With a crime rate of 32 per one thousand residents, Palo Alto has one of the highest crime rates in America compared to all communities of all sizes - from the smallest towns to the very largest cities. One's chance of becoming a victim of either violent or property crime here is one in 32. Within California, more than 85% of the communities have a lower crime rate than Palo Alto.

Importantly, when you compare Palo Alto to other communities of similar population, then Palo Alto crime rate (violent and property crimes combined) is quite a bit higher than average. Regardless of how Palo Alto does relative to all communities in America of all sizes, when NeighborhoodScout compared it to communities of similar population size, its crime rate per thousand residents stands out as higher than most.

Now let us turn to take a look at how Palo Alto does for violent crimes specifically, and then how it does for property crimes. This is important because the overall crime rate can be further illuminated by understanding if violent crime or property crimes (or both) are the major contributors to the general rate of crime in Palo Alto.

From our analysis, we discovered that violent crime in Palo Alto occurs at a rate higher than in most communities of all population sizes in America. The chance that a person will become a victim of a violent crime in Palo Alto; such as armed robbery, aggravated assault, rape or murder; is 1 in 482. This equates to a rate of 2 per one thousand inhabitants.

In addition, NeighborhoodScout found that a lot of the crime that takes place in Palo Alto is property crime. Property crimes that are tracked for this analysis are burglary, larceny over fifty dollars, motor vehicle theft, and arson. In Palo Alto, your chance of becoming a victim of a property crime is one in 34, which is a rate of 30 per one thousand population.