Borough safety · Inner London · data through August 2026

How safe is Southwark, London?

Southwark, London covers 23 neighbourhoods in SafeRoute's Inner London index. Its median safety index is 57/100 — below the Inner London median of 60, so more is reported around a typical neighbourhood here than across Inner London. Dulwich Village scores highest at 86/100; Chaucer lowest at 38/100.

These figures describe reported crime around each neighbourhood's centre — they are informational, not a judgment of any community. 5 of 23 neighbourhoods here rate low risk, 11 moderate, 7 elevated and 0 high risk.

Every neighbourhood in Southwark, safest first

Neighbourhood	Index	Band	Incidents
1 Dulwich Village	86/100	Low risk	135
2 Dulwich Wood	86/100	Low risk	102
3 Peckham Rye	85/100	Low risk	134
4 Dulwich Hill	81/100	Low risk	200
5 Goose Green	75/100	Low risk	270
6 Champion Hill	67/100	Moderate	339
7 Surrey Docks	66/100	Moderate	363
8 Nunhead & Queen's Road	64/100	Moderate	416
9 Old Kent Road	62/100	Moderate	408
10 Rotherhithe	62/100	Moderate	418
11 North Bermondsey	58/100	Moderate	500
12 Rye Lane	57/100	Moderate	542
13 South Bermondsey	54/100	Moderate	613
14 Peckham	52/100	Moderate	650
15 St Giles	51/100	Moderate	665
16 Camberwell Green	50/100	Moderate	664
17 Faraday	48/100	Elevated	777
18 Newington	48/100	Elevated	755
19 London Bridge & West Bermondsey	46/100	Elevated	907
20 North Walworth	44/100	Elevated	940
21 Borough & Bankside	39/100	Elevated	1,158
22 St George's	39/100	Elevated	1,119
23 Chaucer	38/100	Elevated	1,246

How Southwark compares across Inner London

Boroughs (safest first)	Median index	Neighbourhoods
Greenwich	80/100	23
Wandsworth	75/100	22
Lewisham	74/100	19
Hammersmith and Fulham	62/100	21
Kensington and Chelsea	60/100	18
Hackney	59/100	21
Lambeth	58/100	25
Southwark (this page)	57/100	23
Camden	57/100	20
Tower Hamlets	54/100	20
Islington	50/100	17
Westminster	48/100	18

Common questions

What is the safest neighbourhood in Southwark, London?

Dulwich Village has the highest SafeRoute safety index in Southwark, London, at 86/100 (low risk), from 135 reported incidents within 1 km of its centre. Dulwich Wood (86/100) and Peckham Rye (85/100) follow.

Which neighbourhood in Southwark, London has the most reported crime?

Chaucer has the lowest index in Southwark, London, at 38/100, with 1,246 reported incidents within 1 km of its centre. A low score means more is reported around that centre, which busy commercial and transport areas produce simply by having more people in them — it is not a measure of how dangerous a resident's street is.

Is Southwark, London safe?

Across its 23 neighbourhoods the median SafeRoute safety index is 57/100, against 60 across Inner London. 5 rate low risk, 11 moderate, 7 elevated and 0 high risk. These describe reported crime only and vary widely within the borough — check the individual neighbourhood rather than reading one number for the whole of it.

How is the SafeRoute safety index calculated?

SafeRoute weights each police-recorded incident by severity (violence weighs more than shoplifting), sums the last available period within 1 km of the neighbourhood centre, and normalises against national crime rates onto a 0–100 scale — higher is safer. It describes reported crime only; it is not a guarantee of safety. The figure shown for Southwark, London is the median of its 23 neighbourhoods — the borough is not measured separately.

Methodology

Each incident published by the police (via data.police.uk, Open Government Licence) is weighted by severity — violence counts for more than shoplifting. For every ward we sum weighted incidents within 1 km of its centre (ONS December 2025 ward centroids), and normalise onto a 0–100 index, higher = safer. Incident locations are anonymised by the police to nearby snap points, so the maps show streets rather than exact addresses. Pages regenerate as new data is published.

The index compares neighbourhoods within Inner London. It is not comparable between cities: each police force publishes a different set of offences over a different period — London's figures cannot be read against another city's on the same 0–100 scale.