The Social Explorer Crime Index measures community-safety risk for every neighborhood in the United States. It takes reported crime data from thousands of law enforcement jurisdictions and turns it into one index value that can be compared anywhere in the country. Raw counts and rates can be hard to interpret across cities. With this crime index, a value of 100 always marks the national median, so you can tell at a glance how a neighborhood compares to the rest of the nation.
Most public crime statistics are only available at the police-agency level. The SE Crime Index is calculated at the Census block group level, which is much more granular. To build it, Social Explorer combines geocoded incident-level data from 160 places, home to about 46 million people, with the FBI’s NIBRS and Summary Reporting System data, which covers 95.6% of the U.S. population. Every block-group estimate rolls up exactly to the official agency total. The crime index never adds crime beyond what was reported. It shows where the reported crime occurred within each jurisdiction.
How the Crime Index Is Structured
The dataset includes 10 crime indices: seven for individual offense types and three composites.
- Violent Crime Index – murder, rape/sexual assault, felony assault, and robbery
- Property Crime Index – burglary, grand larceny, and grand larceny auto (motor-vehicle theft)
- Total Crime Index – all seven offense types combined
Composite indices are weighted according to each crime’s relative impact on perceived community safety. Values below 100 indicate lower-than-median risk, values above 100 indicate higher risk, and the index is capped at 200 so extreme outliers don’t distort maps. Each geography is indexed against its own national distribution. A county is compared to all U.S. counties, and a block group is compared to all U.S. block groups.
Who Can Use Crime Index Data?
Academic researchers use the crime index to study how neighborhood safety relates to housing, health, education, and economic opportunity. Faculty bring it into the classroom so students can explore spatial patterns in crime and community conditions. Because every value sits on the same national scale, the SE Crime Index makes it simple to compare neighborhoods, cities, and regions without the reporting inconsistencies that complicate raw crime counts. Organizations interested in commercial or enterprise use can contact Social Explorer about licensing options.
Access the Crime Index with Social Explorer
Ready to put the crime index to work? Log in to your Social Explorer account or request a personalized demo and begin mapping the SE Crime Index alongside demographic, economic, health, and housing data from hundreds of community datasets. You can see crime risk down to the block group level, compare it with the conditions around it, and share your findings as maps, tables, and charts, with no technical expertise required.