Arizona’s 20 Safest Cities of 2020

The SafeWise Team is pleased to release the sixth annual Safest Cities report. Here are the 20 Safest Cities in Arizona for 2020. See if your city made the list.

Both crime rates and levels of concern about safety in Arizona are on the decline. Whether you live in one of the state’s 20 safest cities or not, just calling The Grand Canyon State home puts you in a safer position this year than last.

See which cities are Arizona’s 20 safest in 2020.

Statewide, both violent and property crime rates decreased year over year. Arizona saw 4.7 violent crimes per 1,000 people in 2018; down from 5.1 the year before. Property crime saw an even bigger downturn—sliding from 29.1 incidents per 1,000 to 26.8.

Along with fewer statewide crimes, Arizona respondents to our 2020 State of Safety survey reported feeling less worried about their safety on a daily basis than they did in 2018. Participants who said they are highly concerned every day dropped seven percentage points year over year—from 47% to 40%.

Despite improvement year over year, Arizona still exceeds national violent and property crime rates (3.7 and 22.0, respectively).

View the complete 2020 State of Safety report.

Violent Crime in Arizona: Fear vs. Reality

Physical assault by a stranger topped the state’s list of violent crime worries for the second consecutive year. That lines up with crime statistics—aggravated assaults accounted for 69% of all violent crimes reported in Arizona.

• Arizona is more worried about physical assault than the rest of the country, with 45% reporting high or very high concern compared to 40% nationwide.
• Among the safest cities, aggravated assault made up 62% of all violent crimes reported.
• Sexual assault by a stranger is the crime respondents felt was most likely to occur—30% named it highly likely.
• There were 845 rapes reported by Arizona’s safest cities in 2018, making up 18% of the total violent crimes reported by those cities and 11% statewide.
• Only 8% of survey respondents experienced a violent crime in the past 12 months—a decrease of 20% from last year.

Property Crime in Arizona: Fear vs. Reality

Arizona historically holds higher property crime rates than the national average, but rates are dropping year over year. In 2019, The Grand Canyon State had fewer people experience a property crime (22%) than the national average (26%).

• Arizona’s biggest property crime fear is a break-in when the resident is not at home, with 62% naming it their top worry. That’s right on par with nationwide concern.
• Break-ins when the resident is not at home is also the crime respondents felt was most likely to happen.
• Even though folks worry about break-ins, burglaries accounted for only 14% of all property crimes among the safest cities.
• 28% of people surveyed use a home security system, but the most prevalent forms of protection are security cameras and guard dogs, coming in at 33% each.

A Closer Look at Arizona’s Safest Cities of 2020

For the purposes of this report, the terms “dangerous” and “safest” refer explicitly to crime rates as calculated from FBI crime data—no other characterization of any community is implied or intended.

• Two new cities broke into the top 20 this year: Sierra Vista and Mesa.
• 60% of the safest cities improved in rank this year, due largely to the inclusion of property crime in safety scores.
• Big cities perform well when it comes to safety in Arizona—six of the safest cities have more than 100,000 residents, and four of those are over 200,000.
• All cities came in below both state (4.7) and national (3.7) violent crime rates.
• Four cities saw fewer than one violent crime per 1,000 residents: San Luis, Oro Valley, Gilbert, and Marana.
• Six cities had zero murders.
• Apache Junction reported zero murders and zero counts of rape.
• All of the safest cities are below the state’s property crime rate of 26.8, and only five are above the national rate of 22.
• Florence, the top city, is the only one to report fewer than 10 property crimes. This city had just 4.9 incidents per 1,000.

The 20 Safest Cities in Arizona

VC=Violent Crime
PC=Property Crime

How We Determined the Safest Cities

Learn how we identified the safest cities on our methodology page.

How to Make a Safe Home Anywhere

Whether your city made our list or not, we recommend adding extra security to your home with monitored security services provided by the nation’s leading home security providers.

To learn more about your home security options, check out SafeWise’s picks for Best Home Security Systems.

Didn’t Find Your City in the Top 20?

We calculated crime rates for every city in the state that met our population threshold, which is based on the median population of the state. See how the remaining cities ranked in the list below.

NOTE: If you don’t see your city on the list, it means that it was below the population threshold or didn’t submit a complete crime report to the FBI in 2018.

Sources:

FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, “2018 Crime in the United States”
SafeWise, “2020 State of Safety”
US Census Bureau, “American Fact Finder”