Is Siem Reap Safe? What I Tell Friends Who Ask

When friends abroad ask me if Siem Reap is safe, they hardly ever mean pickpockets. They mean the scam centres. They have read about the compounds in Cambodia and want to know if they will walk into one.

You will not. The scam centres have no effect on your safety as a visitor here. They are run and staffed mostly by people from other countries, and if you ask people in Siem Reap about them, most know about as much as you do from the news. The Cambodians I know are not in them. They are the ones getting scammed.

My aunt lives in the countryside outside Siem Reap. Someone messaged her on Telegram and made it sound urgent, the usual trick, and talked her into reading out the code her bank sent to her phone. They logged into her mobile banking app and took about $1,000 before anyone in the family knew.

I am speaking for Siem Reap. Phnom Penh is a bigger, rougher city and even locals notice the difference.

Quick answer, October 2026:

• Yes, Siem Reap is safe. Violent crime against visitors is rare.
• Theft is less of a worry than people think. Lock anything with wheels and keep your phone close in town.
• The roads late at night are the bigger risk, and the hazard is often a dog.
• Within 10 minutes of Pub Street you can walk back at night. Further out, take a Grab.
• Solo women are fine in town. Avoid riding alone through the Angkor park after dark.
• Rainy season wind can bring trees down in the temple park. We cancel tours when it is too strong.
• The border fighting did not change anything in town except the number of visitors.

If you are still building the trip, our guide to things to do in Siem Reap is the place to start. This page is about keeping that trip safe.

Theft: my door stays open, but I lock my bike in town

I live about 20km outside the city. In my village the front door is unlocked all day. We have a fence, and nobody bothers locking the gate, because it is a small community and everyone knows everyone.

In Siem Reap city I lock my motorbike every time and take the key with me. A friend of mine had a motorbike stolen in town, and after something like that you stop leaving it to chance.

That is the reason for paid parking at the markets. At Phsar Leu, the big local market, someone sits out front all day. You pay them, they clip a ticket onto your bike and hand you the matching half, and the bike does not leave without it. I pay 1,000 to 2,000 riel. Around Khmer New Year it goes up to 5,000 riel, and I have never seen it go higher than that. If you rent a bicycle or an e-bike, use the paid parking wherever there is some. Outside a small coffee shop, or further out of town, it matters much less.

As for pickpockets, I have never had anything taken in Siem Reap, and I have never seen it happen. The town is not crowded enough for it. Keep your phone in your pocket when you are not using it, and on the table next to you while you eat. You will not have anyone pull a knife on you for your wallet. That almost never happens here.

The roads: the busy streets are not the problem

Most people assume the crowded parts of town are the dangerous ones. It is the other way around. Around Pub Street and the busy roads in the centre there is so much traffic that everyone goes slowly.

You do not need a licence here to ride anything up to 125cc, which covers the Honda Dreams and Clicks that everyone rides. Young people drive fast and weave between cars and bikes to get somewhere a few seconds sooner. If you are new to it, that is scary. Keep to your lane, keep steady and do not make sudden moves. Most of them have been riding since they were 12 or 13 and they will go around you.

The accidents happen late, around 1am or 2am, when the roads are empty and people are tired or have been drinking. One of my female friends was riding home alone around then. The road was clear, nobody else was on it, and she hit a dog. At that speed it was a bad fall. She had a helmet on and came out of it OK. Guys from the shops and houses nearby ran over straight away, gave her first aid and drove her to the nearest hospital.

There was also a tourist who crashed late at night and was bleeding. Siem Reap has people who roam around at night filming accidents for Facebook, and they got there first. The filming drew a crowd, and the tourist had help within minutes. The police are not much use for a stolen phone, though they are getting better.

Walking back at night

The further you go from the centre, the earlier everything sleeps. In my village it goes quiet from 9pm. Pub Street keeps going until 1am or 2am.

If your guesthouse is about 10 minutes' walk from Pub Street, you can walk it. There are other tourists around, and a lot of the small guesthouses and motels nearby are run by older people, some of them expats, who are often sitting outside late having a smoke and a talk. There is always someone awake on the street. I have walked that way after midnight with two female friends, after a few drinks, on a road that was almost empty, and nothing happened.

