Great Yarmouth vs South Norfolk

South Norfolk records less crime for its size than Great Yarmouth: 48.4 offences per 1,000 residents in the 12 months to June 2026, against 110.4. That is 2.3 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 110.4 crimes per 1,000 residents, Norfolk
South Norfolk 48.4 crimes per 1,000 residents, Norfolk

The England and Wales average is 91.2 recorded crimes per 1,000 residents. Great Yarmouth is about 21% above it. South Norfolk is about 47% below it.

Side by side

Recorded crime in Great Yarmouth and South Norfolk
  Great Yarmouth South Norfolk
Crimes per 1,000 residents 110.4 48.4
Offences in the year to June 2026 11,100 7,182
Residents 100,529 148,448
Change on the previous 12 months -2.6% -2.0%
Rank in England and Wales 70 of 314 299 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. Great Yarmouth records about 3.4 times as much drugs, 3.3 times as much possession of weapons and 2.8 times as much vehicle crime per resident.

Rate per 1,000 residents by offence
Offence, per 1,000 residents Great Yarmouth South Norfolk
Violence and sexual offences 47.8 21.8
Anti-social behaviour 15.4 5.7
Criminal damage and arson 10.4 4.7
Public order 7.6 3.1
Other theft 7.2 3.2
Shoplifting 6.7 3.1
Other crime 2.6 2.4
Burglary 3.2 1.4
Drugs 2.9 0.9
Vehicle crime 2.6 0.9
Possession of weapons 1.7 0.5
Bicycle theft 0.8 0.5
Theft from the person 0.8 0.2
Robbery 0.8 0.2
All recorded crime 110.4 48.4

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 South Norfolk
40801201600Covid lockdown110 Great48 South20122014201620182020202220242026
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 South Norfolk?

South Norfolk records less crime for its size than Great Yarmouth: 48.4 offences per 1,000 residents in the 12 months to June 2026, against 110.4. That is 2.3 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 South 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 June 2026. Police data is published roughly two months in arrears.