Goldsboro, NC is among the highest-crime cities in the country, and earns an F PlainCrime safety grade, where violent crime runs 206% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Goldsboro, NC shows violent crime at 1,076.4 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 5,863.5 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 206% above the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade F from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
F safety grade
1076.4/100K violent
5863.5/100K property
+206% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Goldsboro, NC
Position in the state cohort
Goldsboro reported a higher violent-crime rate than most comparable North Carolina cities
At 1076.4 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Goldsboro ranks 8 of 206 — above 198 of the 205 other North Carolina cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +308.5% against the cohort median of 263.5. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
Comparable rate records
Goldsboro's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the North Carolina cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Goldsboro's 1076.4 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Selma (1049.1), Shelby (1044.1), Fairmont (1041.7), Roxboro (1007.9). 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
Violent offenses make up an unusually large share of the reported mix
Violent offenses are 15.5% of the 2,321 Part I offenses reported in Goldsboro for 2024, against a median of 11.4% across comparable North Carolina cities — a gap of 4.1 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.
2020–2024 direction
The reported violent-crime rate ended the window lower
Across 5 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 1174.7 per 100,000 in 2020 to 1076.4 in 2024 (-8.4%). The highest observed value was 1511.2 in 2023 and the lowest 943.2 in 2021. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property counts dominate Goldsboro'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.
Mid-size municipal totals above are reported offenses, not safety advice for any single block. Reporting completeness still varies by year and agency.
Goldsboro's 2024 municipal footprint
Across 28.6 Census sq mi, Goldsboro logged 68.6 property and 12.6 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Goldsboro's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (66% of 2,321 offenses; mix index 4,685).
Violent offenses are 16% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (28.6 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
Violent rate moved most (2023→2024)
Violent Crime Rate
-28.8%
1511.2 → 1076.4/100K
Property Crime Rate
-7.8%
6359.6 → 5863.5/100K
Property offenses lead Goldsboro's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs US avg
vs NC
Property Crime
1,961
5863.5
1711
1929.5
Larceny-Theft
1,525
4559.9
-
-
Burglary
328
980.7
-
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
108
322.9
-
-
Arson
6
17.9
-
-
Violent Crime
360
1076.4
352
364.6
Aggravated Assault
274
819.3
-
-
Robbery
61
182.4
-
-
Murder
15
44.9
-
-
Rape
10
29.9
-
-
Goldsboro Crime Trend (2020-2024)
Goldsboro 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
Goldsboro Police Department
Reporting agency for Goldsboro NIBRS-participating
Goldsboro Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Goldsboro's 2,321 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 North Carolina
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the North Carolina cities closest to Goldsboro in population. Their populations run from 31,422 to 36,720, against 33,444 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
Goldsboro at 1,076.4/100K violent and 5,863.5/100K property - matched below outside North Carolina (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
In 2024, Goldsboro reported 360 violent crimes and 1,961 property crimes, for a total of 2,321 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Goldsboro?
From 2023 to 2024, Goldsboro's violent crime rate decreased by 28.8%, and the property crime rate decreased by 7.8%.
What is the most common crime in Goldsboro?
The most common crime type in Goldsboro is larceny-theft, accounting for 65.7% of all reported crimes (1,525 incidents in 2024).
Mid-size read: Goldsboro figures are FBI UCR CIUS Table 8 (vintage 2024), population-adjusted per 100,000.
Denominators are the reporting-year population on the municipal row. Incomplete years are dropped from rankings. Confirm at FBI Crime Data Explorer and Census.gov QuickFacts.
Disclaimer (mid-size municipal): figures are informational, not advice. FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program is the source. Consult a professional before decisions.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Goldsboro, NC rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.