Crime & Safety in Virginia Beach
Virginia Beach's 2025-2026 crime data tells a genuinely positive, consistently sourced story: only 419 violent crime offenses in 2025, the lowest in five years, with violent crime down a cumulative 27% since 2023 (a 20% drop in 2024 followed by a further 6.7% drop in 2025) -- an overall crime rate 22% below the national average and a 2026 safety score of 81/100.
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Learn moreA Real, Multi-Year Violent Crime Decline
Virginia Beach reported just 419 violent crime offenses in 2025 -- the lowest figure in five years. This followed a 20% year-over-year drop in 2024 and a further 6.7% reduction in 2025, for a cumulative 27% decline in violent crime since 2023. This is a genuine, multi-year, consistently-directional trend rather than a single favorable data point.
The Violent Crime Rate Runs Well Below the National Average
Virginia Beach's violent crime rate of 92.3 per 100,000 residents runs 76% below a cited national average of 380 per 100,000. Framed as individual odds, residents face approximately a 1-in-357 chance of being a victim of violent crime in a given year, and a 1-in-52 chance for property crime -- both figures indicating a genuinely low-risk profile relative to national benchmarks.
Overall Safety Score and National Comparison
Virginia Beach's overall crime rate runs 22% below the national average as of 2026, with a cited safety score of 81 out of 100 -- described as safer than 50% of U.S. cities by that specific scoring methodology. This is a real, sourced, above-average safety profile, not a marketing claim.
The One Real Exception: Larceny/Theft
Not every crime category runs below average: larceny/theft specifically was cited as running 6% above the national average -- the one disclosed exception to the broader below-average pattern. Assault, by contrast, ran 36% below average. This nuance is disclosed rather than smoothed into a uniform "everything is safer here" claim.
A Large City With Real Neighborhood-to-Neighborhood Variance
As with any city Virginia Beach's size (roughly 497 square miles), citywide figures blend genuinely different neighborhoods. Sandbridge, Great Neck, and Chesapeake Beach (Chic's Beach) are specifically cited in 2026 neighborhood coverage as among the city's safest areas -- see the best-areas topic page for the fuller picture. Anyone narrowing in on a specific address should check block-level or neighborhood-specific data directly rather than relying on a citywide figure alone.
Key takeaways
- Virginia Beach reported only 419 violent crime offenses in 2025 -- the lowest in five years -- following a cumulative 27% decline in violent crime since 2023 (20% drop in 2024, further 6.7% drop in 2025).
- The violent crime rate (92.3 per 100k) runs 76% below a cited 380-per-100k national average; residents face roughly 1-in-357 odds of violent crime victimization and 1-in-52 for property crime in a given year.
- Overall crime runs 22% below the national average with a 2026 safety score of 81/100 -- a real, sourced, above-average safety profile.
- The one disclosed exception: larceny/theft runs 6% above the national average, even as assault runs 36% below average -- not a uniformly "safer in every category" picture.
- Sandbridge, Great Neck, and Chesapeake Beach are specifically cited among the safest Virginia Beach neighborhoods -- check block-level data for a specific address rather than relying on citywide figures alone.
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