Crime & Safety
01
Recorded index crime is down 53% since 2016.
PDRM recorded 52,444 index crimes in 2023 — about 157 per 100,000 residents against DOSM's 2023 estimate. What the police record, how it has moved since 2016, and where — always as a rate beside the count.
Recorded index crimes · 2023
52,444
assault and property categories combined, as recorded by PDRM
Per 100,000 residents
157
recorded incidents per 100,000 residents, using DOSM's 2023 national estimate (33.4M)
Since 2016
−53.3%
change in recorded index crimes, 2016 → 2023 (112,355 → 52,444)
Property vs assault
80 / 20
41,991 property crimes to 10,453 assault crimes in 2023
Recorded crime is not all crime
Every figure on this page counts crimes recorded by the Royal Malaysia Police in its two index categories. An incident that is never reported to the police — or reported but not recorded — never enters this series, and reporting rates differ by crime type and by place. These numbers describe police records, not the full extent of crime in Malaysia.
PDRM (Royal Malaysia Police) — crime_district (recorded index crimes, annual), via the data.gov.my open API · retrieved 2026-10-12 09:42 UTC
Crimes recorded by police in PDRM's two index categories (assault and property), 2016–2023. Recorded crime undercounts actual crime: incidents never reported to police never enter this series. Rates per 100,000 residents use DOSM population estimates (national 2023; states 2023). Fraud, cybercrime and drug offences are not in this dataset.
The long view
02
From 112,355 to 52,444 recorded crimes a year.
The recorded total fell 53% between 2016 and 2023, including 6 consecutive year-over-year declines through 2022; the 2023 reading turned 3.2% higher than the year before. Property crime sets the shape of the line: 8 of every 10 index crimes recorded in 2023 were property crimes.
Total recorded index crimes
Property
Assault
Thousands of recorded crimes per year; the two category lines sum to the total. A falling line means fewer crimes recorded — it cannot, on its own, separate less crime from less reporting.
Where and what
03
Kuala Lumpur records 227 incidents per 100,000 residents; Kelantan, 107.
Every reported jurisdiction in 2023, sorted by recorded incidents per 100,000 residents — the rate is what makes a populous state and a small one comparable. Kuala Lumpur had the most recorded incidents per resident, Kelantan the fewest.
| State / territory | Recorded crimes | Per 100,000 residents |
|---|---|---|
| Kuala Lumpur | 4,540 | 227 |
| Kedah | 4,567 | 209 |
| Penang | 3,604 | 203 |
| Selangor | 13,739 | 191 |
| Sarawak | 4,045 | 161 |
| Negeri Sembilan | 1,895 | 155 |
| Melaka | 1,457 | 142 |
| Perak | 3,572 | 141 |
| Johor | 5,330 | 130 |
| Perlis | 339 | 116 |
| Sabah | 4,117 | 115 |
| Pahang | 1,875 | 114 |
| Terengganu | 1,370 | 113 |
| Kelantan | 1,994 | 107 |
PDRM recorded index crimes, 2023; rates use DOSM's 2023 state population estimates. Recorded crime undercounts actual crime, and reporting rates differ by place — a higher rate means more recorded incidents per resident, nothing more. Labuan and Putrajaya are not reported separately in this dataset.
What was recorded · 2023
| Recorded type | Cases | Share of recorded crime |
|---|---|---|
| Other theft property | 15,837 | 30.2% |
| Break-in property | 11,557 | 22.0% |
| Motorcycle theft property | 10,588 | 20.2% |
| Causing injury assault | 3,693 | 7.0% |
| Car theft property | 3,245 | 6.2% |
| Gang robbery, unarmed assault | 2,578 | 4.9% |
| Solo robbery, unarmed assault | 1,967 | 3.8% |
| Rape assault | 1,914 | 3.6% |
| Lorry / van theft property | 764 | 1.5% |
| Murder assault | 258 | 0.5% |
| Gang robbery, armed assault | 30 | 0.1% |
| Solo robbery, armed assault | 13 | 0.0% |
Every recorded type in both index categories, 2023. Shares are of all 52,444 recorded index crimes that year. Fraud, cybercrime and drug offences are not in this dataset.
Did you know
Other theft is the most common entry in the ledger.
15,837 of the 52,444 index crimes recorded in 2023 — 30% — were classed as other theft, a property crime. The least common recorded type, solo robbery, armed, had 13 cases.
Computed from PDRM recorded-crime data via data.gov.my
28% of recorded index crime is vehicle theft.
Motorcycles account for most of it: 10,588 recorded thefts in 2023, or 20% of all recorded index crimes.
Computed from PDRM recorded-crime data via data.gov.my
The recorded total fell in 6 of 7 year-over-year steps.
The longest stretch ran 6 years, from the 2017 reading through 2022. The latest step points up: the 2023 total was 3.2% higher than the year before.
Computed from PDRM recorded-crime data via data.gov.my
Deep data
03.3
Reported, recorded, convicted — three different numbers.
A crime becomes a statistic here only when someone tells the police and the police open a record in one of two index categories. Each step loses cases. That is why this chapter reads direction and composition from the series, and never treats a single count as the amount of crime in Malaysia.
Years covered
2016–2023
annual recorded-crime series, refreshed yearly on data.gov.my
Categories
2
assault and property — 12 recorded types in 2023
Latest year
2023
the most recent full year in the published series
Data as of
2023-12-31
the publisher's own data_as_of stamp for this catalogue
Reported ≠ recorded ≠ convicted
This series counts crimes recorded by the police. Beneath it sits a larger pool of incidents that were never reported; above it, a smaller set that reached charges and convictions. Court outcomes are a different dataset entirely and are not shown here.
Police districts are not administrative districts
The district column in this catalogue follows PDRM's policing boundaries, which do not always match the administrative districts used elsewhere in this library. This chapter therefore aggregates to states, where the two systems agree.
Why per-100,000 matters
A populous state can record more crimes than a small one while its residents see fewer incidents per person. Dividing by population puts every jurisdiction on one scale — it is why each count on this page carries a rate beside it, with the population vintage named.
What this dataset excludes
The two index categories cover assault and property crimes only. Fraud, cybercrime and drug offences are not in this dataset, so nothing on this page speaks to them — their absence here says nothing about their prevalence.
Every rate on this page borrows its denominator from the Population chapter — DOSM's estimates are what turn a count of records into incidents per 100,000 residents.
PDRM (Royal Malaysia Police) — crime_district (recorded index crimes, annual), via the data.gov.my open API · retrieved 2026-10-12 09:42 UTC
Crimes recorded by police in PDRM's two index categories (assault and property), 2016–2023. Recorded crime undercounts actual crime: incidents never reported to police never enter this series. Rates per 100,000 residents use DOSM population estimates (national 2023; states 2023). Fraud, cybercrime and drug offences are not in this dataset.
Counts only become comparable once you know how many people live behind them — the denominators come from Population.