How do European countries' rape rates compare to the global average in 2024?

Executive summary — Short answer up front

European headline figures from a 2024 EU gender‑based violence survey show 30.7% of women in the EU‑27 reporting lifetime experiences of physical violence or threats and/or sexual violence, with wide country variation (57.1% in Finland vs 11.9% in Bulgaria), while World Health Organization estimates place about 6% of women globally as having experienced non‑partner sexual violence in their lifetime. These two numbers are not directly comparable because they measure different phenomena, use different definitions and populations, and are produced by different methodologies, so any assertion that “European rape rates are higher/lower than the global average” requires careful qualification of what metric is being compared ^{[1] [2] [3]}.

1. Why the headline numbers look so different — apples, oranges, and survey choices

The EU survey’s 30.7% figure addresses a broad set of experiences—physical violence, threats, and sexual violence by any perpetrator, measured over a woman’s lifetime—so it captures intimate‑partner violence, sexual harassment and broader forms of assault together, which inflates its comparability with a narrower global metric ^{[1] [4]}. By contrast, WHO’s reported ~6% global estimate refers specifically to non‑partner sexual violence (sexual assault by someone other than an intimate partner), a narrower category with a different denominator and definitional frame ^{[2] [3]}. The practical effect is that the EU figure and the WHO figure are measuring overlapping but distinct phenomena; comparing them directly without harmonising definitions produces misleading conclusions about relative “rape rates” across regions ^{[4] [5]}.

2. Measurement challenges that reshape any cross‑country comparison

Cross‑country comparisons are undermined by persistent problems: underreporting, legal definition differences, and varied data collection methods. Underreporting skews prevalence downward in official statistics; surveys pick up more cases but depend on question wording, confidentiality and cultural willingness to disclose. Legal definitions of rape and sexual assault differ markedly across European countries and between nations and global reporting frameworks, meaning recorded “rape rates” in one dataset may reflect law and police practice rather than true incidence ^[6]. The EU survey authors explicitly caution against simplistic comparisons and note major between‑country variation driven as much by measurement and disclosure patterns as by true incidence ^{[4] [6]}.

3. What the dates and sources tell us about reliability and relevance

The EU survey results are documented in late‑2024 releases (November 2024) and present the most recent pan‑European survey data on gender‑based violence within the EU‑27 ^{[1] [4]}. WHO’s prevalence synthesis and related studies from 2024 also provide the latest global modelling for non‑partner sexual violence ^{[2] [3]}. These contemporaneous publications strengthen the validity of the descriptive claim that EU survey prevalence appears higher than the WHO non‑partner global estimate, but they also highlight why temporal proximity does not resolve definitional mismatch. Both sets of publications explicitly emphasise methodological caveats, making the temporal alignment useful but insufficient for direct rate comparisons ^{[1] [3]}.

4. The balanced conclusion: what can and cannot be claimed from available data

From available 2024 data, it is accurate to state that the EU‑27 survey records substantially higher lifetime prevalence of broad gender‑based violence (30.7%) than the WHO’s global estimate for non‑partner sexual violence (~6%), but this does not mean European “rape rates” are categorically higher than the global average. A valid comparison requires harmonised definitions (rape vs broader sexual/physical violence), matched populations (any perpetrator vs non‑partner), and comparable timeframes (lifetime vs past year). Policymakers, advocates and journalists should avoid single‑figure comparisons without these clarifications; instead, they should commission or use harmonised cross‑national analyses that explicitly align definitions and methodologies ^{[1] [6] [3]}.