Crime and justice

Recorded crimes (Scotland)

The number of crimes recorded by Police Scotland in each council area in the year.

Level of detail
Council
Published for
Nation and Council
Covers
Scotland
Updates
Yearly
Latest period
2025/26
Published
13 August 2026
Fetched by Open Index
15 October 2026
Licence
Open Government Licence 3.0

Where it covers

  • Scotland
  • England(not covered)
  • Wales(not covered)
  • Northern Ireland(not covered)

This layer covers Scotland only. For England, see street-level crime.

This layer covers Scotland only. For Wales, see street-level crime.

This layer covers Scotland only. For Northern Ireland, see street-level crime.

  • England0 of 296 councils have a figure
  • Wales0 of 22 councils have a figure
  • Scotland32 of 32 councils have a figure
  • Northern Ireland0 of 11 councils have a figure

329 councils have no figure for 2025/26. The map hatches each one and gives the reason.

  • This layer covers Scotland only. For England, see street-level crime. Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, Stockton-on-Tees, Darlington, Halton and 290 more
  • This layer covers Scotland only. For Wales, see street-level crime. Isle of Anglesey, Gwynedd, Conwy, Denbighshire, Flintshire, Wrexham and 16 more
  • This layer covers Scotland only. For Northern Ireland, see street-level crime. Antrim and Newtownabbey, Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon, Belfast, Causeway Coast and Glens, Derry City and Strabane, Fermanagh and Omagh and 5 more

How it is made

Open Index shows the figures as Scottish Government publishes them, for the areas they were published for: nations and councils.

Counts for larger areas are added up from councils.

Zoom in past council level and the map keeps the council shapes and says so, rather than inventing detail.

  • Nation1996/97 to 2025/26 (30 periods)
  • Council1996/97 to 2025/26 (30 periods)

Before you use it

  • These are crimes recorded by Police Scotland, not all the crime that happens. Changes in the law and in how police record crime change the figures.
  • Counts mostly follow how many people live in an area. To compare areas, use the recorded crime rate.
  • All crimes here means Groups 1 to 5 in the Scottish Government's classification, which are the more serious crimes. It leaves out lesser offences such as antisocial behaviour and road traffic offences.
  • Crimes are counted in the year the police record them, which is not always the year they happened. Years run from 1 April to 31 March.
  • Council counts add up to the Scotland count in every year.
  • Scottish figures are not directly comparable with England, Wales or Northern Ireland. Scotland tends to record each crime in an incident, where England and Wales tend to record only the most serious one.

Colours on the map

Fixed breaks, held for every period, so colours mean the same over time.

Source and licence

Scottish Government, from Police Scotland
Edition
Recorded crimes and offences 1996/97 to 2025/26
Published
13 August 2026
Fetched by Open Index
15 October 2026
Credit line

Source: Scottish Government, Recorded Crimes and Offences (data.gov.scot). Crown copyright. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

Use this data

GET /v1/layers/crime-scotland-count