Lower Merion Township, PA has a A safety grade (77/100) with a violent crime rate of 72 per 100,000, 80% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
At 64,290 residents, Lower Merion Township is a large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against PA and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
Data updated 2026-09-05
Lower Merion Township, PA is safer than most U.S. cities, and earns an A PlainCrime safety grade, where violent crime runs 80% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Lower Merion Township, PA shows violent crime at 71.6 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 1,798.1 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 80% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade A from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
2020–2024 direction
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 43.1 per 100,000 in 2020 to 71.6 in 2024 (+66.1%). The highest observed value was 75.8 in 2022 and the lowest 43.1 in 2020. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Comparable rate records
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Lower Merion Township's 71.6 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Bethlehem Township (71.7), Wyomissing (71.8), Aspinwall (72.2), Robinson Township, Allegheny County (70.9). 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 are 3.8% of the 1,202 Part I offenses reported in Lower Merion Township for 2024, against a median of 10.0% across comparable Pennsylvania cities — a gap of 6.2 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.
Position in the state cohort
At 71.6 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Lower Merion Township ranks 404 of 838 — above 434 of the 837 other Pennsylvania cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +9.5% against the cohort median of 65.3. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
Property counts dominate Lower Merion Township'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.
Lower Merion Township's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (83% of 1,202 offenses; mix index 6,977).
Violent offenses are only 4% of the municipal total - a property-led book.
Lower Merion Township offense mix (2024)
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.
| Offense | Count | Rate /100K |
|---|---|---|
| Property Crime | 1,156 | 1798.1 |
| Larceny-Theft | 996 | 1549.2 |
| Motor Vehicle Theft | 113 | 175.8 |
| Burglary | 47 | 73.1 |
| Arson | 0 | 0 |
| Violent Crime | 46 | 71.6 |
| Aggravated Assault | 30 | 46.7 |
| Robbery | 13 | 20.2 |
| Murder | 2 | 3.1 |
| Rape | 1 | 1.6 |
The chart omits 2021 rather than drawing an unsupported zero or partial-coverage dip. The table preserves the year and marks the gap.
Lead series · rose across 4 comparable years · FBI UCR
Secondary series · rose · 2020-2024 · FBI UCR
| Year | Coverage | Population | Violent Rate | Property Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Comparable | 60,353 | 43.1 | 1241 |
| 2021 | Insufficient reporting | 60,905 | - | - |
| 2022 | Comparable | 64,642 | 75.8 | 1147.9 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 64,350 | 66.8 | 1588.2 |
| 2024 | Comparable | 64,290 | 71.6 | 1798.1 |
Lower Merion Township Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Lower Merion Township's 1,202 reported offenses (4-year span 2020-2024, with internal gaps).
This agency reports via the traditional Summary Reporting System (SRS): aggregate monthly offense counts rather than incident-level detail.
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the Pennsylvania cities closest to Lower Merion Township in population. Their populations run from 52,803 to 75,683, against 64,290 here. Or use our side-by-side compare tool to benchmark two cities directly.
Lower Merion Township sits at 71.6/100K violent (grade A); the Pennsylvania cities below are the nearest matches after size peers are removed.
Lower Merion Township at 71.6/100K violent and 1,798.1/100K property - matched below outside Pennsylvania (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
71.6/100K here; nearest out-of-state matches.
1,798.1/100K here; violent-rate peers above excluded.
Out-of-state cities whose violent rate moved a similar share from 2023→2024 (+7.2% here); level-based peers above are excluded.
In 2024, Lower Merion Township reported 46 violent crimes and 1,156 property crimes, for a total of 1,202 reported offenses.
From 2023 to 2024, Lower Merion Township's violent crime rate increased by 7.2%, and the property crime rate increased by 13.2%.
The most common crime type in Lower Merion Township is larceny-theft, accounting for 82.9% of all reported crimes (996 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Lower Merion Township'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.
Large-city rate methodology for how Lower Merion Township's large city row is sourced and ranked.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Lower Merion Township, PA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.
Bulk download: city crime dataset (CSV/JSON)
Put this to use
Put the Lower Merion Township, PA FBI UCR record to work: compare peers, open the state atlas, or look up another city.
A citywide UCR rate is a starting point, not a neighbourhood verdict: read the full profile and the year coverage notes before drawing conclusions.
Every figure on PlainCrime is rendered directly from FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) source data, no number is typed in by an editor. Lower Merion Township is scored here as a large city UCR reporter (64,290 on the row). See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.