Missouri’s 20 Safest Cities of 2022

The SafeWise Team is pleased to release the eighth annual Safest Cities report.

See if your city made the full list.

In our latest State of Safety survey, people in Missouri worried about their safety on a daily basis (46%) almost as much as most Americans (47%)—even with higher crime rates than most states. This is a big increase since last year's survey, when 37% of Missourians had daily concerns about personal safety.

Missouri's violent crime rates made a jump since last year, putting the state above the national average. Still, The Show Me State's safest cities have lower-than-average crime rates compared to the state.

• Violent crime rates
• Property crime rates
• Interesting findings
• The Safest Cities
• Methodology
• How to make a safe home anywhere
• How other cities compare
• How other states compare

Missouri has had the highest crime rates in the West North Central region for both violent crime and property crime for three years now. While violent crime went up in Missouri from 5.0 per 1,000 to 5.4, property crimes decreased from 26.6 per 1,000 to 25.3. Still, Missouri had the ninth-highest property crime rate nationally.

State of Safety survey respondents in Missouri worried more frequently about their safety than last year—bringing the state just below the national average. While experiences with property crime (26%) and gun violence (11%) have grown since last year, those surveyed showed the most concern about package theft.

We asked Missouri residents which crimes they worry may happen to them. See if Missouri residents are concerned about the same crime issues as the rest of the country.

View the complete 2022 State of Safety report.

Survey responses in Missouri reflect the state's above-average violent crime rate with fewer than half of residents feeling safe in the state. Higher percentages of personal experiences with gun violence could play a role in this mentality. 

• 46% of survey respondents in Missouri reported feeling safe in their state compared to 55% of Americans.
• 12% of Missourians reported having a personal experience with violent crime in the past 12 months—down from 13% the last year.
• 95% of Missouri’s safest cities reported no murders.
• 15 (75%) of the safest cities in The Show Me State reported violent crime incidents in the single digits. 
• 31% of survey participants report using some form of personal protection—making Missourians less likely to do this than the national average of 34%.
• 40% of Missouri residents say their personal safety has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic compared to 44% of Americans.

• 64% of Missouri residents cited gun violence as a top safety concern—much higher than the US average of 53%.
• 11% of survey participants reported an experience with gun violence in the last 12 months, an increase from the last year (8%).
• There were 17 mass shootings in Missouri in the reporting year, down from the year before (22).
• 35% of those surveyed are most worried about a gun violence incident happening to them (US 38%).

Missouri has the ninth-highest property crime rate in the country this year. This lines up with surveyed residents reporting an increase in personal experiences with property crime. On the whole, the state saw slightly fewer property crimes per 1,000 people year over year.

• Compared to the last year (22%), a greater number of Missourians reported personal experiences with property crime this reporting year (26%).
• 18% of participants reported experiencing package theft in the last 12 months, putting Missouri below the US average of 20%.
• Even though The Show Me State’s property crime rate is higher than average, it’s trending downward like most of the US.
• 51% of Missouri residents surveyed use some form of property protection. This is below the 60% national average.
• The top form of property protection in Missouri this year was home security systems with 25% of survey respondents using them. This matches the national average.
• 26% of Missourians say the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the security of their property—this is lower than the US average of 29%.

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.

• Even though the statewide violent crime rate is higher, the safest cities all reported fewer than 1.5 violent crimes per 1,000 residents.
• The top two cities, Cottleville and Higginsville, reported 0 violent crimes.
• O’Fallon, the most populous city, accounts for about 44% of the total violent crimes reported among the safest cities. But per capita, it doesn’t have the highest violent crime rate in the top 20 list.
• Motor vehicle thefts saw the biggest increase (100+) year over year among the safest cities, reflecting US trends during the pandemic.
• The safest cities averaged 10.1 property crimes per 1,000 residents. This is much lower than the statewide rate of 25.3.

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

Whether your city made our list or not, we encourage everyone to be proactive about home security. One of the best ways to stop a burglary before it happens is to add a home security system.

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We calculated crime rates for every city in the state that met our population threshold, based on the state’s median population as calculated using FBI data. To request a report of the remaining cities in your state, sign up for our email newsletter or email info@safewise.com with the subject line: Safest Cities Full Report.

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 2020.

Click on the state image or dropdown menu below to check out the safest cities for each state.

• Best Home Security Systems
• Best Home Security Cameras
• Best Video Doorbell Cameras
• Burglary Stats & Facts
• The Most Burglarized City in Every State

FBI: Crime Data Explorer, Accessed March 8, 2022.

US Census Bureau, "Data Explorer," Accessed January 24, 2022.

Best Places, “Find a Place Search Tool,” Accessed January 24, 2022.

SafeWise, “2021 State of Safety survey,” Accessed March 8, 2022.

Gun Violence Archive, “Past Summary Ledgers,” Accessed January 24, 2022.

Gun Violence Archive, “General Methodology,” Accessed March 8, 2022.

Melody Hicks, Ben Stickle, Joshua Harms, American Journal of Criminal Justice, “Assessing the Fear of Package Theft,” January 04, 2021. Accessed March 8, 2022.

For definitions and more on data sources, see our methodology page.