Crime in Waterloo, Iowa
Major crime in Waterloo is 1.7 times the U.S. rate per resident: 1.5 times for persons crimes and 1.7 times for property crimes. Expected major crimes are down 3.3% from a year earlier.
Modeled estimates per resident, not counts of incidents. How we calculated this
Index: crimes per resident compared with the U.S., where 100 is the U.S. rate and 200 is twice it.
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Drugs and alcohol stands out most, at 4.4 times the U.S. rate
Expected crimes per year in Waterloo for each type, and the index against the U.S. rate per resident.
Citywide indexWhere the middle half of residents live
Property crimes
Social disorder
How crime varies across Waterloo
The middle half of Waterloo residents live in neighborhoods with a major-crime index between 82 and 169; the typical (median) resident's is 115. The citywide figure (171) is higher than that because crime concentrates in a smaller set of areas.
- 0–500.0%
- 50–10039.1%
- 100–20038.2%
- 200–40017.7%
- 400+5.1%
Share of residents by the index of their census block group, a neighborhood of roughly 600 to 3,000 people.
Highest on Friday and Saturday nights
Major-crime index by time of week, against the U.S. rate for the same hours.
Major crime fell 3.3% in a year; across Iowa it fell 10.5%
Change in expected crimes, with Iowa as a whole in gray. The past year uses the reporting agencies' year-to-date FBI data; 2031 is the model's projection.
Waterloo against U.S. places with 50,000 to 100,000 residents
61 of the 540 other places of this size have a higher major-crime index than Waterloo; the middle of the group is 92. The 9 nearest in population:
Major-crime index per resident, U.S. = 100; residents in gray.
Waterloo has a higher major-crime index than all of its 8 nearest neighbors
The 8 nearest cities and towns we cover, by major-crime index. The closest, Evansdale (4 mi), is 50% below Waterloo's rate.
Major-crime index per resident, U.S. = 100; distances between where residents live, in miles.
Questions about crime in Waterloo
What are the most common crimes in Waterloo?
By expected count, the most common persons and property crimes are shoplifting (about 553 a year), other larceny (about 438 a year) and aggravated assault (about 274 a year). Compared with the U.S., drugs and alcohol stands out most: 4.4 times the U.S. rate per resident.
How we calculated this
Each police agency's crimes, as reported to the FBI, are spread across the census block groups it serves using population, jobs, points of interest and, where available, local incident records. Waterloo's figures add up its 54 block groups. The index compares crimes per resident with the U.S. rate.
- Waterloo has no published incident records in our data, so its estimate relies on agency totals and neighborhood characteristics.
- 94.5% of residents live in block groups whose estimate has high confidence (80% interval within about 5x).
- Rates are per resident, so places where many people work or visit but few live, such as downtowns, airports and stadiums, can read high.
- Disorderly conduct and trespassing are modeled, because the FBI records them only through arrests.
- Residents: 67,643. Model updated Oct 20, 2026. Release 2026-2026-10-20-2
Full method and validation·Data sources
CrimeMetric. "Crime in Waterloo, Iowa." Vorp Labs, model updated Oct 20, 2026. https://crimemetric.com/ia/waterloo
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Major-crime index, U.S. = 100
- Evansdale4 mi85
- Cedar Falls6 mi71
- Waverly18 mi68
- Independence23 mi49
- Oelwein26 mi55
- Vinton28 mi27
- Eldora38 mi116
- Marshalltown42 mi81