Is Panama Safer Than Costa Rica?
Is Panama safer than Costa Rica? 2025 homicide counts, where the violence clusters, and what those national rates do not say about a neighborhood.
This page compares published homicide counts. It is not a promise that a neighborhood, a building, or a commute is safe, and it is not a reason to ignore ordinary precautions. Figures marked preliminary by the source can move.
On the 2025 counts, Panama recorded fewer homicide victims than Costa Rica. Costa Rica’s judicial police figures, as reported by La Nación and CR Hoy, were 873 homicides, about 16.7 per 100,000. Panama’s Public Ministry recorded 593 homicide victims. As of October 2026, that Ministry file does not print a rate. Secondary reports indicate a lower rate than Costa Rica’s. Check the current figure with the Public Ministry before treating any rate as official.
The Costa Rica vs Panama hub keeps the short version inside the wider expat comparison. This page is the crime, the cities, and the risks that are not crime. Crypto company setup and crypto tax are separate decisions. The relocation guide is the moving checklist. Open Horizon is the managed move.
The counts, and what they are not
| Costa Rica | Panama | |
|---|---|---|
| 2025 homicide victims | 873, reported from the judicial police by La Nación and CR Hoy | 593, Public Ministry open-data file for the full year |
| 2025 rate | About 16.7 per 100,000 in those reports | Not printed in the Public Ministry count file. As of October 2026, secondary reports indicate a lower rate than Costa Rica’s. Check the current figure with the Public Ministry before treating any rate as official. |
| Recent shape | La Nación: 654 in 2022, 905 in 2023 (the worst year it cites), 876 in 2024, 873 in 2025. The rate moved from about 12.6 to about 16.7 over those four years. | La Prensa, citing the Ministry: 583 victims in 2024 and 593 in 2025, an increase of 10. |
| 2026 so far | No full-year official rate is used here. The interim judicial-police director told La Nación that, if conditions do not change, 2026 could look like 2024 and 2025. | Public Ministry, January through July 2026, preliminary: 351 victims, against 339 in the same months of 2025. |
La Nación’s series for Costa Rica is 654 homicides in 2022, 905 in 2023 (the worst year it cites), 876 in 2024, and 873 in 2025. The hub uses that 876 count for 2024. The rate on the hub, 16.6 per 100,000, is the figure that page was already using. La Nación describes the rate moving from about 12.6 to about 16.7 across those four years.
Most of these deaths are not a random sample of residents. In the Panama file, 557 of 593 victims in 2025 were men, 35 were women, and 518 were killed with a firearm. The largest adult band in that file is ages 18 to 24 (128 victims). A national rate is the wrong number for a retiree in a specific building. It is the right number for “which country had more lethal violence.”
Where the violence sits
Costa Rica’s 2025 coverage, from the judicial police via CR Hoy, puts the concentration in the center of the country and on the Caribbean. The hub already names Limón and parts of San José as the micro-trafficking pattern behind the 2024 jump. We do not have an official table, in the sources for this page, that gives a homicide rate for a beach town or an expat suburb. Do not invent one from a forum.
Panama’s violence is also concentrated. InSight Crime, using the 2025 Ministry figures, says more than 40% of cases were in Panama province and 20% in Colón. The Ministry’s own January–July 2026 file, which it marks preliminary and which can change as investigations move, shows 351 victims: Panama province 153, San Miguelito 70, Colón 60, Panama Oeste 31, Chiriquí 19. Against the same months of 2025, Colón was down (75 to 60) and Chiriquí was up sharply (6 to 19). A small province can post a large percentage change on a small base. It is still a change worth noticing if Chiriquí is the plan.
Cities and the places expats actually name
The relocation guide names Panama City, Boquete, and Coronado as the usual expat split: city, mountains, beach. It also says some of those areas have low crime rates. The Ministry tables used here do not print a rate for Boquete, Coronado, San Francisco, Punta Paitilla, Costa del Este, or any other neighborhood. This page does not repeat “low crime” as a statistic. A street can be calm inside a province that leads the national count.
- Panama City and San Miguelito. Panama province and San Miguelito account for a large share of the victims. The capital is not one place. Residential towers and the districts where the killings cluster are different maps. Choose the building and the hour, not the city brand.
- Colón. The port province is a large share of the national total and a trafficking corridor in the InSight account. It is not the usual family base. A free-zone business trip is not the same decision as living there.
- Panama Oeste. Arraiján, La Chorrera, and the western suburbs show up as their own line in the 2026 partial file (31 victims). Growth and a commute do not make a district invisible.
