Cambridge, MA has a D safety grade (33/100) with a violent crime rate of 437 per 100,000, 24% above the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
Cambridge, MA Crime Rate & Safety
At 120,447 residents, Cambridge is a large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against MA and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
Cambridge, MA carries a PlainCrime D safety grade with violent crime 24% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Cambridge, MA shows violent crime at 436.7 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 2,644.3 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 24% above the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade D from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
D safety grade
436.7/100K violent
2644.3/100K property
+24% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Cambridge, MA
Position in the state cohort
Cambridge reported a higher violent-crime rate than most comparable Massachusetts cities
At 436.7 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Cambridge ranks 25 of 317 — above 292 of the 316 other Massachusetts cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +203.7% against the cohort median of 143.8. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
2020–2024 direction
The reported violent-crime rate ended the window higher
Across 5 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 284.3 per 100,000 in 2020 to 436.7 in 2024 (+53.6%). The highest observed value was 479.2 in 2023 and the lowest 284.3 in 2020. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Comparable rate records
Cambridge's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the Massachusetts cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Cambridge's 436.7 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Lawrence (439.7), Revere (444.8), Montague (428.4), Northampton (445.1). These are same-year agency submissions that pass the same completeness screen, not a claim that the cities have identical conditions. They make the cohort position above checkable against named records instead of a generic state average.
Offense mix
The reported mix leans further toward property offenses than the state cohort
Violent offenses are 14.2% of the 3,711 Part I offenses reported in Cambridge for 2024, against a median of 21.5% across comparable Massachusetts cities — a gap of 7.3 points. Offense mix is shaped by which agencies report and how incidents are classified as well as by the underlying offenses, so it describes the reported record rather than a settled difference in conditions.
Property-offense composition
Larceny-theft dominates the property total more than it does across the cohort
Larceny-theft is 87.8% of reported property offenses in Cambridge, against a cohort median of 78.1%. The remainder is burglary (285) and motor vehicle theft (102). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Property counts dominate Cambridge's FBI UCR Table 8 municipal row. Per-100,000 rates use the reporting-year population on that row; cities that fail the completeness test stay out of rate rankings. A citywide figure rarely describes any single neighbourhood inside the municipal boundary.
On a large city row, these are citywide reported offense totals - not neighbourhood advice. Conditions vary by place and time; reporting rates differ across jurisdictions.
Cambridge's 2024 municipal footprint
Cambridge's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (75% of 3,711 offenses; mix index 5,864).
Violent offenses are only 14% of the municipal total - a property-led book.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (when validated); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
Both rates shifted (2023→2024)
Violent Crime Rate
-8.9%
479.2 → 436.7/100K
Property Crime Rate
+10.1%
2402.5 → 2644.3/100K
Property offenses lead Cambridge's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs MA
Property Crime
3,185
2644.3
1101.2
Larceny-Theft
2,798
2323
-
Burglary
285
236.6
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
102
84.7
-
Arson
15
12.5
-
Violent Crime
526
436.7
308.8
Aggravated Assault
375
311.3
-
Robbery
110
91.3
-
Rape
41
34
-
Murder
0
0
-
Cambridge Crime Trend (2020-2024)
Cambridge property crime rate trend
Lead series · rose across 5 comparable years · FBI UCR
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program · split lines are the U.S. national averages
Cambridge Police Department
Reporting agency for Cambridge NIBRS-participating
Cambridge Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Cambridge's 3,711 reported offenses (5-year span 2020-2024).
This agency reports via NIBRS, the incident-based system that captures more detail per offense (multiple crimes per incident, victim/offender data) than the older summary counts.
Similar-Size Cities in Massachusetts
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the Massachusetts cities closest to Cambridge in population. Their populations run from 89,600 to 116,062, against 120,447 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
In 2024, Cambridge reported 526 violent crimes and 3,185 property crimes, for a total of 3,711 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Cambridge?
From 2023 to 2024, Cambridge's violent crime rate decreased by 8.9%, and the property crime rate increased by 10.1%.
What is the most common crime in Cambridge?
The most common crime type in Cambridge is larceny-theft, accounting for 75.4% of all reported crimes (2,798 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Cambridge's rates come from the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program, CIUS Table 8, vintage 2024.
Incomplete reporters stay out of rate rankings. Cross-check population with Census ACS; state UCR programs for statewide context. Primary verify links: FBI.gov UCR, Census QuickFacts.
Disclaimer (large city): informational crime rates only - not legal, insurance, or personal-safety advice. Source: FBI UCR. Ask a qualified professional before acting.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Cambridge, MA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.