Somerville, MA has a B safety grade (63/100) with a violent crime rate of 221 per 100,000, 37% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
Somerville, MA Crime Rate & Safety
At 81,766 residents, Somerville is a large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against MA and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
Somerville, MA is higher-crime than most U.S. cities, and earns a B PlainCrime safety grade, where violent crime runs 37% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Somerville, MA shows violent crime at 221.4 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 1,698.8 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 37% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade B from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
B safety grade
221.4/100K violent
1698.8/100K property
-37% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Somerville, MA
Comparable rate records
Somerville's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the Massachusetts cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Somerville's 221.4 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Hardwick (221.0), Attleboro (220.6), Great Barrington (222.3), Aquinnah (219.3). 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
Somerville sits mid-pack among comparable Massachusetts cities
At 221.4 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Somerville ranks 91 of 317 — above 226 of the 316 other Massachusetts cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +53.9% against the cohort median of 143.8. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
Offense mix
The reported mix leans further toward property offenses than the state cohort
Violent offenses are 11.5% of the 1,570 Part I offenses reported in Somerville for 2024, against a median of 21.5% across comparable Massachusetts cities — a gap of 10.0 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 higher
Across 5 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 187.6 per 100,000 in 2020 to 221.4 in 2024 (+18.0%). The highest observed value was 252.6 in 2022 and the lowest 185.1 in 2021. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property counts dominate Somerville'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.
Somerville's 2024 municipal footprint
Somerville's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (67% of 1,570 offenses; mix index 4,803).
Violent offenses are only 12% of the municipal total - a property-led book.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (when validated); 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
+19.3%
1423.7 → 1698.8/100K
Violent Crime Rate
-10.2%
246.5 → 221.4/100K
Property offenses lead Somerville's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs MA
Property Crime
1,389
1698.8
1101.2
Larceny-Theft
1,046
1279.3
-
Burglary
237
289.9
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
106
129.6
-
Arson
2
2.4
-
Violent Crime
181
221.4
308.8
Aggravated Assault
148
181
-
Robbery
20
24.5
-
Rape
13
15.9
-
Murder
0
0
-
Somerville Crime Trend (2020-2024)
Somerville property crime rate trend
Lead series · rose across 5 comparable years · FBI UCR
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program · split lines are the U.S. national averages
Somerville Police Department
Reporting agency for Somerville NIBRS-participating
Somerville Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Somerville's 1,570 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.
Similar-Size Cities in Massachusetts
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the Massachusetts cities closest to Somerville in population. Their populations run from 65,488 to 95,573, against 81,766 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
In 2024, Somerville reported 181 violent crimes and 1,389 property crimes, for a total of 1,570 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Somerville?
From 2023 to 2024, Somerville's violent crime rate decreased by 10.2%, and the property crime rate increased by 19.3%.
What is the most common crime in Somerville?
The most common crime type in Somerville is larceny-theft, accounting for 66.6% of all reported crimes (1,046 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Somerville'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 Somerville, MA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.