San Mateo, CA has a C safety grade (59/100) with a violent crime rate of 243 per 100,000, 31% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
San Mateo, CA Crime Rate & Safety
At 99,929 residents, San Mateo is a large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against CA and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
San Mateo, CA carries a PlainCrime C safety grade with violent crime 31% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, San Mateo, CA shows violent crime at 243.2 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 1,883.3 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 31% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade C from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
C safety grade
243.2/100K violent
1883.3/100K property
-31% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for San Mateo, CA
Comparable rate records
San Mateo's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the California cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to San Mateo's 243.2 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Buellton (243.2), Capitola (243.2), Sunnyvale (244.5), Brentwood (241.8). 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.
Position in the state cohort
San Mateo sits mid-pack among comparable California cities
At 243.2 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, San Mateo ranks 300 of 458 — above 158 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is -27.0% against the cohort median of 333.1. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
Property-offense composition
Larceny-theft dominates the property total more than it does across the cohort
Larceny-theft is 83.8% of reported property offenses in San Mateo, against a cohort median of 69.5%. The remainder is burglary (98) and motor vehicle theft (207). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Offense mix
The reported mix leans further toward property offenses than the state cohort
Violent offenses are 11.4% of the 2,125 Part I offenses reported in San Mateo for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 5.7 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 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 260.3 per 100,000 in 2020 to 243.2 in 2024 (-6.6%). The highest observed value was 344.9 in 2023 and the lowest 243.2 in 2024. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property counts dominate San Mateo'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.
San Mateo's 2024 municipal footprint
Across 12.1 Census sq mi, San Mateo logged 155.1 property and 20 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
San Mateo's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (74% of 2,125 offenses; mix index 5,679).
Violent offenses are only 11% of the municipal total - a property-led book.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (12.1 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
-29.5%
344.9 → 243.2/100K
Property Crime Rate
-2.8%
1937.6 → 1883.3/100K
Property offenses lead San Mateo's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs US avg
Property Crime
1,882
1883.3
1711
Larceny-Theft
1,577
1578.1
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
207
207.1
-
Burglary
98
98.1
-
Arson
4
4
-
Violent Crime
243
243.2
352
Aggravated Assault
138
138.1
-
Robbery
74
74.1
-
Rape
26
26
-
Murder
5
5
-
San Mateo Crime Trend (2020-2024)
The chart omits 2021 rather than drawing an unsupported zero or partial-coverage dip. The table preserves the year and marks the gap.
San Mateo property crime rate trend
Lead series · fell across 4 comparable years · FBI UCR
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program · split lines are the U.S. national averages
San Mateo Police Department
Reporting agency for San Mateo NIBRS-participating
San Mateo Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind San Mateo's 2,125 reported offenses (4-year span 2020-2024, with internal gaps).
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 California
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the California cities closest to San Mateo in population. Their populations run from 98,217 to 101,983, against 99,929 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
San Mateo at 243.2/100K violent and 1,883.3/100K property - matched below outside California (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
In 2024, San Mateo reported 243 violent crimes and 1,882 property crimes, for a total of 2,125 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in San Mateo?
From 2023 to 2024, San Mateo's violent crime rate decreased by 29.5%, and the property crime rate decreased by 2.8%.
What is the most common crime in San Mateo?
The most common crime type in San Mateo is larceny-theft, accounting for 74.2% of all reported crimes (1,577 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: San Mateo'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.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 San Mateo, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.