Texas’s 50 Safest Cities of 2020

The SafeWise Team is pleased to release the sixth annual Safest Cities report. Here are the 50 Safest Cities in Texas for 2020. See if your city made the list.

If you call the Lone Star State home, you may have more concern about your safety on a daily basis than people from other states. Texas also has higher statewide crime rates, but all of its safest cities come in well below state and national rates.  

See if your town made the list of Texas’s 50 safest cities of 2020. 

Texas reported a slight increase in concern about safety this year, climbing one percentage point from 48% to 49%. That’s also three points higher than the national average. See how it compares to the rest to the country in our 2020 State of Safety report.

View the complete 2020 State of Safety report.

Although Texas survey respondents indicated an increase in the amount of property crime experienced over the past 12 months, the state’s report of 23% is below the national average of 26%. But violent crime made a bigger leap—doubling this year from 8% who had a personal experience with violent crime to 16%.

The violent crime rate in Texas is 4.1 incidents per 1,000, compared to 3.7 nationwide and 4.4 reported last year. The state’s property crime rate is 23.7, which is nearly two incidents higher than the national rate of 22.0, but lower than last year’s rate of 25.5.

Violent Crime in Texas: Fear vs. Reality

Murder committed by a stranger is the crime that Texans think is the most likely to happen to them, but the majority have higher concern on a daily basis about physical assault by a stranger. 

• 49% named physical assault by a stranger as the most concerning violent crime in Texas, compared with 40% nationwide.
• Aggravated assault made up 62% of all violent crime reported across the state and 54% of all incidents in the safest cities.
• Being murdered by a stranger was the violent crime Texas survey respondents found most likely to actually happen, with 31% selecting it. Across the country, only 23% think murder by a stranger is the most likely crime that could happen to them. 
• There were 14 murders among the 50 safest cities, accounting for a mere 1% of all violent crime reported. Statewide, murder was also just 1% of all reported incidents.

Property Crime in Texas: Fear vs. Reality

Concern about theft of digital property like photos and files is the biggest property crime worry in the Lonestar State. Texans named it as the crime that causes the most concern and the property crime most likely to happen. 

• 67% said they have high concern about having digital property stolen. Nationally, 52% felt the same.  
• Digital security was the most concerning safety issue in Texas last year.
• 48% of Texas respondents believe having digital property stolen is the most likely property crime that could occur.  36% of everyone across the nation feel the same.
• Larceny-theft is the most common property crime in Texas, totalling 72% of the state’s property crimes and 83% of the property crimes reported by the safest cities.
• 38% of Texas respondents have a home security system for protection, versus 24% across the US.  22% don’t use any extra security method, compared to 29% nationwide.

A Closer Look at Texas’s Safest Cities of 2020 

• The top three safest cities in Texas are all new to the top three this year—Fulshear, Hutto, and San Elizario.
• 50% of the cities improved their ranking year over year, with Whitehouse jumping 187 spots.
• 18 cities (36%) fell in rank.
• Three cities are brand new to the ranking this year: San Elizario, Fate, and Elgin.
• All of the cities that made the safest list are well below both state (4.1) and national (3.7) violent crime rates. The highest violent crime rate reported by any of the cities was 1.8 incidents per 1,000 in Floresville. 
• 66% of the cities limited violent crime to less than one incident per 1,000, with Fulshear and West University Place each reporting just 0.1 incident per 1,000.
• 21 cities (42%) reported 10 or fewer total violent crimes.
• Every safest city came in under both state (23.7) and national (22.0) property crime rates, and no city reported more than 13.8 incidents per 1,000, which is nearly 10 full points below the state property crime rate.
• San Elizario had the lowest property crime rate at 3.1 per 1,000 and 28 total incidents reported.
• 19 cities (38%) reported fewer than 100 total property crimes.

The 50 Safest Cities in Texas

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 50?

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”
BestPlaces, “Find a Place Search Tool”