- Chiriquí, Boquete, and the border. The full-year province is a small share of Panama’s killings, and the partial 2026 file is higher than the year before. People also ask about earthquakes. Chiriquí sits on Volcán Barú and on the Costa Rica border, in a region where seismic risk is a planning item separate from homicide. Check current alerts with SINAPROC in Panama and the Comisión Nacional de Prevención de Riesgos y Atención de Emergencias in Costa Rica. This page does not quote a magnitude.
- Costa Rica’s Central Valley and Limón. That is where the 2025 official commentary places the heat. Beach and mountain towns can feel unlike the national rate. Without a town-level judicial-police table, the honest line is that we cannot show they match it, or that they escape it.
Practical habits from the relocation guide still stand, and they are not a crime statistic: don’t flash phones and jewelry, don’t walk an unfamiliar street late, and use a registered car. They apply in both countries.
The expat survey is not the crime table
InterNations’ Expat Insider survey ranked Panama first overall in 2024, 2025, and 2026. In 2023 it was third, so “number one for several years” means those three editions, not a decade. The 2026 edition is first of 31 destinations. InterNations says the fieldwork ran from 1 February to 31 March 2026. Panama led Working Abroad and Personal Finance and placed sixth for Quality of Life. In the 2025 country chapter, Safety & Security had moved from 27th to 5th. That is expats rating their own life, among people who answered a survey. It is useful as a satisfaction signal. It does not cancel 593 homicide victims, and it does not measure Costa Rica in the same table unless that edition included it. We are not using the survey as a safety ranking against Costa Rica.
Both countries can be less comfortable than their brochure. Costa Rica’s jump since 2022 is the larger break with its old reputation. Panama’s 2025 count is a bit higher than 2024, not a collapse, and the partial 2026 file is a bit higher than the same months of 2025. “Safer than Costa Rica on the 2025 homicide comparison” and “as safe as it felt ten years ago” are different sentences.
How this fits the move
If the question is only “is Panama safer than Costa Rica,” the 2025 victim counts point to Panama. If the question is “where do we live,” the province table matters more than the national one, and a visa, a school, and a hospital still sit on the hub and the relocation guide. Open Horizon is the mandate for people who want that landing managed. Crime is not the crypto question: company structure is on the VASP page, tax on the tax page.
Sources
- La Nación, on the 2025 rate of 16.7, the 873 homicides, and the 2022–2024 series: nacion.com.
- CR Hoy, judicial police close of 2025 (873 homicides, rate 16.7, concentration in the center and the Caribbean): crhoy.com.
- Public Ministry of Panama, 2025 homicide-victim file (593), via the open-data portal: datosabiertos.gob.pa.
- Public Ministry, victims 1 January–31 July 2026 (preliminary): ministeriopublico.gob.pa.
- La Prensa, 593 victims in 2025 and 583 in 2024: prensa.com.
- InSight Crime, 2025 homicide round-up (share of cases in Panama province and Colón). This page does not take a Panama homicide rate from that round-up, because the Public Ministry file does not print one: insightcrime.org.
- InterNations Expat Insider, Panama chapters and the 2026 ranking: 2026, 2025, 2024, 2026 top ten.
Frequently asked questions
Is Panama safer than Costa Rica?
On the 2025 counts, yes: Panama’s Public Ministry recorded 593 homicide victims, and Costa Rica’s judicial police figures reported by La Nación and CR Hoy were 873, about 16.7 per 100,000. As of October 2026, the Ministry file does not print a Panama rate. Secondary reports indicate a lower rate than Costa Rica’s. Check the current figure with the Public Ministry. A national rate is not a street.
Which cities should expats look at in Panama versus Costa Rica?
The relocation guide names Panama City, Boquete, and Coronado as the usual Panama split. Ministry tables do not print a rate for those neighborhoods. In Costa Rica, 2025 commentary puts the concentration in the center of the country and on the Caribbean, including patterns around San José and Limón. Choose a street, not a national brand.
Are earthquakes a reason to avoid western Panama?
Chiriquí and the Costa Rica border are a seismic region, separate from homicide. Volcán Barú is part of that geography. Check SINAPROC and Costa Rica’s emergency commission for current alerts. This page does not quote a magnitude or call any town earthquake-proof.
Does the InterNations ranking prove Panama is safer?
No. InterNations ranked Panama first overall in its Expat Insider survey in 2024, 2025, and 2026. That is expats rating their own life. In 2025 its Safety and Security subcategory was 5th. It is not a homicide table and it is not a finding that Panama is safer than Costa Rica.
