By type of crime
- 9Overall safety
- 15Property crime
- 4Violent crime
Metaxourgeio scores 4 out of 100 (modelled estimate, Eurostat 2021–2024) for violent crime — high crime, on a scale where 50 is the average for Greece. Metaxourgeio has no police figures of its own. Its estimate starts from Athens's rate — Athens scores 23 for violent crime — and is adjusted for documented local reporting about Metaxourgeio. An estimated 4,650 people live there: the 2021 census counts the surrounding community as a whole, and this is its share by area.
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
What Metaxourgeio is actually like
Metaxourgeio, named for a 19th-century silk mill, is the most uneven neighbourhood in central Athens. Avdi Square is its heart - trees, cafes, theatres, an art gallery - and the blocks around it hold galleries, wine bars and some of the city's better restaurants. Three streets away the same district still has brothel rows and an entrenched street drug market.
After dark
Avdi Square and the restaurant streets stay busy and feel normal. The western and northern fringes towards Kolonos, Iasonos and Leonatou do not, and Greek reporting in January 2026 described residents there living behind bars.
What to watch for
- Named in the Hellenic Police 'second sector' for drug dealing and petty crime (Sept 2026)
- A January 2026 Ta Nea report on gangs and drugs named Iasonos and Leonatou streets in Metaxourgeio specifically, alongside Kolonos and Kerameikos
- Long-documented brothel concentration on and around Kolonou and Iasonos streets
- Travel guides advise avoiding the derelict blocks near Karaiskaki Square after dark
Staying here
Reasonable if you pick the address, not the postcode. Book within two or three blocks of Avdi Square or the metro and it is good value; anything further west and you are walking home through the part the police plan targets.
Reputation against reality. This is the classic case of reputation lagging reality - and of reality lagging the hype. Metaxourgeio was one of the roughest parts of central Athens and is now a real gallery-and-restaurant district; Athens Social Atlas dates the process to renovation buying from the mid-1990s and acceleration after the 2004 Olympics. But unlike, say, Kerameikos, the turnaround is street-by-street rather than district-wide: the good half is genuinely good and the bad half is genuinely bad, and they are 300 metres apart.
Streets and squares: Avdi Square · Iasonos · Leonatou · Kolonou · Keramikou · Myllerou
Sources
- Ta Nea - Crime and fear in central Athens: neighbourhoods at the mercy of gangs and drugs (20 Jan 2026)
- LiFO - Metaxourgeio, an invisible neighbourhood
- Athens Social Atlas - Gentrification
- Wikipedia - Metaxourgeio
- GR&PL - Dangerous neighborhoods in Athens 2026
- Rick Steves Travel Forum - Athens, areas to avoid
Other neighbourhoods in Athens
Nearby municipalities
Questions people ask
Is Metaxourgeio safe?+
SafetyMap estimates Metaxourgeio (Μεταξουργείο) at 4 out of 100 for violent crime — high crime, on a scale where 50 is the Greek average. It is a modelled estimate, not a count of crimes recorded there: it comes from the estimate for Athens, adjusted for documented local reporting about Metaxourgeio; there are no police figures for Metaxourgeio itself. As a rate, the estimate comes to roughly 3,400 property and 400 violent offences per 100,000 residents a year. The written notes on this page class it as “Fine by day, care after dark”.
Is Metaxourgeio safe at night?+
Avdi Square and the restaurant streets stay busy and feel normal. The western and northern fringes towards Kolonos, Iasonos and Leonatou do not, and Greek reporting in January 2026 described residents there living behind bars.
How does Metaxourgeio compare with the rest of Athens?+
Metaxourgeio has no police figures of its own. Its estimate starts from Athens's rate — Athens scores 23 for violent crime — and is adjusted for documented local reporting about Metaxourgeio.