There were 938,020 crimes recorded in London in the 2023/24 reporting year, compared with 887,870 in the previous year. During this time period, crime in London increased steadily, with the figure of 912,487 in 2019/20 a previous peak when there were approximately 102.4 crimes per 1,000 people taking place in the UK capital, compared with 105.8 crimes per 1,000 people in the most recent year. What types of crime are rising? Compared with crime levels before the COVID-19 pandemic, some types of crime have yet to reach the same levels they were at in the 2019/20 reporting year. The number of criminal offences related to theft and drugs, are slightly down in 2023/24 when compared with pre-pandemic trends. On the other hand, the number of violent crimes reached a peak of 252,545 offences in 2023/24, while the number of sexual offences in London since 2021/22 has been far higher than in previous years. London compared to the rest of UK While the UK capital receives extensive coverage for its crime problems, the increase in crime there is part of a wider trend afflicting the rest of the country. The overall crime rate for England and Wales in 2023/24 was 89.7 crimes per 1,000 people, slightly lower than in 2022/23, when the crime rate was the highest since 2006/07. Additionally the Metropolitan Police, the police service responsible for policing Greater London had the sixth-highest crime rate among police force areas with Cleveland police force in North East England having the highest.

The crime rate in London was 105.8 crime offences per thousand people for the 2023/24 reporting year, compared with 100.9 in the previous year. Between 2015/16 and 2019/20 the crime rate in the UK capital increased in every reporting year, with the sudden drop seen in 2019/20 due to the COVID-19 pandemic causing a sharp reduction in certain types of crime such as robbery and theft. Police record over 938,00 crimes in 2023/24 The number of crimes reported by the police in London was 938,020 in 2023/24, compared with 887,870 in the previous reporting year. Although there was a slight dip in overall recorded crime in the aftermath of the pandemic, this was not the case for violent crimes which have risen consistently. One positive is that the number of homicide offences in 2023/24 has remained beneath the 159 reported in 2017/18. Additionally, the Metropolitan Police force area has a lower crime rate than many of the UK's other major police forces, such as West Yorkshire, Greater Manchester, and Merseyside. Police recruitment drive ends era of cuts   The rise in crime in London happened alongside a decline in both personnel and funding for the London Metropolitan Police. Compared with 2010 for example, there were around 3,000 fewer police officers in 2018, while annual funding was reduced to around 3.3 billion pounds between 2013/14 and 2018/19, compared with 3.62 billion in 2012/13. These cuts were due to the policy of austerity that was implemented by the UK government during that time period, but this has recently been replaced by pledges to increase spending and to recruit more police. In 2023/24, the budget for the Metropolitan Police was 4.53 billion pounds, while the number of officers in 2023 increased to around 34,900.

U.K. crime rate per 100K population for 2020 was 1.00, a 12.74% decline from 2019.

<ul style='margin-top:20px;'>

<li>U.K. crime rate per 100K population for 2019 was <strong>1.15</strong>, a <strong>1.2% increase</strong> from 2018.</li>
<li>U.K. crime rate per 100K population for 2018 was <strong>1.14</strong>, a <strong>7.19% decline</strong> from 2017.</li>
<li>U.K. crime rate per 100K population for 2017 was <strong>1.22</strong>, a <strong>1.9% increase</strong> from 2016.</li>
</ul>Intentional homicides are estimates of unlawful homicides purposely inflicted as a result of domestic disputes, interpersonal violence, violent conflicts over land resources, intergang violence over turf or control, and predatory violence and killing by armed groups. Intentional homicide does not include all intentional killing; the difference is usually in the organization of the killing. Individuals or small groups usually commit homicide, whereas killing in armed conflict is usually committed by fairly cohesive groups of up to several hundred members and is thus usually excluded.

