springs, FL | 134,967.0 | 144 | 1,710 | |||||
29 | Broken Arrow, OK | 110,480.0 | 124 | 1,789 | |||||
30 | Virginia Beach, VA | 449,038.0 | 129 | 1,760 | |||||
31 | Sandy Springs, GA | 110,760.0 | 129 | 1,780 | |||||
32 | Elk Grove, CA | 175,492.0 | 211 | 1,480 | |||||
33 | Aurora, IL | 199,784.0 | 258 | 1,008 | |||||
34 | Richardson, TX | 123,893.0 | 143 | 1,839 | |||||
35 | Henderson, NV | 317,732.0 | 170 | 1,748 | |||||
36 | College Station, TX | 119,246.0 | 188 | 1,759 | |||||
37 | Fremont, CA | 240,887.0 | 166 | 1,877 | |||||
38 | Bend, OR | 100,588.0 | 153 | 1,907 | |||||
39 | Daly City, CA | 107,748.0 | 215 | 1,733 | |||||
40 | Scottsdale, AZ | 260,464.0 | 159 | 1,957 | |||||
41 | Carlsbad, CA | 117,220.0 | 204 | 1,821 | |||||
42 | El Monte, CA | 115,830.0 | 262 | 1,542 | |||||
43 | Yonkers, NY | 200,075.0 | 353 | 912 | |||||
44 | Pembroke Pines, FL | 174,641.0 | 203 | 1,914 | |||||
45 | Ann Arbor, MI | 122,893.0 | 251 | 1,728 | |||||
46 | Rochester, MN | 118,267.0 | 214 | 1,881 | |||||
47 | Torrance, CA | 145,183.0 | 192 | 1,965 | |||||
48 | Corona, CA | 170,875.0 | 170 | 2,037 | |||||
49 | Chula Vista, CA | 275,230.0 | 328 | 1,386 | |||||
50 | Cambridge, MA | 119,908.0 | 278 | 1,653 | |||||
51 | Peoria, AZ | 174,571.0 | 233 | 1,874 | |||||
52 | Raleigh, NC | 477,828.0 | 255 | 1,783 | |||||
53 | Fontana, CA | 215,883.0 | 342 | 1,433 | |||||
54 | Temecula, CA | 116,630.0 | 142 | 2,251 | |||||
55 | Vista, CA | 102,227.0 | 346 | 1,406 | |||||
56 | Kenosha, WI | 100,255.0 | 310 | 1,577 | |||||
57 | Huntington Beach, CA | 201,843.0 | 191 | 2,053 | |||||
58 | Denton, TX | 141,492.0 | 233 | 1,883 | |||||
59 | Clovis, CA | 114,170.0 | 212 | 1,993 | |||||
60 | Hialeah, FL | 240,688.0 | 208 | 2,032 | |||||
61 | Sunnyvale, CA | 154,859.0 | 167 | 2,182 | |||||
62 | Mcallen, TX | 144,915.0 | 96 | 2,480 | |||||
63 | Beaverton, OR | 100,130.0 | 216 | 1,985 | |||||
64 | Lewisville, TX | 108,000.0 | 221 | 1,967 | |||||
65 | Boca Raton, FL | 101,163.0 | 183 | 2,157 | |||||
66 | Hillsboro, OR | 110,549.0 | 247 | 1,957 | |||||
67 | El Paso, TX | 686,793.0 | 352 | 1,511 | |||||
68 | Roseville, CA | 141,744.0 | 182 | 2,225 | |||||
69 | Escondido, CA | 153,215.0 | 349 | 1,548 | |||||
70 | Lowell, MA | 111,423.0 | 363 | 1,482 | |||||
71 | Chandler, AZ | 259,881.0 | 228 | 2,070 | |||||
72 | Grand Prairie, TX | 196,971.0 | 217 | 2,101 | |||||
73 | Laredo, TX | 264,916.0 | 315 | 1,771 | |||||
74 | Palm Bay, FL | 115,520.0 | 342 | 1,714 | |||||
75 | Rancho Cucamonga, CA | 179,247.0 | 278 | 1,928 | |||||
76 | Fort Collins, CO | 170,889.0 | 217 | 2,172 | |||||
77 | San Mateo, CA | 106,020.0 | 250 | 2,091 | |||||
78 | West Jordan, UT | 117,644.0 | 224 | 2,171 | |||||
79 | Palmdale, CA | 157,138.0 | 418 | 1,419 | |||||
80 | Bellevue, WA | 150,200.0 | 123 | 2,838 | |||||
81 | Norwalk, CA | 105,067.0 | 411 | 1,495 | |||||
82 | West Covina, CA | 106,335.0 | 244 | 2,227 | |||||
83 | Burbank, CA | 103,738.0 | 182 | 2,522 | |||||
84 | Tampa, FL | 400,501.0 | 404 | 1,628 | |||||
85 | Fullerton, CA | 140,194.0 | 266 | 2,251 | |||||
86 | San Diego, CA | 1,441,737.0 | 361 | 1,882 | |||||
87 | Oxnard, CA | 211,349.0 | 342 | 2,007 | |||||
88 | Mesa, AZ | 518,160.0 | 376 | 1,868 | |||||
89 | Joliet, IL | 148,155.0 | 506 | 1,457 | |||||
90 | Irving, TX | 245,423.0 | 251 | 2,437 | |||||
91 | Santa Rosa, CA | 177,884.0 | 481 | 1,615 | |||||
92 | Jurupa Valley, CA | 110,111.0 | 287 | 2,264 | |||||
93 | Garden Grove, CA | 172,832.0 | 292 | 2,261 | |||||
94 | Downey, CA | 112,330.0 | 313 | 2,201 | |||||
95 | New York, NY | 8,379,043.0 | 570 | 1,459 | |||||
96 | Davie, FL | 108,486.0 | 254 | 2,577 | |||||
97 | Green Bay, WI | 104,992.0 | 503 | 1,642 | |||||
98 | Anaheim, CA | 353,915.0 | 316 | 2,333 | |||||
99 | Norman, OK | 125,076.0 | 267 | 2,612 | |||||
100 | Warren, MI | 134,653.0 | 481 | 1,830 | |||||
HomeSnacks is based in Durham, NC.
We aim to deliver bite-sized pieces of infotainment about where you live.
We use data, analytics, and a sense of humor to determine quality of life for places across the nation.