Crime rates are considered the best way to determine whether a city is safe, but there has been a recent movement to expand the definition of safe.
Ranking of the safest and most dangerous cities to live in
See the latest rankings of America’s safest and most dangerous cities based on crime, natural disasters, and economic factors.
Mayor Frank Picozzi wasn’t surprised when he learned that Warwick, Rhode Island, topped the list of America’s safest cities.
This charming coastal city has taken advantage of federal funds distributed during the coronavirus pandemic to expand its fleet of fire trucks and police vehicles. This is part of a long-standing effort to improve public safety, which Picozzi believes has contributed to the city’s rise in rankings.
“There used to be areas in the city that were like rocky neighborhoods, but with constant police activity and economic development, that’s no longer the case,” Picozzi said. “People are proud of this city.”
The analysis WalletHub published in October doesn’t just take into account crime data, which is flawed and difficult to compare across cities. It also assesses how safe residents are from natural disasters such as tornadoes, wildfires, and hurricanes. Economic security is also measured by factors such as the unemployment rate and the percentage of people living in poverty without health insurance.
“Too many people don’t take this into account when evaluating security,” says Chip Lupo, writer and analyst at WalletHub.
But trying to determine where Americans are safest is not an exact science. As efforts are made to find new ways to measure public safety, some experts warn that assessing public safety and personal safety may require more nuance.
What are the top 10 safest cities?
According to WalletHub, the top 10 safest cities in the United States are:
- Warwick, Rhode Island
- Overland Park, Kansas
- Burlington, Vermont
- Juneau, Alaska
- Yonkers, New York
- Casper, Wyoming
- South Burlington, Vermont
- Columbia, Maryland
- Lewiston, Maine
- Salem, Oregon
What are the top 10 most dangerous cities?
According to WalletHub, the top 10 most dangerous cities in the country (or least safe of the 182 cities ranked) are:
- new orleans
- memphis tennessee
- Baton Rouge, Louisiana
- detroit
- baltimore
- Fort Lauderdale, Florida
- houston
- San Bernardino, California
- philadelphia
- cleveland
How did WalletHub go about finding America’s safest cities?
Lupo said WalletHub evaluated the 150 most populous cities in the country and at least two of the most populous cities in each state based on 41 weighted metrics related to safety. Each city was given a score out of 100. Factors related to home and community safety were given the highest weight, including crime, traffic fatalities, number of law enforcement personnel, and perceptions of safety.
While most cities in the top 10 rank highly in all three categories, some remain at high risk of extreme weather and financial distress. For example, Overland Park, Kansas, and Yonkers, New York ranked 118th in natural disaster risk and financial security, respectively.
Comparing crime data can be difficult
Crime rates are often used as the main way to accurately determine where Americans are safest, but that data is “very incomplete,” said Adam Gelb, president and CEO of the Council on Criminal Justice.
Comparing cities by city doesn’t explain the fact that some areas have much more crime than others. Gelb also said pitting cities with vastly different populations against each other can be somewhat unfair, noting that the FBI even warns against using crime data to compare jurisdictions.
For example, Memphis is often reprimanded for having the worst crime rate in the country, but that title was actually held by Lakeside, Colorado in 2024, according to data submitted to the FBI.
However, Lakeside’s estimated population is only 16 people. Among the 40 most populous cities in the country, Memphis had the highest overall crime rate.
New factors, changing views on public safety
Many in the criminal justice community try to define public safety by the presence of health and well-being indicators, not just the absence of crime, Gelb said.
On December 18, advocacy group Campaign Zero launched an interactive platform that compares data on “housing affordability, access to health care, economic security, access to education, heart disease, and crime” in 11 major cities, with the aim of redefining public safety and how it is measured.
Local leaders, including the city of St. Paul, Minnesota, are launching similar efforts. The researchers interviewed young people and developed “safety indicators, such as playing outside and riding the train, and corresponding indicators that St. Paul can use to measure each indicator, such as the number of young people using public spaces.” (St. Paul ranks 47th on WalletHub’s list of safest cities.)
Researchers at the University of California conducted a similar project, asking residents of Oakland, which is ranked 169th on WalletHub, how they know if their neighborhood is safe, and created about 600 “direct indicators” of neighborhood safety.
Which city is the safest? It depends on who you ask.
Depending on what safety indicators are considered when comparing regions, dramatically different results can occur.
Ranked 84th by WalletHub, San Jose, California was found to be the safest city in the country in a recent study by SmartAsset. The company ranked the 50 most populous cities based on variables such as violent crime rate, property crime rate, and vehicle fatality rate.
Meanwhile, U.S. News & World Report found that Johns Creek, Georgia, is the safest place to live, based on homicide and property crime rates per 100,000 people reported to the FBI.
At the other end of the spectrum, Memphis is considered the most dangerous city in the country in all three rankings, with the National Guard deployed to curb crime.
Chris Knoller, police chief in Pueblo, Colorado, pointed out that his city is listed among the 10 most dangerous by U.S. News & World Report but is not included in a similar list compiled by Newsweek. Both are based on FBI data.
While Knoller said he may not be “satisfied” with the crime situation in Pueblo, he told the Pueblo Chieftain, part of the USA TODAY Network, that the department has done a “tremendous job” in reducing crime.
“I can name about 30 cities that no one would want to be in right now that are much more dangerous than Pueblo,” Noller said.
Safety ranking remains controversial
Gelb said such a list could be a great way to motivate local officials to enact better public safety plans. No one wants to be at the bottom, he said.
“It’s critical that cities understand their situation,” he says. “Even if rankings are not an accurate measure of performance.”
But for people trying to decide where to live, work and play, rankings of city-level data, especially when it comes to crime, aren’t detailed enough to provide real insight, said Alec Brownlow, a professor at DePaul University who studies the geographies of fear, safety and security in urban landscapes. “I think the rankings are bogus,” he said.
Ultimately, Brownlow said, no single analysis can capture all potential threats to human safety.
“I think at the end of the day, it’s kind of a waste because we’re all individuals and my perception of safety and my perception of decisions to make a billion different things on a given day is very different from someone else’s.”
Contributed by: Lucas Finton, Memphis Commercial Appeal. James Bartolo, Pueblo Chief