There were 116 homicides recorded by the police in London in the 2023/24 reporting year, compared with 112 in 2022/23. During this provided time period, 2017/18 had the most homicides in London at 159, with the fewest occurring in 2016/17, when there were 107. Comparisons with the rest of the UK With a homicide rate of 13.1 per million people, London had the highest homicide rate among UK regions in 2023/24. On a more localized level, the Metropolitan Police of Greater London reported a lower homicide rate than other police force areas that cover major cities, such as the West Midlands Police Force, while the highest homicide rate among UK police forces was in Cleveland, in North East England. Across England and Wales as a whole, the number of homicides in 2023/24 was 583, compared with 581 in the previous year. Knives the most common weapon used In 2022/23 there were 244 homicides in England and Wales involving a knife or other sharp instrument. As a comparison, there were just 29 homicides caused by a firearm in the same reporting year. While guns are generally difficult to obtain in the United Kingdom, knives are far more prevalent and have become a major problem for the police, particularly in London. The number of knife crime offences in London rose from 9,752 in 2015/16 to over 15,928 by 2019/20, before falling back recently, to 12,786 in 2022/23. Although 2023/24 saw a return to near pre-pandemic levels, with 15,016 offences.

With a crime rate of 132.4 per 1,000 people Cleveland, in North East England, had the highest crime rate of all the police force areas in England and Wales in 2023/24. High crime rates are evident in other areas of northern England, such as West Yorkshire and Greater Manchester at 121.7 and 117.7 respectively. In the English capital, London, the crime rate was 105.1 per 1,000 people. The lowest crime rate in England was in the relatively rural areas of Wiltshire in South West England, as well as North Yorkshire. Overall crime on the in England and Wales The number of crimes in England and Wales reached approximately 6.74 million in 2022/23, falling slightly to 6.66 million in 2023/24. Overall crime has been rising steadily across England and Wales for almost a decade, even when adjusted for population rises. In 2022/23, for example, the crime rate in England and Wales was 93.6, the highest since 2006/07. When compared with the rest of the United Kingdom, England and Wales is something of an outlier, as crime rates for Scotland and Northern Ireland have not followed the same trajectory of rising crime. Additionally, there has been a sharp increase in violent crimes and sexual offences since the mid-2010s in England and Wales. While theft offences have generally been falling, the number of shoplifting offences reached a peak of 440,000 in 2023/24. Troubled justice system under pressure Alongside rising crime figures, many indicators also signal that the justice system is getting pushed to breaking point. The percentage of crimes that are solved in England and Wales was just 5.7 percent in 2023, with sexual offences having a clearance rate of just 3.6 percent. Crimes are also taking far longer than usual to pass through the justice system. In 2023, it took an average of 676 days for a crown court case to reach a conclusion from the time of the offence. This is most likely related to the large backlog of cases in crown courts, which reached over 62,200 in 2023. Furthermore, prisons in England and Wales are dangerously overcrowded, with just 1,458 spare prison places available as of June 2024.

Police recorded crime figures by Police Force Area and Community Safety Partnership areas (which equate in the majority of instances, to local authorities).

There were 252,545 violent crime offences recorded by the Metropolitan Police and City of London Police Forces in London in 2023/24 an increase when compared with the previous reporting year. From a low of 186,488 violent crimes in 2015/16, violent crime has increased in almost every year. This reflects a pattern of increasing violent crime replicated across England and Wales as a whole, with a peak of 2.1 million offences reported in 2022/23. Overall offences also rising The overall crime figures for London also show a trend of increasing crime in the UK capital. In 2015/16 for example, there were 743,728 crimes recorded in London, compared to 938,020 in 2023/24. This follows a similar pattern seen in the rest of the United Kingdom, which has witnessed an uptick in crime after reaching historic lows in the mid-2010s. In 2013/14 for example, there were approximately 62 crimes per 100,000 people in England and Wales, compared with 89.7 in 2023/24. Police budgets rising again Due to the austerity policies enacted by UK governments in the 2010s, the amount the UK government spent on the police was effectively frozen between 2013/14 and 2016/17. This policy has since been reversed, with the overall UK police budget reaching 25.3 billion pounds in 2022/23. The amount budgeted for the Metropolitan Police by the Mayor of London for 2023/24 was 4.53 billion British pounds, a significant increase on the 3.33 billion budgeted in 2018/19.

