A recent Atlanta Journal-Constitution article reported that crime in the city of Atlanta “saw a reduction in every major crime category in 2024.” What does this look like in historical perspective? And what parts of the city saw the most improvement?
To answer these questions, we utilize data provided through the Atlanta Police Department’s (APD) Open Data Portal, which provides information on all crimes reported including type, location, and date reported.[1] Figure 1 below shows violent crime trends for the city of Atlanta from 2009 through 2024.
Figure 1: Violent Crime Rates in the City of Atlanta, 2009-2024
This graph shows that after a worrisome uptick between 2018 and 2021, the violent crime rate has now declined for the third straight year. Moreover, in 2024 it reached a new historic low of 50.3 incidents per 10,000 population. This represents an 31% decline since 2021 and a 60% decline since 2009.
How does this vary across the city? Figure 2 below tracks the violent crime rate across the city over time by Neighborhood Planning Unit (NPU).[2]
Figure 2: Violent Crime Rates by Atlanta NPU, 2009-2024
As the above charts show, violent crime rates across all NPUs have generally trended downwards since 2009. And violent crime was down year-over-year in 18 of the 25 NPUs (NPUs C, G, H, I, J, O, and V being the exceptions). Violent crime rates dropped by 20% or more in 11 NPUs, and only increased by more than 20% in NPU-I (27%). The three northernmost NPUs of A, B, and C remain the safest parts of the city.
But not all types of violent crime are equal. Figure 3 (that follows) disaggregates violent crime into its three categories: aggravated assault, homicide, and robbery.
Figure 3: Violent Crime Rates by Type of Crime in the City of Atlanta, 2009-2024
As Figure 3 above demonstrates, the robbery rate has been on a steady decline over the entire sixteen-year period for which data are available; it reached a new low in 2024 at just 17% of its 2009 level. Aggravated assault rates, on the other hand, have not seen a consistent direction of change. They declined from 2009 to 2018, then rose for a few years, and have again been on the decline since 2021. The aggravated assault rate, hit a historic low in 2024– at 37.2 incidents per 10,000 population; this level was just a hair below the previous low of 37.5 set in 2018. Homicide– the rarest, but also most serious of the three– appears flat in this graph, but primarily so due to the scale. Figure 4, as a result, focuses only on homicide.
Figure 4: Homicide Rates in the City of Atlanta, 2009-2024
The line chart above shows that the homicide story is significantly less positive than the ones for the other types of violent crime. Like other violent crime, homicide rates followed a downward trend (aside for a spike in 2016) through 2017, but rose sharply over the next several years to more than one-and-a-half times their 2009 rate. Since then, the story is mixed: on one hand, homicides have declined for the second straight year, but they are still higher than their pre-pandemic levels.
What parts of the city have seen the most reduction in violent crime? And what areas are most in need of improvement? Figure 5 below presents change in homicide rates over time by NPU.
Figure 5: Violent Crime Rates by Atlanta NPU, 2009-2024
As Figure 5 above illustrates, 17 of Atlanta’s 25 NPUs saw a decline in homicide rates year-over-year. Homicide rates grew in seven NPUs: B, G, I, K, L, S, and V. The remaining two NPUs, A and Q, had zero homicides in both 2023 and 2024. NPUs F, N, and W saw their homicide rates drop to zero in 2024, but NPUs G, L, and V started higher than average and saw their rates increase.
In sum, violent crime rates continue to trend down in the city of Atlanta and are at historic lows for all subtypes except homicides. Yet, our Metro Atlanta Speaks (MAS) survey shows that Atlanta residents continue to rate crime their #1 issue facing the region (though the percentage rating it as the top issue has dropped 5 percentage points from 31% in 2023 to 26% in 2024). Perceptions have been slow to catch up with what the data reveal.
A future blog post will examine property crime trends in the city. In the meanwhile, if you want to learn more, we have updated our Atlanta Crime Dashboard to include 2024 data:
Notes:
[1] APD exhibits exemplary transparency with its crime data. One can visit their Open Data portal at https://opendata.atlantapd.org/ on any given day and access a map of all crimes reported the day before. The system provides data on not just the Part I crimes of homicide, robbery, aggravated assault (collectively known as violent crimes) and burglary, larceny, and auto theft (collectively known as property crimes), but many types of Part II crimes as well, such as vandalism, drug violations, simple assault, and confidence games. Available data span the period 2009 through the present.
[2] As a reminder, Atlanta’s 25 NPUs are lettered A-Z (only there is no NPU-U), proceeding from A in the northwest corner to Z in the southwest corner of the city. Letters advance across, then down; see the map from the City of Atlanta’s planning department for a reference: https://gis.atlantaga.gov/docs/npu/npuall.pdf
[3] Visit https://33n.atlantaregional.com/mas to explore Bill Huang’s excellent visualization of the Metro Atlanta Speaks data.