Oakland, CA has a F safety grade (0/100) with a violent crime rate of 1925 per 100,000, 447% above the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · very large city
At 435,042 residents, Oakland is a very large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against CA and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
Data updated 2026-09-05
Oakland, CA is among the highest-crime cities in the country, and earns an F PlainCrime safety grade, where violent crime runs 447% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Oakland, CA shows violent crime at 1,925.3 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 7,230.3 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 447% 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.
Position in the state cohort
At 1925.3 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Oakland ranks 4 of 458 — above 454 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +486.1% against the cohort median of 328.5. 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
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Oakland's 1925.3 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Sand City (1823.7), Nevada City (1753.8), Colma (1596.5), Big Bear (1581.9). 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.
2020–2024 direction
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 1290.9 per 100,000 in 2020 to 1925.3 in 2024 (+49.2%). The highest observed value was 3640.6 in 2023 and the lowest 1290.9 in 2020. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property-offense composition
Larceny-theft is 57.6% of reported property offenses in Oakland, against a cohort median of 69.5%. The remainder is burglary (3,423) and motor vehicle theft (9,914). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Offense mix
Violent offenses are 21.0% of the 39,831 Part I offenses reported in Oakland for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 3.9 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 counts dominate Oakland'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.
Across 56 Census sq mi, Oakland logged 562.1 property and 149.7 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Oakland leans on larceny-theft at 45% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 2,978.
Violent offenses are 21% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Oakland offense mix (2024)
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (56 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 | 31,455 | 7230.3 |
| Larceny-Theft | 18,118 | 4164.7 |
| Motor Vehicle Theft | 9,914 | 2278.9 |
| Burglary | 3,423 | 786.8 |
| Arson | 114 | 26.2 |
| Violent Crime | 8,376 | 1925.3 |
| Aggravated Assault | 5,039 | 1158.3 |
| Robbery | 2,960 | 680.4 |
| Rape | 296 | 68 |
| Murder | 81 | 18.6 |
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 | 437,923 | 1290.9 | 5219.6 |
| 2021 | Insufficient reporting | 428,406 | - | - |
| 2022 | Comparable | 428,374 | 1521.1 | 6519.5 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 425,484 | 3640.6 | 10153.4 |
| 2024 | Comparable | 435,042 | 1925.3 | 7230.3 |
Oakland Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Oakland's 39,831 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 California cities closest to Oakland in population. Their populations run from 316,764 to 546,722, against 435,042 here. Or use our side-by-side compare tool to benchmark two cities directly.
Oakland sits at 1,925.3/100K violent (grade F); the California cities below are the nearest matches after size peers are removed.
Oakland at 1,925.3/100K violent and 7,230.3/100K property - matched below outside California (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
1,925.3/100K here; nearest out-of-state matches.
7,230.3/100K here; violent-rate peers above excluded.
Out-of-state cities whose violent rate moved a similar share from 2023→2024 (-47.1% here); level-based peers above are excluded.
In 2024, Oakland reported 8,376 violent crimes and 31,455 property crimes, for a total of 39,831 reported offenses.
From 2023 to 2024, Oakland's violent crime rate decreased by 47.1%, and the property crime rate decreased by 28.8%.
The most common crime type in Oakland is larceny-theft, accounting for 45.5% of all reported crimes (18,118 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Oakland'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.
Large-city rate methodology for how Oakland's very large city row is sourced and ranked.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Oakland, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.
Bulk download: city crime dataset (CSV/JSON)
Put this to use
Put the Oakland, CA 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. Oakland is scored here as a very large city UCR reporter (435,042 on the row). See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.