The number of knife or sharp instrument offences recorded by the police in London rose to approximately 15,016 in 2023/24, compared with 12,786 in the previous year. This was the highest number of knife crime offences reported in London since 2019/20, when there were 15,928 offences. Between 2015/16 and 2019/20, knife crime in London increased yearly, with a particularly large increase occurring between 2016/16 and 2017/18. A wider trend The increase in knife crime witnessed in London has occurred alongside a general increase in overall crime throughout England and Wales. In 2022/23, there were approximately 6.74 million crime offences across England and Wales, compared with just over four million ten years earlier. During a similar time period, the number of knife homicides also increased, and reached 282 in 2021/22, compared with 186 in 2014/15. Due to strict gun laws in the United Kingdom, firearms are rarely used to commit homicides, with knives or other sharp instruments being used in over 41.4 percent of homicides in 2022/23. Acid and moped attacks While knife crime in London has certainly been given a lot of attention by the British media, the increase in acid and moped attacks during the same time period also generated many headlines. In 2017, for example, there were 471 acid attacks recorded by the Metropolitan Police, compared with just 51 in 2007. Moped crime also reached high levels in 2017, with both types of crime declining to much lower levels by the early 2020s. Although overall crime in London continued to rise until 2019/20, this fell back during the COVID-19 pandemic, but by 2023/24, the number of crimes committed in the capital had exceeded pre-pandemic levels.

Number and rate (per 100,000 population) of homicide victims, Canada and Census Metropolitan Areas, 1981 to 2023.

Part of Release: Official Sub-Ward, Ward and Borough level crime counts. This is the most accurate data available for counting numbers of crimes in London according to official recorded crime types, by the month the offence occurred, and by either borough, ward or sub ward location. The page contains the LSOA level file (Pre-2015 data in the 'archive' file) Click here for corresponding ward level data: Recorded Crime Summary Data for London: Ward Level Click here for corresponding borough level data: Recorded Crime Summary Data for London: Borough Level ‘Sub-Ward data’ counts the number of crimes in each sub ward area of London (Census Lower Super Output Area or LSOA) per month according to crime type. Use this data if you need to analyse crime data at a sub ward level. Because not all crimes can be matched to a specific LSOA area, you should not use this data set to count crimes by ward or borough. For these purposes use one of the other datasets according to the level of geographic precision you need. The categories of crime counts within them may change from time to time. Below is a list of the crime types you can currently extract (*only at borough or ward level): Minor Category: Major Category Murder: ViolenceAgainstThePerson CommonAssault: ViolenceAgainstThePerson OffensiveWeapon: ViolenceAgainstThePerson Harassment: ViolenceAgainstThePerson Otherviolence: ViolenceAgainstThePerson AssaultWithInjury: ViolenceAgainstThePerson WoundingGBH: ViolenceAgainstThePerson PersonalProperty: Robbery BusinessProperty: Robbery BurglaryInADwelling: Burglary BurglaryInOtherBuildings: Burglary TheftOrTakingOfMotor: TheftAndHandling TheftFromMotor: TheftAndHandling MotorInterferenceAndTampering: TheftAndHandling TheftFromShops: TheftAndHandling TheftOrTakingOfPedalCycles: TheftAndHandling OtherTheftPerson: TheftAndHandling OtherTheft: TheftAndHandling HandlingStolenGoods: TheftAndHandling CriminalDamageToADwelling: CriminalDamage CriminalDamageToOtherBldg: CriminalDamage CriminalDamageToMotor: CriminalDamage OtherCriminalDamage: CriminalDamage DrugTrafficking: Drugs PossessionOfDrugs: Drugs OtherDrugOffences: Drugs GoingEquipped: OtherNotifiableOffences OtherNotifiable: OtherNotifiableOffences (NB. no Sexual Offences data is included at LSOA level for disclosure purposes) Each row of data in the data sets contains: *The number of incidents according to the Month Recorded, the specific crime type, and the Location *The Month Recorded *The broad crime type (Major HO category – eg Robbery) *The specific crime type (Minor HO category – eg Robbery: Personal Property) *The Location (Sub –Ward, Ward or borough depending on the data set selected)

