Council area

Chelmsford crime rate and statistics (council area)

Updated October 2026.

Police published 15,911 street-crime records for the Chelmsford council area from September 2025 to August 2026. That is 9.9% more than in the 12 months before. The rate is 87.6 per 1,000 residents counted in the Census 2021, against 89.7 for Essex Police. A residents-only rate reads high where many people visit. Police locations are approximate.

These figures cover the whole area Chelmsford council runs. Its boundary can differ from the place people call Chelmsford: it can take in other towns and villages, and part of a town can sit in a neighbouring council area.

Explore the crime map

Last 12 published months

September 2025 to August 2026. Street-crime records include anti-social behaviour.

Street-crime records

15,911

Latest month (August 2026)

1,541

Year-on-year

+9.9%

Month-by-month totals

1.2k

Sep

1.3k

Oct

1.2k

Nov

1.2k

Dec

1.2k

Jan

1.2k

Feb

1.4k

Mar

1.4k

Apr

1.4k

May

1.4k

Jun

1.6k

Jul

1.5k

Aug

Show as a table

Month	Street-crime records
September 2025	1,187
October 2025	1,299
November 2025	1,197
December 2025	1,215
January 2026	1,178
February 2026	1,167
March 2026	1,390
April 2026	1,355
May 2026	1,387
June 2026	1,408
July 2026	1,587
August 2026	1,541

Street-crime records per 1,000 residents

Published street-crime records (including anti-social behaviour), September 2025 to August 2026, per 1,000 usual residents in the Census 2021.

Chelmsford council area

87.6

Essex Police

89.7

Residents are the Census 2021 usual residents of every postcode the ONS Postcode Directory places in this council area, added up by CrimeMapsUK from the census postcode counts. Records are assigned through the same postcodes, so both numbers cover the same ground. The total can differ slightly from the council's official population.

15,911 records and 181,602 residents. Residents-only rates overstate crime where many people visit who do not live there, such as city centres, stations, and retail parks. Residents are counted at March 2021 while records are current, so areas with many newer homes can read higher.

No England and Wales comparison is shown, because not every force involved has published every month of this window.

Rates cover England and Wales only. Residents: Office for National Statistics, Census 2021 postcode estimates, Open Government Licence v3.0. How rates are built.

Top crime categories

Share of the Chelmsford council area's records in the same trailing window. The black line on each bar marks the England and Wales share for the same months.

Where records cluster in the Chelmsford council area

Records by part of the Chelmsford council area: the centre 4,734, the south 2,236, the north-west 1,718, the west 1,681, the north 1,621, the south-east 1,546, the north-east 1,318, the south-west 851, the east 653.

North is at the top. Each hexagon is about 1.2 km across, the size the crime map uses zoomed out, and holds at least one of the Chelmsford council area's postcodes; darker ones hold more records. Hexagons at the edge also hold records from neighbouring council areas, and the Chelmsford council area's records placed outside these hexagons are not drawn, so the map's counts won't add up to the page's total. Police place each record at an approximate public point, so this shows which parts of the Chelmsford council area records cluster in, not where incidents happened. Explore the Chelmsford council area on the crime map.

Year by year

Calendar-year totals for the Chelmsford council area (December 2013 to August 2026).

Year	Street-crime records
2021	17,898
2022	17,259
2023	17,243
2024	15,309
2025	14,467
2026 (part year)	11,013

Police forces

The Chelmsford council area's records from September 2025 to August 2026 were published by Essex Police (99.6%), Metropolitan Police (0.2%), Suffolk Constabulary (0.0%), Hertfordshire Constabulary (0.0%), Leicestershire Police (0.0%), Avon and Somerset Police (0.0%), Bedfordshire Police (0.0%), Norfolk Constabulary (0.0%), Warwickshire Police (0.0%), Devon and Cornwall Police (0.0%), Humberside Police (0.0%), Nottinghamshire Police (0.0%), South Yorkshire Police (0.0%) and Staffordshire Police (0.0%).

Limits to keep in mind

A council area follows the council's boundary (ONS local authority district E07000070), which can differ from the place people call Chelmsford.
Published locations are approximate, and each record counts for the council area of its nearest postcode, using the council codes in the ONS Postcode Directory. Counts near the boundary are indicative.
These are counts of published police records, not all crime, and not a safety score.
Other sites can show a different figure for Chelmsford. These counts include anti-social behaviour, cover the 12 published months shown, and assign each record by its nearest postcode. The rate divides by Census 2021 residents of the same postcodes, not by a later mid-year population estimate.
Full detail is on the methodology page.

Browse all council areas

Postcode areas and neighbouring councils

Postcode districts

Districts with a page and at least 5% of their live postcodes in this council area. A district can cross a council boundary, so its page counts records on both sides.

Postcode sectors

Neighbouring council areas

Council areas that share a postcode district with this one.

Cite this page

This page updates as new months are published, so a citation needs the months shown and the date you read it. One click selects the whole citation.

CrimeMapsUK. Chelmsford council area: published street-crime records, September 2025 to August 2026. Source: data.police.uk, Open Government Licence v3.0. Retrieved 30 October 2026. Police locations are approximate; records are assigned to the area by nearest postcode. Postcode centroids from the ONS Postcode Directory. Source: Office for National Statistics licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains Royal Mail data © Royal Mail copyright and database right 2026. https://crimemapsuk.com/crime/council-areas/chelmsford/