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Fact check: How do US cities rank in terms of safety compared to other countries in 2025?
Executive Summary
US cities do not appear among the very top-ranked global safest cities in 2025; international rankings place cities like Abu Dhabi at the top while U.S. municipalities more commonly appear well below the global leaders. Differences in methodology, indicator scope, and the domestic focus of many U.S. safety lists mean comparisons require careful qualification rather than simple rank-to-rank equivalence [1] [2] [3].
1. What the original claims say — a quick inventory of assertions that matter
The core claims across the supplied analyses present three clear points: first, global rankings for 2025 place Abu Dhabi as the world’s safest city with a safety score of 97.73, and U.S. cities such as Salt Lake City and Boise land far lower in those global lists [1]. Second, multiple U.S.-focused compilations identify safe American cities — Lehi, Utah; Bloomington, Illinois; Boise, Honolulu and others — but these are results of domestic criteria and not direct global head-to-head comparisons [4] [5]. Third, crime trends within the U.S. showed measurable declines in major-city crime through mid‑2025, notably a 17% fall in homicide rates in a 42-city sample, complicating year-to-year comparisons [6].
2. The visible gap: Global top tiers versus U.S. placements
Global indices for 2025 show a substantial gap between the handful of top-ranked international cities and where most U.S. cities land; CEOWORLD’s global list places Abu Dhabi first at 97.73 while U.S. examples cited appear near the middle or lower half of the global table, with Salt Lake City and Boise ranked 96th and 104th respectively [1]. That gap reflects both metric selection and comparative population samples: global rankings often prioritize low violent crime, public health preparedness, and infrastructure resiliency that favor some small, wealthy city-states and Gulf capitals over larger, more diverse American cities [1] [2].
3. U.S. safety leaders: domestic excellence does not equal global dominance
U.S.-centric rankings highlight cities with very low violent-crime rates and strong emergency systems — Lehi and Bloomington’s violent-crime rates of 1.2 and 2.5 per 1,000 residents are examples that signal exceptional local safety [4]. Lists such as WalletHub and other 2025 U.S. overviews repeatedly include mid-size, less-dense cities (Virginia Beach, Portland ME, South Burlington) and Western smaller cities (Boise, Lehi) among top national performers, reflecting domestic strengths in community policing, lower density and local disaster risk profiles [3] [5]. These national honors rarely translate into top global slots because global indices compare across different social and infrastructural environments [5] [2].
4. Methodology matters: why apples-to-apples comparisons are rare
The Safety Index by City and the various U.S. lists differ on indicators — crime reports, emergency preparedness, health systems, natural disaster risk, and financial stability — resulting in incomplete comparability between domestic and global rankings [2] [5]. Global lists may rely on aggregated composite scores and weighting choices that emphasize aspects where some non-U.S. cities outperform, such as single-city fiscal capacity or national-level security arrangements. Conversely, U.S. lists often use more granular crime metrics and community measures that boost smaller municipalities’ standings but are not normalized for international context [2] [4].
5. Recent trends in U.S. crime complicate the snapshot for 2025
U.S. crime data through mid‑2025 show notable declines in many major-city crime measures: a reported 17% drop in homicides across 42 large cities and sharp declines in property crimes were observed, altering the mid‑year picture of urban safety [6]. These downward trends strengthen arguments that several U.S. cities are improving rapidly, but timing matters: many global rankings use calendar-year or multi-year averages that may not yet reflect the 2025 declines. Thus, a city improving sharply in 2025 might remain lower on a global list compiled earlier or using lagged data [6] [2].
6. Factors beyond crime: why U.S. cities may lose ground in global lists
Global safety indices commonly fold in non-crime risks — pandemic preparedness, infrastructure resilience, environmental hazards and financial stability — areas where national policy, geography, and urban form strongly influence rankings. U.S. cities with favorable crime statistics can still be penalized in global composites for higher wildfire, hurricane or economic exposure, or for uneven access to healthcare, which domestic U.S. lists may treat separately or weight differently [5] [2]. These cross-domain differences explain why an American city can be “very safe” domestically but not top the global charts [5].
7. Bottom line: nuanced conclusion for readers asking “how do U.S. cities rank?”
U.S. cities generally do not occupy the very top positions of 2025 global safest-city rankings, which are dominated by certain international capitals; however, multiple U.S. cities rank highly on national safety lists and show improving crime trends through 2025. Any fair comparison must account for differing indicator sets, timing of data collection, and the broader non‑crime dimensions that global indexes include; therefore, the statement that U.S. cities are less safe than top global peers is supported by the cited rankings, but it omits the methodological reasons and recent domestic improvements that complicate that headline [1] [2] [6].