Car Accident Laws in Texas: Fault, Insurance & Deadlines

Texas is an at-fault (tort) state, not a no-fault state. After a crash, the driver who caused it — or that driver's insurance company — is responsible for the resulting medical bills, lost wages, and vehicle damage. If you were hurt in a Texas crash, you generally have two years from the date of the crash to file a personal injury or property-damage lawsuit, under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code §16.003(a). Miss that deadline and a court can throw your case out no matter how strong it is. If a government-owned vehicle (a city bus, county truck, or state agency car) was involved, a much shorter notice deadline applies — read that section below before you wait.

1. Is Texas a No-Fault or At-Fault State?

Texas is a traditional at-fault (tort liability) state. There is no state-mandated no-fault system here. That means:

• The driver (or drivers) found responsible for causing the crash — and their liability insurance — is on the hook for the other side's medical expenses, lost income, pain and suffering, and property damage.
• An injured person can choose to file a claim directly with the at-fault driver's insurer, use their own insurance where applicable (such as personal injury protection or med-pay), or file a lawsuit.
• Because Texas is at-fault, insurers and courts have to determine who caused the crash — and, as covered below, Texas also allows fault to be split between multiple drivers.

This is different from "no-fault" states, where your own insurer pays your medical bills up to a limit regardless of who caused the wreck. Texas does not require no-fault Personal Injury Protection (PIP) coverage as your primary source of recovery — but PIP is still part of the picture, explained next.

2. Minimum Auto Insurance Required in Texas

Under Texas Transportation Code Chapter 601 and Texas Department of Insurance (TDI) guidance, every driver must carry liability insurance meeting at least the following limits, commonly shorthanded as 30/60/25:

• $30,000 in bodily injury liability coverage per person, per crash;
• $60,000 in bodily injury liability coverage total per crash (for all people injured); and
• $25,000 in property damage liability coverage per crash.

These are minimums a driver's own liability policy must meet — they are not the amount of money guaranteed to be available to an injured claimant, since a policy can be that low and no higher. Confirm current figures with the Texas Department of Insurance auto insurance guide before relying on them, since minimums can be revised by the legislature.

PIP and Uninsured/Underinsured Motorist Coverage

Two additional coverages matter a lot in Texas and work differently than the liability minimum:

• Personal Injury Protection (PIP): Texas Insurance Code §1952.152 requires insurers to automatically include PIP (at least $2,500 in coverage, historically) in every auto policy unless the policyholder rejects it in writing. PIP pays your medical bills and some lost income regardless of fault, so it is not a "no-fault" system in the state-mandated sense, but it functions like a no-fault safety net if you keep it.
• Uninsured/Underinsured Motorist (UM/UIM) coverage: insurers must offer UM/UIM coverage with every policy, but a driver can reject it in writing (Texas Insurance Code Chapter 1952, Subchapter C). If you didn't sign a rejection, you may already have it — check your declarations page.

Because both PIP and UM/UIM can be declined on paper you may have signed without close attention, pull your actual policy declarations page or call your agent to confirm what you currently carry.

3. Statute of Limitations to Sue After a Texas Crash

Under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code §16.003(a), a lawsuit for personal injury caused by a crash generally must be filed within two years of the date of the crash. The same two-year period applies to property-damage claims arising from the same incident. A wrongful-death claim also generally runs two years from the date of death.

Important nuances:

• The clock generally starts on the date of the crash itself, not the date an injury is diagnosed.
• If the injured person was under 18 at the time of the crash, the limitations period is generally tolled (paused) until that person's 18th birthday.
• Settlement negotiations with an insurance company do not pause this deadline on their own — only a lawsuit filed in time protects your rights.
• If a governmental entity's vehicle or employee was involved, a separate and much shorter notice deadline applies (see below) in addition to, not instead of, the two-year suit deadline.

Because limitations rules have exceptions and can be amended by the legislature, verify the current wording of §16.003 with the official Texas Statutes site or a licensed Texas attorney if your situation is close to a deadline.