There has been little research on United States homicide rates from a long-term perspective, primarily because there has been no consistent data series on a particular place preceding the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR), which began its first full year in 1931. To fill this research gap, this project created a data series on homicides per capita for New York City that spans two centuries. The goal was to create a site-specific, individual-based data series that could be used to examine major social shifts related to homicide, such as mass immigration, urban growth, war, demographic changes, and changes in laws. Data were also gathered on various other sites, particularly in England, to allow for comparisons on important issues, such as the post-World War II wave of violence. The basic approach to the data collection was to obtain the best possible estimate of annual counts and the most complete information on individual homicides. The annual count data (Parts 1 and 3) were derived from multiple sources, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Uniform Crime Reports and Supplementary Homicide Reports, as well as other official counts from the New York City Police Department and the City Inspector in the early 19th century. The data include a combined count of murder and manslaughter because charge bargaining often blurs this legal distinction. The individual-level data (Part 2) were drawn from coroners' indictments held by the New York City Municipal Archives, and from daily newspapers. Duplication was avoided by keeping a record for each victim. The estimation technique known as "capture-recapture" was used to estimate homicides not listed in either source. Part 1 variables include counts of New York City homicides, arrests, and convictions, as well as the homicide rate, race or ethnicity and gender of victims, type of weapon used, and source of data. Part 2 includes the date of the murder, the age, sex, and race of the offender and victim, and whether the case led to an arrest, trial, conviction, execution, or pardon. Part 3 contains annual homicide counts and rates for various comparison sites including Liverpool, London, Kent, Canada, Baltimore, Los Angeles, Seattle, and San Francisco.

Number of crimes and crime rate by type of public transport, including bus, LU / DLR, London Overground, and London Tramlink. Monthly data released 3 months at a time at end of each quarter.

The BTP is responsible for policing the rail network in London, including the TfL managed London Underground (LU), the Docklands Light Railway (DLR), London Tramlink and the London Overground (LO) services. Crime figures for the LU, DLR, London Tramlink and LO have been provided by the BTP. Crime figures for LU and DLR are reported together as these networks are policed by the same division of the BTP. The BTP only deals with crime relating to the rail and Tramlink network

The MPS is responsible for policing the rest of London’s transport network, including the bus network. The figures reported for the bus network are based on official MPS figures for bus-related crime unless otherwise stated.

There is no distinct category of ’bus crime’ in the MPS crime recording system. Recorded crime data is extracted from the MPS system using a complex query that searches all MPS crime for transport venue codes and those that have the word bus, bus stop, bus station and transport related words somewhere in the electronic case file. For this reason, some crimes that did not occur on the bus network will be included in the figures. This is different from the BTP as all crimes dealt with by the BTP and included on their crime recording system relate directly to the rail network.

The crime volume and rate figures displayed by month are accurate according to the month they were extracted from police and TfL systems and are subject to revision due to late reporting of crimes and adjustment of crime and passenger figures. The full financial year total of figures will differ slightly as they will reflect the most accurate and up to date crime and passenger data available; hence the monthly figures here should not be used to generate full financial year totals. The adjusted financial year figures are published in the annual TfL Crime Statistics Bulletin available here.

Data will be updated on a quarterly basis, showing monthly breakdowns of crime volume and rate of crime per million passenger journeys. The rate of crime per million passenger journeys is calculated by the dividing the volume of crimes by the number of passenger journeys multiplied by one million.

