Richmond is less safe than its reputation, and well below the standard of its own borough. Recorded crime runs around four in ten above the borough average. Most of it is nuisance, theft and things taken from cars. Serious violence is a smaller share here than across the country. The money in the streets is what draws the trouble.
The Metropolitan Police recorded 3,152 crimes in Richmond in the year from June 2025 to May 2026, a published rate of about 105 per 1,000 residents. That is roughly 42% above the average for Richmond upon Thames.
Across the whole of Richmond upon Thames, the published rate for the same year was about 74 per 1,000, so the borough's main town carries a noticeably heavier load than the borough it gives its name to. Kew and North Sheen are counted inside Richmond's figure, so the town centre and its quieter neighbours share one number. The police.uk street map breaks reported crime down month by month, and an evening look at the streets around a shortlisted address costs nothing.
This is a dense place, with about 8,000 people per square kilometre on average, and a comfortable one. About 3% of residents were unemployed at the 2021 Census and about 4% of households were overcrowded. None of that explains the crime rate by itself. It describes a busy, well-off town with a major shopping centre on George Street and plenty of people passing through it.
Anti-social behaviour is the biggest category, at about 23% of recorded crime against 16% across England and Wales. Violence and sexual offences come next at about 20%, well under the national share of 35%, and that category covers everything from common assault without injury upward. Vehicle crime makes up about 12% against 5% nationally, shoplifting 11% against 8%, other theft 8% against 7%, and burglary 6% against 4%. Richmond's crime goes after property far more than people, and the parked cars are doing more than their share of the suffering.
What happens after a report is a force-wide question. The Metropolitan Police charges a suspect in about 10% of cases, against about 12% nationally, which puts it 33rd of 42 forces in England and Wales over the year to May 2026. In about 53% of its cases the investigation closed with nobody identified. That describes the Met across London, and it answers a different question from how much crime Richmond has. For a car broken into on a Richmond street, it does mean the odds of a name at the end are slim.
Richmond is a poor bet on safety by the standards of its own borough, mostly because of what happens to property and to the peace on a busy night. The cars and the shop shelves take far more of it than the people do.