4. Shared Fault: Texas's 51% Bar Rule

Texas follows modified comparative negligence, codified in Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code §33.001, sometimes called the "51% bar rule":

• If you are found 50% or less at fault for the crash, you can still recover damages, but your award is reduced by your percentage of fault. (Example: a $100,000 verdict with 20% fault assigned to you nets $80,000.)
• If your percentage of responsibility is greater than 50%, Texas law bars you from recovering any damages at all.

Insurance adjusters routinely try to push a claimant's assigned fault percentage above 50% specifically because it erases the payout — another reason to document the scene and get an official crash report.

5. Crash Reporting Requirements in Texas

The core reporting duty falls on law enforcement:

• Officer's crash report: under Texas Transportation Code §550.062, a peace officer who investigates a crash involving injury, death, or property damage of $1,000 or more to any one person must submit a written crash report (the CR-3) to the Texas Department of Transportation, generally within 10 days of the crash.
• Driver self-reporting form (largely discontinued): Texas historically required drivers to file their own written report — the blue "Driver's Crash Report," Form CR-2 — when officers did not investigate, but the state discontinued that driver self-report form effective September 1, 2017, and TxDOT no longer accepts or retains it. There is no longer a statewide requirement to mail in a driver's own crash report.

In practice: if anyone is hurt, or the damage plausibly exceeds $1,000 (most fender-benders today do), call police to the scene so an official CR-3 exists. That report is often the single most useful piece of evidence for an insurance claim or lawsuit. Confirm current thresholds and forms with the Texas Department of Transportation crash reports page.

6. Damage Caps and Crashes Involving a Government Vehicle

If the at-fault vehicle was owned or operated by a city, county, school district, or state agency, your claim is governed by the Texas Tort Claims Act (Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Chapter 101), not ordinary tort law, and two things change dramatically:

• Much shorter notice deadline: under §101.101, you generally must give the governmental unit written notice of your claim within six months of the incident — far shorter than the two-year suit deadline. Some cities and agencies set even shorter notice periods by charter or ordinance, so this six-month window is a maximum, not a safe default.
• Damage caps: under §101.023, recoverable damages against many governmental units are capped — commonly cited around $250,000 per person and $500,000 per occurrence for bodily injury/death claims, with a lower cap for property damage — though the exact cap depends on which type of governmental unit is involved (state agency vs. municipality vs. other local entity). Verify the specific cap that applies to your situation against the current text of Chapter 101 or with a Texas attorney, since this is one of the more fact-specific areas of the law.

If you're not sure whether a government vehicle or employee was involved (a school bus, an on-duty police cruiser, a public utility truck), find out immediately — the six-month notice clock is unforgiving and can run out long before the ordinary two-year deadline would ever be a concern.

What to Do After a Crash in Texas

1. Check for injuries and call 911 if anyone is hurt, or if the crash likely caused $1,000 or more in damage — this gets police to the scene and starts an official CR-3 report.
2. Move to safety if the vehicles are drivable and it's safe to do so, but avoid leaving the scene before police release you if a report is being taken.
3. Exchange information with every driver involved: name, address, phone number, driver's license number, license plate, and insurance company and policy number.
4. Document the scene with photos and video of vehicle positions, damage, skid marks, traffic signs/signals, weather, and any visible injuries, before vehicles are moved if it's safe to do so.
5. Get the officer's name and report number, and note whether any driver was cited — request a copy of the CR-3 report once it's available.
6. Identify witnesses and get their contact information before they leave.
7. Seek medical evaluation promptly, even if you feel "fine" — some injuries surface hours or days later, and a documented timeline matters for both PIP claims and any later lawsuit.
8. Notify your own insurer of the crash, and ask specifically whether your policy includes PIP or UM/UIM coverage.
9. Find out immediately if a government vehicle was involved — if so, the notice deadline may be as short as six months, not two years.
10. Keep records of medical bills, repair estimates, lost wages, and all correspondence with insurance adjusters.
11. Be careful with recorded statements to any insurance company, including your own, before you understand how fault will be assessed under Texas's 51% bar rule.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice; laws and dollar figures change, so confirm current details with the Texas Department of Insurance, the official Texas Statutes, or a licensed Texas attorney before relying on them.