Merkel, TX has a A safety grade (78/100) with a violent crime rate of 165 per 100,000, 53% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · small municipal
Merkel's UCR row covers a small municipal population (2,420). Rates below are per 100,000 and sit next to TX and U.S. averages.
Data updated 2026-09-05
Merkel, TX is close to the national middle for violent crime, and earns an A PlainCrime safety grade, where violent crime runs 53% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Merkel, TX shows violent crime at 165.3 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 619.8 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 53% 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.
Small-count caution
Merkel reported 4 violent offences in 2024 against a population of 2,420. At this volume one additional or one fewer report moves the per-100,000 rate noticeably, so the figure is better read as a data point than as a precise measurement, and year-to-year swings here are expected.
Property-offense composition
Larceny-theft is 20.0% of reported property offenses in Merkel, against a cohort median of 71.6%. The remainder is burglary (10) and motor vehicle theft (2). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Comparable rate records
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Merkel's 165.3 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Anna (165.4), Linden (165.7), Somerset (164.7), Oyster Creek (163.7). 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.
2020–2024 direction
Across 5 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 229.0 per 100,000 in 2020 to 165.3 in 2024 (-27.8%). The highest observed value was 249.1 in 2023 and the lowest 76.0 in 2021. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Offense mix
Violent offenses are 21.1% of the 19 Part I offenses reported in Merkel for 2024, against a median of 14.3% across comparable Texas cities — a gap of 6.8 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 165.3 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Merkel ranks 370 of 686 — above 316 of the 685 other Texas cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is -8.1% against the cohort median of 179.9. 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 Merkel'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.
Based on 4 reported violent incidents in a population of 2,420. At this volume, one additional or one fewer report can shift the rate and letter grade noticeably; small-city crime counts are inherently more volatile year to year than large-city counts, so treat this grade as a data point, not a precise ranking.
On a small municipal row, small denominators make rates sensitive to a handful of incidents. Figures are reported totals, not neighbourhood advice.
Across 2.8 Census sq mi, Merkel logged 5.4 property and 1.4 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Merkel leans on burglary at 53% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 3,352.
Violent offenses are 21% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Merkel offense mix (2024)
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (2.8 sq mi); 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 | 15 | 619.8 |
| Burglary | 10 | 413.2 |
| Larceny-Theft | 3 | 124 |
| Motor Vehicle Theft | 2 | 82.6 |
| Arson | 0 | 0 |
| Violent Crime | 4 | 165.3 |
| Rape | 2 | 82.6 |
| Aggravated Assault | 2 | 82.6 |
| Murder | 0 | 0 |
| Robbery | 0 | 0 |
Lead series · rose across 5 comparable years · FBI UCR
Secondary series · fell · 2020-2024 · FBI UCR
| Year | Coverage | Population | Violent Rate | Property Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Comparable | 2,620 | 229 | 572.5 |
| 2021 | Comparable | 2,633 | 76 | 645.7 |
| 2022 | Comparable | 2,431 | 246.8 | 781.6 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 2,409 | 249.1 | 373.6 |
| 2024 | Comparable | 2,420 | 165.3 | 619.8 |
Merkel Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Merkel's 19 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.
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the Texas cities closest to Merkel in population. Their populations run from 2,385 to 2,456, against 2,420 here. Or use our side-by-side compare tool to benchmark two cities directly.
In 2024, Merkel reported 4 violent crimes and 15 property crimes, for a total of 19 reported offenses.
From 2023 to 2024, Merkel's violent crime rate decreased by 33.6%, and the property crime rate increased by 65.9%.
The most common crime type in Merkel is burglary, accounting for 52.6% of all reported crimes (10 incidents in 2024).
Micro-municipal read: Merkel's FBI UCR Table 8 row (2024) is the only source for the rates above.
With a small population base, per-100,000 rates amplify sparse counts. Incomplete submissions are excluded from rankings. See FBI.gov UCR for the raw Table 8 file.
Disclaimer (small municipal): small-base rates are especially easy to misread. Informational only - not advice. Source: FBI UCR Program.
Micro-municipal rate methodology for how Merkel's small municipal row is sourced and ranked.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Merkel, TX rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.
Bulk download: city crime dataset (CSV/JSON)
Put this to use
Put the Merkel, TX 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. Merkel is scored as a small municipal UCR reporter (2,420 on the row). See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.