By type of crime
- 66Overall safety
- 70Property crime
- 62Violent crime
Heraklion scores 66 out of 100 (police-recorded offences, Eurostat 2021–2024) for overall safety — below-average crime, on a scale where 50 is the average for Greece. It is home to about 305,490 people (2021 census).
The score is absolute, not a ranking: 50 is the offence rate of Greece as a whole and every doubling of the rate costs the same points, so any two places compare directly. How the scores are made
Updated · police figures: Eurostat 2021–2024 · What's new
Written guides in Heraklion: Is Heraklion safe?
Heraklion in the police figures
Eurostat publishes the offences recorded by the Hellenic Police in each regional unit. The figures here are the yearly mean of 2021–2024, per 100,000 residents, next to the rate for Greece as a whole.
For overall safety, Heraklion ranks 29th of Greece's 52 regional units, counting from the safest, at 66 out of 100 against 50 for the country as a whole. Property crime: 308 offences per 100,000 residents a year, 59% below the rate for Greece as a whole, 744. Violent crime: 69 offences per 100,000 residents a year, 31% below the rate for Greece as a whole, 101. Against the Greek rate, its highest is assault (−11%) and its lowest robbery (−90%).
Its nearest regional units, for overall safety: Rethymno 68, Lasithi 78, Chania 73, Cyclades 51, Dodecanese (Rhodes, Kos, Kalymnos, Karpathos) 59, and Piraeus and the Islands 40. Heraklion is 5 points above their average of 62.
Heraklion is made up of islands with far more people in summer than live there. The rates are per resident, and offences involving visitors count against a population of 305,490 that does not include them, so per-resident figures can read higher than what residents experience.
| Offence | Heraklion | Greece | Against Greece | Rank of 46 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Burglary | 51 | 127 | −59% | 28 |
| Theft | 257 | 617 | −58% | 30 |
| of which vehicle theft | 111 | 166 | −34% | 34 |
| Property crime, total | 308 | 744 | −59% | 29 |
| Assault | 66 | 74 | −11% | 28 |
| Robbery | 2.5 | 26 | −90% | 18 |
| Intentional homicide | 0.6 | 0.8 | −26% | 17 |
| Violent crime, total | 69 | 101 | −31% | 26 |
Rank among the 46 areas Eurostat reports — the 45 regional units outside Attica and Attica as a whole — 1 being the lowest rate. Homicides are so few that a single case moves a small unit's rate a long way.
Is crime rising or falling in Heraklion?
Each year Eurostat publishes for Greece, 2021 to 2024: offences recorded by the Hellenic Police per 100,000 residents.
Property crime: 338 in 2021 and 261 in 2024, down 23%; Greece as a whole went from 680 to 716, up 5%. Violent crime: 55 in 2021 and 66 in 2024, up 22%; Greece as a whole went from 96 to 96, about the same.
| Year | Property crime | Violent crime | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Heraklion | Greece | Heraklion | Greece | |
| 2021 | 338 | 680 | 55 | 96 |
| 2022 | 329 | 803 | 74 | 103 |
| 2023 | 303 | 775 | 83 | 108 |
| 2024 | 261 | 716 | 66 | 96 |
A regional unit's yearly rate moves with a handful of cases, and it is divided by residents, not visitors. That is why the score uses the mean of all 4 years.
Municipalities in Heraklion
8 places, by overall safety
Safest
Most crime
All municipalities, largest first
The number on the right is how many people live there. The one on the left is its safety score out of 100.
Neighbouring regional units
Questions people ask
Is Heraklion safe?+
Heraklion (Ηράκλειο) scores 66 out of 100 for overall safety on SafetyMap — below-average crime, on a scale where 50 is the Greek average. That is based on police-recorded offence rates reported to Eurostat for 2021–2024. That works out to about 308 property offences and 69.4 violent offences per 100,000 residents a year.
Is Heraklion safe at night?+
SafetyMap has no time-of-day figures for Heraklion: the police data behind the score are yearly totals that do not say when offences happen, so its 66 out of 100 is for day and night alike.
How does Heraklion compare with the rest of Greece?+
For overall safety, Heraklion ranks 29th of Greece's 52 regional units, counting from the safest, at 66 out of 100 against 50 for the country as a whole. Its nearest regional units, for overall safety: Rethymno 68, Lasithi 78, Chania 73, Cyclades 51, Dodecanese (Rhodes, Kos, Kalymnos, Karpathos) 59, and Piraeus and the Islands 40. Heraklion is 5 points above their average of 62.