A crime rate per million passenger journeys was unavailable for London Overground prior to April 2011 due to lack of accurate passenger journey information across the entire London Overground network.

In 2023/24, London had the highest homicide rate of any region of the United Kingdom, at 13.1 homicides per million people, followed by the East Midlands at 12.2 homicides per million people.

In 2023/24 there were 116 homicide offences recorded in London, the most of any region of the United Kingdom during that time period. North West England, which includes the large city of Manchester had 71 homicides, and had the second-highest number of homicides. In the same reporting period, the constituent countries of Northern Ireland and Wales reported the fewest homicides, at 24 each. Homicides in the UK falling despite recent uptick Since 2002/03, all three jurisdictions of the UK; England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, have seen their homicide rates fall, with Scotland seeing the steepest decline. The most significant decline in homicides in this period occurred between 2002/03 and 2014/15, which saw the annual number of homicides in England and Wales half from over 1,000 to 500. This trend was suddenly reversed from 2015/16 onwards, with homicides rising to around 700 per year between 2016/17 and 2019/20. While homicides fell back to 583 in 2023/24, it remains to be seen if this pattern will continue. Knives used in almost half of all murders In 2022/23 a knife or other sharp instrument was used in over 41 percent of all murders in England and Wales, making this, by far, the most common method of killing in that reporting year. The overall number of knife homicides reached 244 in 2022/23, compared with 282 in the previous year, and just above the 281 reported in 2017/18. Firearm homicides were much rarer than knife homicides, with 29 taking place in the same reporting year, and homicides caused by shooting only accounting for 4.9 percent of homicides overall.

There were 452,868 theft offences recorded by the Police in London in 2023/24, which was the highest amount of theft offences in the UK capital since 2019/20.

In 2024, Colima in Mexico ranked as the world's most dangerous city with a homicide rate of 140 per 100,000 inhabitants. Seven of the 10 cities with the highest murder rates worldwide are found in Mexico. The list does not include countries where war and conflict exist. Latin America dominates murder statistics Except for Mandela Bay, all the cities on the list are found in Latin America. Latin America also dominate the list of the world's most dangerous countries. Violence in Latin America is caused in great part by drug trafficking, weapons trafficking, and gang wars. Crime in South Africa Mandela Bay in South Africa is the only city outside Latin America among the 10 most dangerous cities worldwide. The country is struggling with extremely high levels of inequality, and is struggling with high levels of crime and power outages, harming the country's economy and driving more people into unemployment and poverty.

In 2023/24 there were 56,263 burglary offences recorded in London, an increase when compared with the previous reporting year. During the provided time period, the reporting year with the most burglary offences recorded was 2018/19, when there were approximately 81,463 burglaries.

