Arun vs Worthing

Arun records less crime for its size than Worthing: 87.6 offences per 1,000 residents in the 12 months to June 2026, against 99.2. That is about 13% more. Both figures are averages across a whole local authority, and neither area is uniform: the gap between neighbourhoods inside one of these places is usually wider than the gap between the two of them.

Arun 87.6 crimes per 1,000 residents, West Sussex
Worthing 99.2 crimes per 1,000 residents, West Sussex

The England and Wales average is 91.2 recorded crimes per 1,000 residents. Arun is close to it. Worthing is about 9% above it.

Side by side

Recorded crime in Arun and Worthing
  Arun Worthing
Crimes per 1,000 residents 87.6 99.2
Offences in the year to June 2026 14,896 11,295
Residents 170,064 113,866
Change on the previous 12 months +1.2% +8.0%
Rank in England and Wales 142 of 314 104 of 314

Rank 1 is the highest recorded rate. Both areas are local authority areas, so the two populations are counted the same way and the rates are directly comparable.

Offence by offence

The mix differs more than the totals do. Arun records about 1.4 times as much burglary per resident. Worthing records about 1.7 times as much bicycle theft, 1.6 times as much shoplifting and 1.4 times as much public order per resident.

Rate per 1,000 residents by offence
Offence, per 1,000 residents Arun Worthing
Violence and sexual offences 29.0 30.9
Anti-social behaviour 17.1 19.6
Shoplifting 9.6 15.3
Criminal damage and arson 7.4 6.8
Public order 6.0 8.6
Other theft 5.2 4.3
Vehicle crime 3.5 3.1
Drugs 2.4 2.7
Burglary 2.6 1.8
Other crime 1.7 1.9
Possession of weapons 1.1 1.3
Robbery 1.2 1.1
Bicycle theft 0.8 1.4
Theft from the person 0.2 0.3
All recorded crime 87.6 99.2

Both places since 2011

Each line is a rolling twelve-month rate per 1,000 residents, so seasonality is taken out and the two areas are on the same scale despite their different sizes.

Arun Worthing
3060901200Covid lockdown88 Arun99 Worthing20122014201620182020202220242026
A line breaks wherever the twelve months behind it include a return the force never filed, because a twelve-month total missing three of its months is not a total.

Questions

Is Arun safer than Worthing?

Arun records less crime for its size than Worthing: 87.6 offences per 1,000 residents in the 12 months to June 2026, against 99.2. That is about 13% more. Both figures are averages across a whole local authority, and neither area is uniform: the gap between neighbourhoods inside one of these places is usually wider than the gap between the two of them.

What does this comparison not tell you?

Recorded crime counts what the police wrote down, so a place where people report more looks worse than a place where they report less, whatever actually happened. Both figures are averages across a whole local authority: a town with one busy centre and quiet suburbs carries a rate that describes neither. And the denominator is residents, so somewhere that fills up with commuters, students or shoppers by day records crime against a population it is not credited with. How the figures work sets all of this out.

Where else can I compare?

Pick any other two areas, or start from Arun or Worthing and use the neighbouring areas listed on each. The ranked lists of the safest places and the highest crime rates cover all of them at once.

Figures cover the 12 months to June 2026. Police data is published roughly two months in arrears.