Updated April 2026 · FBI UCR 2023
South Dakota, Crime Statistics & Safety
Population 270,020 · Per-capita crime rates with FBI national context
See full South Dakota crime rankings →South Dakota reports 276.5 violent crimes and 1,796 property crimes per 100,000 residents in the latest FBI Uniform Crime Reporting data. The state earns a Safety Context Score of 65/100 (Grade B), with a 5-year trend of 0.0% (stable).
South Dakota in National Context
On violent crime, South Dakota reports 276.5 per 100,000 residents — close to the national rate (24% below the FBI national rate of 363.8/100K). On property crime, the state reports 1,796 per 100,000 — close to the national rate (2% below the U.S. average of 1,832/100K). Property crime is far more common than violent crime nationally and at the state level. South Dakota's 5-year change of 0.0% is essentially flat, falling within the year-to-year noise band for state-level UCR data. The current snapshot is the most useful read; per-city pages show whether some cities are moving even when the state aggregate isn't.
State-level rates aggregate hundreds of cities and unincorporated areas with very different conditions. They are useful for cross-state comparison and for context-setting, but the per-city data below is the more decision-relevant figure for anyone evaluating an actual move or investment. The FBI Crime Data Explorer publishes the same underlying state aggregates and breaks them down by reporting agency, and the Bureau of Justice Statistics publishes the National Crime Victimization Survey for context on unreported crime.
Safest Cities in South Dakota
Least Safe Cities in South Dakota
How These State Figures Are Calculated
State-level rates are weighted aggregates of the city-level FBI UCR submissions in South Dakota, plus statistical adjustments for non-reporting agencies. The Safety Context Score uses the same composite as the city pages: per-capita violent crime versus the U.S. average (40%), per-capita property crime versus the U.S. average (30%), and 5-year trend direction (30%). All inputs are population-adjusted; raw counts are never used. The 4 cities highlighted above are the highest- and lowest-scoring cities in the state cohort. Read the full methodology.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the crime rate in South Dakota?
South Dakota's per-capita violent crime rate is 276.5 per 100,000 residents and the property crime rate is 1,796/100K. The U.S. national rates are 363.8/100K violent and 1,832/100K property — useful as comparison anchors when reading state-level figures.
Which cities in South Dakota are safest?
The 2 highest-scoring cities by Safety Context Score in South Dakota are listed below. Scores combine per-capita violent crime versus the U.S. average (40%), per-capita property crime versus the U.S. average (30%), and the 5-year direction of total crime (30%). Each city links to a full profile with year-by-year UCR data.
Is crime in South Dakota rising or falling?
South Dakota's 5-year trend on total per-capita crime is 0.0% — stable. State-level trends smooth over substantial city-to-city variation; the per-city pages below show which municipalities are driving the aggregate. Trend direction contributes 30% to the Safety Context Score because direction matters as much as the snapshot for long-run reads.
How does South Dakota compare to the U.S. average?
South Dakota's violent crime rate (276.5/100K) is below the U.S. average of 363.8/100K, and the property crime rate (1,796/100K) is below the U.S. average of 1,832/100K. State aggregates can mask very different conditions across cities, so per-city reads are the more decision-relevant figure for relocation or travel.
Where does the underlying data come from?
Every figure traces back to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting program, accessed through the FBI Crime Data Explorer at cde.ucr.cjis.gov. Population denominators come from the U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program. The Bureau of Justice Statistics (bjs.ojp.gov) publishes the National Crime Victimization Survey, which captures crime that goes unreported to police — useful supplementary context. The data is public domain.
Source: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program (2023), accessed via the FBI Crime Data Explorer. Population denominators from the U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program. Reporting context from the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Public domain.
Last refreshed 2026-04-06 · All rates per 100,000 residents.
For this entity, the underlying data on this page comes from the FBI UCR/NIBRS dataset. The breakdown above is the federal record; the paragraphs below add the per-entity context that makes the headline numbers usable for a real decision rather than just a data lookup.
The methodology behind every numeric value on this page is publicly documented on the the FBI UCR/NIBRS dataset portal and described in detail on this site’s methodology page. Refresh cadence varies by underlying series; the page surfaces the as-of date for each number so readers can trace any figure back to the source release.
For readers using this page as a decision input, the related-entity pages elsewhere on the site provide the comparison set. The most useful comparison for this entity is typically a peer within U.S. cities and counties with similar size, similar exposure, or similar geography — not the national-level summary alone.