Most Dangerous Neighborhoods in Boston (2024)
Boston's open crime data has no reliable neighborhood population figure, so these Boston neighborhoods are ranked by severity-weighted reported incident volume, not a per-person rate. The Boston neighborhoods at the top of this list have the most reported incidents relative to other Boston Boston neighborhoods.
Volume, not a safety rate. Boston neighborhood resident population is not reliably available for a per-100k rate, so no safety grade is published for any zone (see /crime-rate/methodology §6.6). The geographic unit is the Boston neighborhood (a policing/analysis boundary, not a resident-population neighborhood). relativeIndex ranks each zone by its VIOLENCE-WEIGHTED reported-incident volume (violent incidents weighted 3x property) against the other Boston zones — it is NOT population-adjusted and must not be read as a safety rate. Offenses are grouped into three coarse buckets (violent / property / other) via a keyword classifier.
Ranked highest reported volume first
Not the same Boston neighborhoods as the safest neighborhoods in boston list.
- 1Dorchester0/100
- 2Roxbury55/100
- 3Downtown71/100
- 4Mattapan80/100
- 5East Boston80/100
- 6Back Bay80/100
- 7South Boston83/100
- 8Jamaica Plain83/100
- 9South End84/100
- 10Hyde Park87/100
- 11Brighton87/100
- 12Allston89/100
- 13Roslindale90/100
- 14Fenway90/100
- 15West Roxbury92/100
- 16West End93/100
- 17Mission Hill94/100
- 18Charlestown95/100
- 19South Boston Waterfront96/100
- 20Beacon Hill96/100
- 21North End97/100
- 22Chinatown98/100
- 23Longwood99/100
- 24Leather District100/100
- 25Bay Village100/100
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Most dangerous neighborhoods in Boston — FAQ
What is the most dangerous neighborhood in Boston?
How are Boston neighborhoods ranked?
Does this predict how safe a specific street is?
No area has zero risk
A high Crime Index score means lower reported crime relative to other US cities — it is not a guarantee of safety. Reported crime is not the same as actual crime. Research on the gap between crime that occurs and crime that gets reported to police — often called the "dark figure" of crime — estimates that roughly 40% of violent crime and about a third of property crime go unreported each year. Every index built on official statistics, including this one, necessarily undercounts real crime. That gap is exactly why homicide — the offense with the smallest dark figure — anchors the calculation instead of a more commonly reported but less reliable category like theft.
Scores on this page reflect FBI-reported data for 2024. See the full methodology →