Lagos has been ranked among the 30 most crime-prone cities in the world, placing 27th out of 406 cities assessed in the 2026 Numbeo Crime Index.
The report, published on Numbeo’s website on Saturday, gave Nigeria’s commercial capital a crime index of 69.1 points and a safety index of just 30.9 points.
The ranking classified Lagos as having a high crime level, with scores between 60.01 and 80 falling into that category.
The development puts Lagos ahead of several major international cities, including Oakland, New Orleans, Marseille and Mexico City, which recorded crime indices of 68.6, 67.7, 67.1 and 66.1 points, respectively.
However, Lagos fared worse than Nairobi, Kenya, which recorded a crime index of 58.8 and a safety index of 41.2.
Port Moresby in Papua New Guinea and Caracas in Venezuela jointly topped the global ranking with 81.4 points each.
They were followed by Pretoria, South Africa, with 81.3 points, while Pietermaritzburg and Johannesburg, also in South Africa, recorded 81.1 and 80.8 points, respectively.
Other cities among the 10 most crime-prone included Durban and Port Elizabeth in South Africa, San Pedro Sula in Honduras, Memphis in the United States and Salvador in Brazil.
At the opposite end of the ranking, Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates emerged as the safest city among the 406 assessed, with a crime index of 11.2 points and a safety index of 88.8.
Ajman, Ras al-Khaimah and Sharjah, all in the UAE, as well as Doha, Qatar, also recorded some of the lowest crime scores.
Numbeo explained that its Crime Index measures the perceived level of crime in cities and countries, using responses from visitors to its website.
The assessment covers public concerns about robbery, mugging, car theft, physical attacks, harassment, discrimination and other property and violent crimes.
It also examines how safe residents and visitors feel walking alone during the day and at night.
According to the platform, respondents’ answers are assigned numerical values based on their perceptions before being converted to a scale of zero to 100.
Numbeo said it uses spam-filtering systems to remove suspicious submissions and sets minimum contributor requirements for cities included in the ranking.
It added that its current index is continuously updated with information gathered over the preceding five years.
However, the platform warned that its findings should not be mistaken for official crime statistics, stressing that the ranking reflects public perceptions rather than verified police records.
It also noted that differences in crime-reporting practices, underreporting and the manipulation of official figures could affect comparisons between countries.
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