Crime on the Greek islands: why per-resident rates mislead

By the SafetyMap team · Updated September 26, 2026

The Greek islands record less property crime per resident than the mainland but more violent crime — about 259 property and 86 violent offences per 100,000 residents a year, against 522 and 74 on the mainland outside Attica. Most of the difference is how the rates are counted.

A rate divides by residents, not by people present

Eurostat's rates are offences per 100,000 inhabitants. On an island that hosts several times its population in August, offences involving visitors are counted in full but divided by residents alone. The islands that come out worst are the ones with the most visitors: Zakynthos records 166 violent offences per 100,000 residents a year, the highest rate in Greece, and the Cyclades 124 — mostly assault.

Crete

Crete's four regional units sit in the middle of the Greek range. Heraklion, the largest, records 308 property and 69 violent offences per 100,000 residents a year; Chania 197 and 61; Rethymno 221 and 77; Lasithi 184 and 50. Rethymno's homicide rate, 1.5 per 100,000, is the second highest in the country, from a small number of cases.

The quietest islands

Chios has the lowest property crime rate in Greece — about 36 offences per 100,000 residents a year — and one of the lowest rates of violent crime. Corfu records 106 property offences per 100,000, Lesbos and Lemnos 108, Ikaria and Samos 156: far below the Greek level of 744.

The island figures are for the 13 regional units made up only of islands, weighted by population; Euboea, joined to the mainland by bridges, and the mixed units of Kavala and Thasos and Magnesia and the Sporades are counted with the mainland. The North Aegean units cover several islands each (Lesbos with Lemnos, Ikaria with Samos), as Eurostat publishes them. Each island unit has its own page on the map, with its municipalities: open the map of Greece.