Great Yarmouth vs North Norfolk

North Norfolk records less crime for its size than Great Yarmouth: 50.7 offences per 1,000 residents in the 12 months to July 2026, against 111.4. That is 2.2 times the rate. 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.

Great Yarmouth 111.4 crimes per 1,000 residents, Norfolk
North Norfolk 50.7 crimes per 1,000 residents, Norfolk

The England and Wales average is 91.2 recorded crimes per 1,000 residents. Great Yarmouth is about 22% above it. North Norfolk is about 44% below it.

Side by side

Recorded crime in Great Yarmouth and North Norfolk
  Great Yarmouth North Norfolk
Crimes per 1,000 residents 111.4 50.7
Offences in the year to July 2026 11,197 5,232
Residents 100,529 103,217
Change on the previous 12 months -2.2% +8.4%
Rank in England and Wales 65 of 306 290 of 306

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. Great Yarmouth records about 3.9 times as much vehicle crime, 3.0 times as much possession of weapons and 2.8 times as much burglary per resident.

Rate per 1,000 residents by offence
Offence, per 1,000 residents Great Yarmouth North Norfolk
Violence and sexual offences 48.1 22.6
Anti-social behaviour 15.8 8.1
Criminal damage and arson 10.4 4.5
Public order 7.7 3.6
Other theft 7.2 3.2
Shoplifting 6.8 3.1
Burglary 3.2 1.2
Drugs 3.0 1.1
Other crime 2.5 1.3
Vehicle crime 2.7 0.7
Possession of weapons 1.8 0.6
Robbery 0.8 0.2
Theft from the person 0.8 0.2
Bicycle theft 0.7 0.2
All recorded crime 111.4 50.7

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.

Great Yarmouth North Norfolk
40801201600Covid lockdown111 Great51 North2012201420162018202020222024Jul 2026
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 Great Yarmouth safer than North Norfolk?

North Norfolk records less crime for its size than Great Yarmouth: 50.7 offences per 1,000 residents in the 12 months to July 2026, against 111.4. That is 2.2 times the rate. 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 Great Yarmouth or North Norfolk 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 July 2026. Police data is published roughly two months in arrears.