Jersey City, NJ has a D safety grade (26/100) with a violent crime rate of 562 per 100,000, 60% above the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · very large city
Jersey City, NJ Crime Rate & Safety
At 297,922 residents, Jersey City is a very large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against NJ and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
Jersey City, NJ carries a PlainCrime D safety grade with violent crime 60% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Jersey City, NJ shows violent crime at 561.6 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 2,029.1 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 60% 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
561.6/100K violent
2029.1/100K property
+60% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Jersey City, NJ
Position in the state cohort
Jersey City reported a higher violent-crime rate than most comparable New Jersey cities
At 561.6 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Jersey City ranks 13 of 417 — above 404 of the 416 other New Jersey cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +724.0% against the cohort median of 68.1. 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
Jersey City's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the New Jersey cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Jersey City's 561.6 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Penns Grove (574.7), Seaside Heights (546.0), South Hackensack Township (579.3), Newark (581.2). 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 21.7% of the 7,718 Part I offenses reported in Jersey City for 2024, against a median of 7.1% across comparable New Jersey cities — a gap of 14.5 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 higher
Across 5 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 443.3 per 100,000 in 2020 to 561.6 in 2024 (+26.7%). The highest observed value was 561.6 in 2024 and the lowest 372.8 in 2021. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property counts dominate Jersey City'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 very large city row, these are citywide reported offense totals - not neighbourhood advice. Conditions vary by place and time; reporting rates differ across jurisdictions.
Jersey City's 2024 municipal footprint
Jersey City leans on larceny-theft at 59% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 3,901.
Violent offenses are 22% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
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.
Violent rate moved most (2023→2024)
Violent Crime Rate
+12.8%
497.7 → 561.6/100K
Property Crime Rate
+4.6%
1940.3 → 2029.1/100K
Property offenses lead Jersey City's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs NJ
Property Crime
6,045
2029.1
1395.7
Larceny-Theft
4,547
1526.2
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
885
297.1
-
Burglary
613
205.8
-
Arson
6
2
-
Violent Crime
1,673
561.6
215.7
Aggravated Assault
1,063
356.8
-
Robbery
515
172.9
-
Rape
88
29.5
-
Murder
7
2.3
-
Jersey City Crime Trend (2020-2024)
Jersey City 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
Jersey City Police Department
Reporting agency for Jersey City NIBRS-participating
Jersey City Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Jersey City's 7,718 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 New Jersey
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the New Jersey cities closest to Jersey City in population. Their populations run from 91,236 to 309,708, against 297,922 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
Jersey City at 561.6/100K violent and 2,029.1/100K property - matched below outside New Jersey (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
In 2024, Jersey City reported 1,673 violent crimes and 6,045 property crimes, for a total of 7,718 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Jersey City?
From 2023 to 2024, Jersey City's violent crime rate increased by 12.8%, and the property crime rate increased by 4.6%.
What is the most common crime in Jersey City?
The most common crime type in Jersey City is larceny-theft, accounting for 58.9% of all reported crimes (4,547 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Jersey City'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 (very 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 Jersey City, NJ rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.