Santa Monica, CA has a F safety grade (0/100) with a violent crime rate of 778 per 100,000, 121% above the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
Santa Monica, CA Crime Rate & Safety
At 88,948 residents, Santa Monica 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.
Santa Monica, CA carries a PlainCrime F safety grade with violent crime 121% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Santa Monica, CA shows violent crime at 778 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 4,790.4 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 121% 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.
F safety grade
778/100K violent
4790.4/100K property
+121% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Santa Monica, CA
Position in the state cohort
Santa Monica reported a higher violent-crime rate than most comparable California cities
At 778.0 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Santa Monica ranks 38 of 458 — above 420 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +136.8% 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
Santa Monica's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the California cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Santa Monica's 778.0 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Merced (784.8), South Lake Tahoe (785.5), Huron (769.5), Sacramento (754.9). 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
The reported violent-crime rate ended the window higher
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 598.0 per 100,000 in 2020 to 778.0 in 2024 (+30.1%). The highest observed value was 874.1 in 2023 and the lowest 598.0 in 2020. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Offense mix
The reported mix leans further toward property offenses than the state cohort
Violent offenses are 14.0% of the 4,953 Part I offenses reported in Santa Monica for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 3.1 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 Monica'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.
Santa Monica's 2024 municipal footprint
Across 8.4 Census sq mi, Santa Monica logged 506.7 property and 82.3 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Santa Monica's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (61% of 4,953 offenses; mix index 4,120).
Violent offenses are only 14% of the municipal total - a property-led book.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (8.4 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
Violent rate moved most (2023→2024)
Violent Crime Rate
-11%
874.1 → 778/100K
Property Crime Rate
-0.7%
4823.2 → 4790.4/100K
Property offenses lead Santa Monica's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs US avg
vs CA
Property Crime
4,261
4790.4
1711
1985.9
Larceny-Theft
3,009
3382.9
-
-
Burglary
755
848.8
-
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
497
558.8
-
-
Arson
55
61.8
-
-
Violent Crime
692
778
352
476.8
Aggravated Assault
444
499.2
-
-
Robbery
180
202.4
-
-
Rape
64
72
-
-
Murder
4
4.5
-
-
Santa Monica 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 Monica property crime rate trend
Lead series · rose across 4 comparable years · FBI UCR
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program · split lines are the U.S. national averages
Santa Monica Police Department
Reporting agency for Santa Monica NIBRS-participating
Santa Monica Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Santa Monica's 4,953 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 Monica in population. Their populations run from 85,809 to 89,767, against 88,948 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
Santa Monica at 778/100K violent and 4,790.4/100K property - matched below outside California (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
In 2024, Santa Monica reported 692 violent crimes and 4,261 property crimes, for a total of 4,953 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Santa Monica?
From 2023 to 2024, Santa Monica's violent crime rate decreased by 11%, and the property crime rate decreased by 0.7%.
What is the most common crime in Santa Monica?
The most common crime type in Santa Monica is larceny-theft, accounting for 60.8% of all reported crimes (3,009 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Santa Monica'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 Santa Monica, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.