This MSOA atlas provides a summary of demographic and related data for each Middle Super Output Area in Greater London. The average population of an MSOA in London in 2010 was 8,346, compared with 1,722 for an LSOA and 13,078 for a ward. The profiles are designed to provide an overview of the population in these small areas by combining a range of data on the population, births, deaths, health, housing, crime, commercial property/floorspace, income, poverty, benefits, land use, environment, deprivation, schools, and employment. If you need to find an MSOA and you know the postcode of the area, the ONS NESS search page has a tool for this. The MSOA Atlas is available as an XLS as well as being presented using InstantAtlas mapping software. This is a useful tool for displaying a large amount of data for numerous geographies, in one place (requires HTML 5). CURRENT MSOA BOUNDARIES (2011) PREVIOUS MSOA BOUNDARIES (2001) NB. It is currently not possible to export the map as a picture due to a software issue with the Google Maps background. We advise you to print screen to copy an image to the clipboard. Tips: - Select a new indicator from the Data box on the left. Select the theme, then indicator and then year to show the data. - To view data just for one borough*, use the filter tool. - The legend settings can be altered by clicking on the pencil icon next to the MSOA tick box within the map legend. - The areas can be ranked in order by clicking at the top of the indicator column of the data table. Themes included here are Census 2011 Population, Mid-year Estimates, Population by Broad Age, Households, Household composition, Ethnic Group, Country of Birth, Language, Religion, Tenure, Dwelling type, Land Area, Population Density, Births, General Fertility Rate, Deaths, Standardised Mortality Ratio (SMR), Population Turnover Rates (per 1000), Crime (numbers), Crime (rates), House Prices, Commercial property (number), Rateable Value (£ per m2), Floorspace; ('000s m2), Household Income, Household Poverty, County Court Judgements (2005), Qualifications, Economic Activity, Employees, Employment, Claimant Count, Pupil Absence, Early Years Foundation Stage, Key Stage 1, GCSE and Equivalent, Health, Air Emissions, Car or Van availability, Income Deprivation, Central Heating, Incidence of Cancer, Life Expectancy, and Road Casualties. The London boroughs are: City of London, Barking and Dagenham, Barnet, Bexley, Brent, Bromley, Camden, Croydon, Ealing, Enfield, Greenwich, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Haringey, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Kingston upon Thames, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Newham, Redbridge, Richmond upon Thames, Southwark, Sutton, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Wandsworth, Westminster. These profiles were created using the most up to date information available at the time of collection (Spring 2014). You may also be interested in LSOA Atlas and Ward Atlas.

This MSOA atlas provides a summary of demographic and related data for each Middle Super Output Area in Greater London. The average population of an MSOA in London in 2010 was 8,346, compared with 1,722 for an LSOA and 13,078 for a ward.

The profiles are designed to provide an overview of the population in these small areas by combining a range of data on the population, births, deaths, health, housing, crime, commercial property/floorspace, income, poverty, benefits, land use, environment, deprivation, schools, and employment.

If you need to find an MSOA and you know the postcode of the area, the ONS NESS search page has a tool for this.

The MSOA Atlas is available as an XLS as well as being presented using InstantAtlas mapping software. This is a useful tool for displaying a large amount of data for numerous geographies, in one place (requires HTML 5).

NB. It is currently not possible to export the map as a picture due to a software issue with the Google Maps background. We advise you to print screen to copy an image to the clipboard.

Tips:

1. - Select a new indicator from the Data box on the left. Select the theme, then indicator and then year to show the data.
2. - To view data just for one borough*, use the filter tool.
3. - The legend settings can be altered by clicking on the pencil icon next to the MSOA tick box within the map legend.
4. - The areas can be ranked in order by clicking at the top of the indicator column of the data table.

Themes included here are Census 2011 Population, Mid-year Estimates, Population by Broad Age, Households, Household composition, Ethnic Group, Country of Birth, Language, Religion, Tenure, Dwelling type, Land Area, Population Density, Births, General Fertility Rate, Deaths, Standardised Mortality Ratio (SMR), Population Turnover Rates (per 1000), Crime (numbers), Crime (rates), House Prices, Commercial property (number), Rateable Value (£ per m2), Floorspace; ('000s m2), Household Income, Household Poverty, County Court Judgements (2005), Qualifications, Economic Activity, Employees, Employment, Claimant Count, Pupil Absence, Early Years Foundation Stage, Key Stage 1, GCSE and Equivalent, Health, Air Emissions, Car or Van availability, Income Deprivation, Central Heating, Incidence of Cancer, Life Expectancy, and Road Casualties.

• The London boroughs are: City of London, Barking and Dagenham, Barnet, Bexley, Brent, Bromley, Camden, Croydon, Ealing, Enfield, Greenwich, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Haringey, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Kingston upon Thames, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Newham, Redbridge, Richmond upon Thames, Southwark, Sutton, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Wandsworth, Westminster.

These profiles were created using the most up to date information available at the time of collection (Spring 2014).

You may also be interested in LSOA Atlas and Ward Atlas.