Wotton-under-Edge is a safe place to live, and it is safer than the district around it. Recorded crime runs about a quarter below the local average. Joblessness is very low, and so is overcrowding. Crime is low enough that a handful of incidents can shift the breakdown by several points. What it does have is more antisocial behaviour than its share would suggest, which in a town this size mostly means noise.
Police recorded 216 crimes in Wotton-under-Edge in the year from June 2025 to May 2026, a published rate of about 33 per 1,000 residents. That is roughly 27% below the average for Stroud district.
Across Stroud district as a whole, the published rate for the same year is about 46 crimes per 1,000 residents, compared with about 33 here. Wotton is the calmer part of a district that is not especially rough to begin with.
Within the town's built-up area, people live at an average of about 2,900 per square kilometre, so the old streets on the slope are more closely packed than the fields around them suggest. Unemployment is about 1% and about 2% of households are overcrowded. None of those figures causes crime or prevents it. They describe a town of owners, earners and spare bedrooms.
The breakdown needs care, because the totals are small. Violence and sexual offences make up about 38% of recorded crime here against about 35% nationally, which is close to the norm. That category also covers a wide legal range, including common assault where nobody is hurt. Antisocial behaviour stands out more, at about 31% of the total against 16% nationally. Other theft is about 8% against 7%, criminal damage and arson about 5% against 7%, and burglary about 4% against 4%. At 216 crimes a year, a few rowdy weekends can move a share by several points, so the mix describes one year and not the character of the town. The worst violence on record near the Ancient Ram Inn was the Battle of Nibley Green in 1470, when Berkeley's men won and then sacked the manor. The modern figures are tame by comparison.
What happens after a report depends on the county force, not the town. Gloucestershire Constabulary charged a suspect in about 9% of cases over the year to May 2026, against about 12% nationally, which puts it 39th of 42 forces in England and Wales. About a third of its cases, 33%, were closed with nobody identified, and its published outcomes cover eight months of that year. Those figures are about the force, not the town. They tell you what to expect if you are a victim, not how likely you are to become one, and on that question the force does worse than the town does.
Safety is one of Wotton-under-Edge's real strengths. Crime is low, and the people who do report something have more reason to worry about Gloucestershire Constabulary's clear-up rate than about the streets.