New York Risk Spotlight: the highest- and lowest-risk counties (July 2026)
Published 2026-07-17
Every county in New York carries a different mix of natural-hazard, road-safety and crime risk. RiskIndex scores all of them on a single 0–100 composite scale (higher = riskier) built entirely from official U.S. government data — FEMA, NHTSA and the FBI. Here's how New York's counties stack up this month.
The 5 highest-risk counties in New York
| # | County | Composite | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Suffolk County | 52.2 | C |
| 2 | Sullivan County | 50.9 | C |
| 3 | Delaware County | 50.5 | C |
| 4 | Chenango County | 50.4 | C |
| 5 | Erie County | 49.4 | C |
Across these five, the biggest risk driver is natural hazards (wildfire, flood, severe storms and related perils). Click any county for its full hazard, crash, crime and area profile.
The 5 lowest-risk counties in New York
| # | County | Composite | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Orleans County | 13 | A |
| 2 | Schuyler County | 17.4 | A |
| 3 | Putnam County | 24.8 | B |
| 4 | Wyoming County | 25.1 | B |
| 5 | Fulton County | 29.1 | B |
How these scores are built
The composite blends three government datasets: natural hazard (FEMA National Risk Index, 45%), road safety (NHTSA fatal-crash records, 30%) and crime (FBI Crime Data Explorer, 25%). Each is expressed as a percentile against all U.S. counties, so a score of 80 means an area is riskier than 80% of the country. Full methodology and refresh dates are on our Data Sources page.
Want this data programmatically? The RiskIndex API returns these scores — plus ZIP-level detail and 14 area indicators — as clean JSON. Get a free API key (100 calls/month, no card required).
Scores are statistical percentiles for comparing areas, not predictions, and not a consumer report under the FCRA. See our Terms.