Commissaire de police is a rank or group of ranks in the French National Police. It should not be confused with the French appointment of "armed forces commissary" (commissaire des armées) which is an administrative military position.

Every commune with a population of more than 30,000-50,000 has a commissaire in charge of its detachment of the National Police, and larger communes have more than one (the Prefecture of Police of Paris has well over one hundred). A commissaire has both an administrative role and an investigative role. In most circumstances, a commissaire is responsible for leading a police station.

Most officers join directly at the rank of commissaire. All are university graduates, usually in law, and have completed a further training course. It is also possible for junior officers to be promoted to the rank (something which was virtually impossible until relatively recently). A commissaire may be promoted to commissaire divisionnaire (a rank which existed in the Paris Police and the Mobile Brigades from the early 20th century), and thence to the higher ranks of the service.

The police station which serves as an ordinary commissaire's headquarters and the area for which they are responsible is a commissariat, a term which can also refer to the body of commissaires as a whole.

There are 8 ranks of officer who are commissaires. The first four are ranks to which one is promoted, whilst the latter four are appointments made by the government, including the Director General of Police although he is usually selected from the Corps de Préfets. In Paris, a slightly different higher rank structure applies, based on the civilian administrative system and not the armed-forces derived Police system.

There is no direct equivalent grade in a British-style police system. The term commissioner is an inaccurate literal translation. A newly-graduated commissaire may often be found in charge of a police station, so to this end, the grade is equivalent to a British superintendent, although the latter may also be more comparable to a Commandant de Police à l'Emploi Fonctionnel . The problem becomes more complicated when discussing commissaires divisionnaires and généraux, as the grade equivalence is less clear. A commissaire général may be a regional head of the Police Judiciaire (CID), for instance. In London, this would be a role fulfilled by an assistant commissioner. However, this officer is likely to be more akin in rank to a deputy assistant commissioner. The rank of a commissaire divisionnaire is best described as equivalent to a deputy assistant commissioner or commander. A commissaire principal, when it was in existence, would be equivalent to a chief superintendent. The highest four ranks do not have any form of equivalence, as the Director-General and his deputies are in charge of the whole of France's policing.

Commissaires, as commissioners, are commissioned by the government to undertake civil and administrative duties as well as some quasi-judicial roles.

The commissaires originated in Paris as the 48 commissaires enquêteurs-examinateurs of the Grand Châtelet.