Santa Ana, CA has a D safety grade (36/100) with a violent crime rate of 493 per 100,000, 40% above the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · very large city
Santa Ana, CA Crime Rate & Safety
At 310,304 residents, Santa Ana 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.
Santa Ana, CA carries a PlainCrime D safety grade with violent crime 40% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Santa Ana, CA shows violent crime at 493.1 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 1,702.2 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 40% 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
493.1/100K violent
1702.2/100K property
+40% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Santa Ana, CA
Comparable rate records
Santa Ana's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the California cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Santa Ana's 493.1 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Desert Hot Springs (491.9), Coalinga (491.6), Montebello (494.7), Farmersville (490.6). 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
Santa Ana sits mid-pack among comparable California cities
At 493.1 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Santa Ana ranks 131 of 458 — above 327 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +50.1% 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.
2020–2024 direction
The reported violent-crime rate ended the window higher
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 429.0 per 100,000 in 2020 to 493.1 in 2024 (+14.9%). The highest observed value was 567.1 in 2023 and the lowest 392.6 in 2022. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Offense mix
Violent offenses make up an unusually large share of the reported mix
Violent offenses are 22.5% of the 6,812 Part I offenses reported in Santa Ana for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 5.4 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 Santa Ana'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.
Santa Ana's 2024 municipal footprint
Across 27.4 Census sq mi, Santa Ana logged 192.9 property and 55.9 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Santa Ana leans on larceny-theft at 53% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 3,362.
Violent offenses are 22% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (27.4 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
Property rate moved most (2023→2024)
Property Crime Rate
-17.3%
2058.7 → 1702.2/100K
Violent Crime Rate
-13%
567.1 → 493.1/100K
Property offenses lead Santa Ana's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs CA
Property Crime
5,282
1702.2
1985.9
Larceny-Theft
3,601
1160.5
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
981
316.1
-
Burglary
700
225.6
-
Arson
24
7.7
-
Violent Crime
1,530
493.1
476.8
Aggravated Assault
1,023
329.7
-
Robbery
329
106
-
Rape
163
52.5
-
Murder
15
4.8
-
Santa Ana 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.
Santa Ana 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
Santa Ana Police Department
Reporting agency for Santa Ana NIBRS-participating
Santa Ana Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Santa Ana's 6,812 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 Santa Ana in population. Their populations run from 221,303 to 338,488, against 310,304 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
Santa Ana at 493.1/100K violent and 1,702.2/100K property - matched below outside California (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
In 2024, Santa Ana reported 1,530 violent crimes and 5,282 property crimes, for a total of 6,812 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Santa Ana?
From 2023 to 2024, Santa Ana's violent crime rate decreased by 13%, and the property crime rate decreased by 17.3%.
What is the most common crime in Santa Ana?
The most common crime type in Santa Ana is larceny-theft, accounting for 52.9% of all reported crimes (3,601 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Santa Ana'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 Santa Ana, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.