If you are 15 or 20 minutes out, most things will be shut by the time you head home. Book a Grab or a PassApp and save the walk for the daytime.

Is Siem Reap safe for solo female travellers?

In town, yes. The tuk-tuk drivers waiting outside Pub Street at midnight are there to work and feed their families. Book through PassApp or Grab so the price is fixed, and they will take you where you are going.

I asked my female friends what they avoid, and they all said the same thing. They will not ride alone at night on the roads through and around the Angkor park. They are not worried about crime out there. Those roads run through forest with no lights and nobody on them, and they get dark and creepy fast, even for women who grew up here.

That matters if you want to see Angkor Wat at sunrise or stay out for sunset, because both put you on those roads in the dark. Go with a guide and a driver, which is how our Angkor Wat sunrise tour works, and the dark stretch through the forest is just the drive to the temple.

At the temples: monkeys, stairs and wind

Monkeys

Angkor Thom has the most of them. A friend of mine put a pair of headphones down on a rock there, and a monkey grabbed them and went straight up a tall tree. What got them back was one of the people who film the monkeys for Facebook. We call them MMO, for make money online. He knew the monkeys and traded it a piece of bread for the headphones. I do not like that the monkeys have learned to take things and swap them back for food, and the people feeding them for videos are a big part of why some have turned aggressive. Keep your things in your bag and off the stones.

Stairs

Some temple stairs are thin and worn smooth from centuries of people walking on them. There are handrails on the steep ones and staff watching. Take them slowly and you will be fine.

Heat

None of our guests has had a problem with the heat yet. It is hot, but inside the temples the stone and the trees keep it surprisingly cool. We carry cold towels and as many drinks as you want. A small portable fan is worth packing if you really feel the heat.

Wind

This is the one I take most seriously. The temple park is full of big old trees, which is a lot of why it is beautiful, but in a rainy-season storm branches come down and sometimes whole trees. In July 2026 a tree fell on a vehicle at the South Gate of Angkor Thom during a storm and killed one person, and in May 2025 lightning killed three people at Angkor Wat. We check the weather every morning, and if the wind is too strong, we cancel the tour. You pay nothing in advance, so it costs you nothing either.

Dogs, sun and getting sick

Dogs

Dogs here have no leashes and roam where they like. The mean ones are kept behind fences, and the ones on the street mostly ignore you. A 2018 study in Siem Reap province found almost all dogs roam free and fewer than 1 in 100 were vaccinated against rabies, and Cambodia has one of the highest rabies rates in the world.

I was bitten when I was 12. In my village there are one or two doctors who work from home, and one of them came to our house and gave me the injections. Most people here go to a public hospital in Siem Reap. If a dog bites you, even a small bite, get rabies shots that same day. Go to a clinic or hospital in town, tell them it was a dog bite and ask for the rabies vaccine.

Sun

I have burned badly in Cambodia, but at the beach on Koh Rong, not at the temples, where there are trees and stone almost everywhere to stand in. Wear sunscreen anyway.

Getting sick

There are pharmacies and small clinics on most corners and a few hospitals in town. Treatment is cheap compared to what you would pay at home, but hospital stays add up. After the dog crash, my friend spent one night in hospital having scans, and her insurance paid for all of it. Bring travel insurance, and check that it covers you on a scooter or e-bike if you plan to ride one.

For anything serious, people here used to go to Thailand or Vietnam. Since the border fighting it is just Vietnam. Bus companies run from Siem Reap and Phnom Penh to Vietnam all the time, and the buses are surprisingly comfortable.

The border fighting

The fighting along the Thai border in 2025 did not change anything about safety in Siem Reap. There were no soldiers in town and no checkpoints.

What changed was the mood. A big mural went up next to Heritage Walk, by the Preah Ang Chek Preah Ang Chorm shrine, and you started seeing soldier paintings and pictures on t-shirts and on the backs of tuk-tuks. People here felt proud. The other change was the town getting quieter, because a lot of visitors got scared and did not come. The land crossings to Thailand are still closed, so fly in rather than coming overland.

Booking with a local

Most of what goes wrong for visitors here is a bad fall or a dog bite. If you want someone local beside you for the dark roads and the weather calls, meet your guide, and if you are still deciding how long to stay, here is how many days Siem Reap really needs.

Meet your local guide