How safe are Bucharest, Brașov, Cluj or Craiova compared to other European cities. And what place does Romania occupy in the world crime list
Romania is a safer country than France, Belgium, Italy, Germany or Spain, according to the 2026 ranking published by Numbeo,a platform that monitors, among other things, the cost, quality of life and crime indices in the world. The platform also analyzed over 150 European cities, including Bucharest, Brașov, Cluj, Craiova and Constanța.
“Romania – among the safest countries in the world”, the Minister of the Interior, Cătălin Predoiu, wrote on Facebook on Saturday, citing the list made by the international platform Numbeo, which collects data provided by citizens from all over the world regarding their perception of the level of safety and crime in certain areas.
The platform ranked 150 countries in the world according to the crime index: the higher it is and the higher the place occupied by a state, the more unsafe it is. In this ranking, Romania occupies, with a crime index of 32.8 and a safety index of 67.2, the 114th position, being in the third safe place globally.
European safety map. Source: Numbeo
In the European ranking, Romania occupies a better position, 28, than France, Belgium, Ireland, Great Britain, which is at the top of the ranking, as well as Italy, Germany and Spain
Crime in Bulgaria is also perceived by citizens to be more serious than that in Romania. The same goes for crime in Hungary and the Republic of Moldova.
At the opposite pole, countries such as Poland, Austria, Switzerland, Finland, the Czech Republic and Denmark are considered safer than Romania, with a crime rate below 30.
In the global top, citizens placed Papua New Guinea, Venezuela and Haiti as the countries with the highest crime rate.
Analysis of crime in the big cities in Romania
Regarding the perceived level of crime in European cities, the graph made by Numbeo for 2026 shows that, at the European level, large cities in Romania are perceived as relatively safe.
The highest crime rates in Romania are in Constanța and Craiova (56th and 65th respectively). But these are well below the level of many Western European cities, for example Marseille and Birmingham, which take the 1st and 2nd places.
Bucharest ranks 114th out of 153, with an index of approximately 28.5, which places it at a lower level of crime than cities such as Paris, London, Brussels and in the area of cities considered safe or moderate.
At the opposite pole, the cities in the west and center are considered the safest: Timișoara (127th place), Brașov (131st place) and Cluj-Napoca (141st place).
What Predoiu says
Minister Cătălin Predoiu presented a balance sheet of police activities “in the war against organized crime”: “13,786 home searches in one year on suspects of serious crimes. Over 1,800 large-scale actions to combat organized crime. 123 criminal groups destroyed. Over 3 tons of high-risk and high-risk drugs confiscated,” wrote Cătălin Predoiu.
He added that “all this can be translated into a globally recognized result: Romania – among the safest countries in the world”.
How Numbeo gets its data and makes its rankings
Numbeo's data comes from surveys answered by people entering the website, structured similarly to established scientific and government surveys. Individual responses are assigned a numerical value between -2 (indicating a strongly negative perception) and +2 (indicating a strongly positive perception).
“To maintain data accuracy, we use spam filtering algorithms that exclude entries from users exhibiting suspicious behavior. Survey results are then scaled from 0 to 100 for easier interpretation and comparison,” according to Numbeo.
The index, continuously updated, is compiled with data from the last 5 years. The semi-annual index is calculated twice a year by incorporating the most recent data into the historical view.
The crime index estimates the overall level of crime in a city or country. It is classified as follows:
- Very low: 20 and below
- Low: 20.01-40
- Moderate: 40.01-60
- Raised: 60.01-80
- Very high: over 80
