Photo: NC Aquarium PKS · CC BY 3.0Pine Knoll Shores records less violent crime per head than 94% of U.S. towns
Its letter overall is A−: less crime per resident than 82% of U.S. towns, from crimes its police reported through 2023 to 2025. Year on year, 0.2 violent crime and 6.7 incidents of property crime occur per 1,000 residents, compared with 5.0 and 27.9 in the rest of North Carolina.
Crimes reported to the FBI per 1,000 residents a year, 2023–2025. “Rest of NC” is every other North Carolina city and town in the FBI’s tables; the U.S. figure is the FBI’s national estimate as published, averaged over the three years. The FBI publishes no national homicide or robbery rate in our data, so those compare with all U.S. cities and towns in its tables.
What stands out about safety in Pine Knoll Shores
Pine Knoll Shores reports less crime than every graded town next door
Of the 1 North Carolina towns on Pine Knoll Shores’ borders, 1 have a Safety Grade: Atlantic Beach (D). Neighbors ↓
Written from the FBI data on this page. Figures are crimes reported to police, not convictions.
What’s behind Pine Knoll Shores’ grade
Property crimes plus four times violent crimes reported to the FBI per resident, 2023–2025, on a national curve. Both violent and property crime are lower than in most U.S. towns; violent crime is the stronger of the two.
Violent crime, by year and by type
Show as a table
| Year | Pine Knoll Shores | Rest of North Carolina | U.S. (FBI national estimate) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 0.7 | 5.7 | 4.0 |
| 2023 | 0.0 | 5.5 | 3.9 |
| 2024 | 0.0 | 5.3 | 3.6 |
| 2025 | 0.7 | 4.4 | 3.3 |
Violent crimes per 1,000 residents
By type 2023–2025, counts
Pine Knoll Shores’ police reported 1 violent crimes to the FBI over 2023–2025, about 0.2 per 1,000 residents a year, against 5.0 in the rest of North Carolina and the FBI’s national estimate of 3.6.
Crime in Pine Knoll Shores per 1,000 residents
Violent crime per 1,000 residents, 2025
Property crime per 1,000 residents, 2025
Crimes reported to police in 2025 per resident; one person can be the victim of more than one, and some reports involve visitors.
And about 1 violent crime, in 2025. Below are 1,000 dots, one per resident; each colored dot is one reported crime.
Reported crime is steady
Show as a table
| Year | Pine Knoll Shores property | Rest of North Carolina property | Pine Knoll Shores violent | Rest of North Carolina violent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 12.2 | 28.9 | 0.7 | 5.7 |
| 2023 | 7.7 | 29.6 | 0.0 | 5.5 |
| 2024 | 6.2 | 28.8 | 0.0 | 5.3 |
| 2025 | 6.2 | 25.2 | 0.7 | 4.4 |
Crimes per 1,000 residents
Reported crime per resident was steady from 2023 to 2025: the change is within ordinary year-to-year swings. Per 1,000 residents, 2022–2025, against the rest of North Carolina.
10 crimes reported in 2025
2025 offenses reported
Offenses reported to police, not convictions. FBI Uniform Crime Reporting. The last row is counted outside the property total.
1 violent and 9 property, as reported to the FBI by Pine Knoll Shores’ police.
No one died in a crash on Pine Knoll Shores’s roads in 2019–2023
That is about what is typical for North Carolina towns of 2,500–5,000 people: at their median rate (7.4 deaths per 100,000 residents a year), a town of Pine Knoll Shores’s size would see about 0 in five years. With numbers this small, a death or two either way changes the picture, so Pine Knoll Shores’s own rate (0.0) is context, not a ranking.
Deaths are counted where the crash happened, not where the people lived: a highway through town adds through-traffic deaths, and residents’ own risk on roads elsewhere isn’t here. Town rates sit below state and U.S. rates because a third of fatal crashes happen outside any town. Road safety is described here and is not part of the Safety Grade. Source: NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), 2019–2023.
Pine Knoll Shores and its neighbors
| Town | Grade | Violent | Property |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pine Knoll Shores | A− | 0.2 | 6.7 |
| Atlantic Beach | D | 6.6 | 39.6 |
Crimes reported to the FBI per 1,000 residents a year, 2023–2025.
North Carolina towns of a similar size
| Town | Grade | Violent | Property |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pine Knoll Shores | A− | 0.2 | 6.7 |
| Biltmore Forest | A− | 0.2 | 6.4 |
| Broadway | B | 0.7 | 12.5 |
| Bryson City | C− | 5.5 | 13.3 |
| Weldon | C− | 2.9 | 27.0 |
| West Jefferson | D | 1.0 | 61.9 |
The five graded North Carolina towns closest to Pine Knoll Shores’ population (1,423), by grade.
How reported crime compares across the town line. Tap a town to see its safety page.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- It’s reported crime. Only incidents reported to and recorded by police appear here. Many crimes are never reported to police.
- One number for all of Pine Knoll Shores. A town-wide rate doesn’t show where incidents happen, and that can differ a lot from one part of town to another.
- Visitors count too. Incidents involving people who work, shop or visit are counted against Pine Knoll Shores’ residents, which raises the per-resident rate.
- Whose population. Rates use the FBI’s population for the department (1,448 in 2025); our figure for Pine Knoll Shores is 1,423 (2025 Census estimate).
- Gaps are real gaps. A missing year means the department didn’t report a full year, not that nothing happened.
How the grade is calculated, for every town: How TownRatings grades safety →
Questions about safety in Pine Knoll Shores
Is Pine Knoll Shores, NC safe?
On crimes reported to the FBI in 2023–2025, Pine Knoll Shores reports less crime per resident than 82% of U.S. towns, an A− Safety Grade. Its police reported 0.2 violent crimes per 1,000 residents a year, against 5.0 in the rest of North Carolina and the FBI’s national estimate of 3.6.
What is the crime rate in Pine Knoll Shores?
0.2 violent and 6.7 property crimes per 1,000 residents a year, 2023–2025, as reported to the FBI. The rest of North Carolina reports 5.0 and 27.9; the FBI’s national estimate is 3.6 and 17.6.
Is Pine Knoll Shores safer than Atlantic Beach?
Atlantic Beach reports more crime per resident than Pine Knoll Shores: Atlantic Beach grades D for safety and Pine Knoll Shores A−. Atlantic Beach’s police reported 6.6 violent and 39.6 property crimes per 1,000 residents a year, 2023–2025.
Who polices Pine Knoll Shores?
Pine Knoll Shores’s own police department, which reports to the FBI as “Pine Knoll Shores”. Its figures are the ones on this page.
Heads-up board
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Please don’t name or describe individuals. In an emergency, call 911.
Neighbors looking out for each other in Pine Knoll Shores.
Crime: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program, Crime Data Explorer: offenses known to law enforcement by city, 2025, and state and national rates. Counts are crimes reported to police, not convictions. The Safety Grade is our own summary of that data, not an official rating. Road deaths: NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), 2019–2023. This isn’t an official statement of public safety. In an emergency, call 911.