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There were approximately 507,100 shoplifting offences recorded by the police in England and Wales in 2025/26, the highest in this provided time period. Although the annual number of shoplifting offences was quite stable before the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a sharp rise in shoplifting since then. The 2020/21 and 2021/20 reporting years are not directly comparable to the other reporting years due to COVID-19 lockdowns that occurred at that time. 

Areas with the highest shoplifting rate

In 2024/25, the shoplifting rate for England and Wales as a whole was 8.7 shoplifting offences per 1,000 population. Looking at individual police force areas, the area covered by Cleveland Police Force in North East England had the highest shoplifting rate of 14.2 , followed by Nottinghamshire Police Force, in the East Midlands, at 13 . By contrast, the Dyfed-Powys Police Force Area, in Wales had the lowest shoplifting rate of just 3.9 offences per 1,000 population. Although Cleveland also had the highest overall crime rate in England and Wales, and Dyfed-Powys had one of the lowest, Nottinghamshire's crime rate was slightly below the overall average, despite having such a high shoplifting rate. 

Comparisons with other theft offences

Shoplifting is one of the major sub-categories of theft in the jurisdiction of England and Wales. Although shoplifting offences have increased significantly recently, the number of theft offences overall has generally been falling. In 2002/03 for example, there were approximately 3.41 million incidences of theft, compared with just 1.78 million in 2024/25. This trend has been driven by declines in other types of crime, such as burglary and motor vehicle theft which have both fallen considerably when compared to the early 2000s. The sharp increase of fraud offences also reflects how the nature of property crime has evolved in recent years.