Car accident statistics by state: fatal crashes and deaths, 2015-2024.

Which states have the highest traffic death rates?

Measured by deaths per 100,000 residents in 2024, Mississippi (25.6), Arkansas (19.5), New Mexico (19.2), South Carolina (18.9) and Alabama (18.7) were highest of the 50 states and DC. Rhode Island (4.7), Massachusetts (5.1) and New York (5.5) were lowest; the U.S. rate was 11.5. The chart marks our four launch states in orange.

What this data is. FARS is "a nationwide census providing NHTSA, Congress and the American public yearly data regarding fatal injuries suffered in motor vehicle traffic crashes." [2] It does not include crashes in which nobody died, so it does not measure who the worst drivers are, who crashes most often or how many crashes there are in total. A state's death rate depends on more than how people drive, and this data cannot separate those factors.

Tennessee, Alabama, Oklahoma and South Carolina

Deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled come from NHTSA's own published table [1]. The two rankings can differ: South Carolina is 4th per resident and 3rd per mile, while Alabama drops from 5th per resident to 17th per mile, which implies more miles driven per resident there. See each state's own guides for what happens after a crash: Tennessee, Alabama, Oklahoma and South Carolina.

The full ranking, 50 states and DC

Sorted by deaths per 100,000 residents in 2024. Our four launch states are in bold. The same table, with more columns, is in the downloadable CSV.

Swipe sideways to see every column

What state has the most crashes and the most deaths?

Counting fatal crashes over 2015-2024, California had the most (36,640), followed by Texas (35,785), Florida (30,387), Georgia (14,652) and North Carolina (14,061). In 2024 the most deaths were in Texas (4,160), California (3,876) and Florida (3,138). Those are the three most populous states, which is why counts and rates give different answers: in 2024 their rates were 13.3 (Texas), 9.8 (California) and 13.4 (Florida) per 100,000 residents, against 25.6 in Mississippi.

How have deaths changed since 2015?

Deaths fell from 37,806 in 2016 to 36,355 in 2019, rose to 39,007 in 2020 and peaked at 43,230 in 2021. They have fallen each year since: 42,721 in 2022, 41,025 in 2023 and 39,254 in 2024. In 2024 there were 36,297 fatal crashes. The national rate was 11.5 deaths per 100,000 residents in 2024, up from 11.1 in 2015, and 1.19 per 100 million miles driven, up from 1.15 in 2015 [1].

Who dies, and in what kind of crash?

Over 2015-2024, 63.0% of people killed were drivers, 17.1% pedestrians, 16.8% passengers and 2.4% bicyclists. The age group with the most deaths was 25-34 (72,422, or 18.6%), followed by 35-44 (57,079), 55-64 (54,854) and 45-54 (53,214). Children 14 and under were 11,145 deaths (2.9%).

By type of collision, 60.7% of fatal crashes (217,576 of 358,460) did not involve a collision with another moving motor vehicle: they were crashes into fixed objects, rollovers, and crashes with pedestrians, cyclists or parked vehicles. Angle crashes made up 18.3%, front-to-front 10.6% and front-to-rear 7.1%.

By the posted speed limit of the road where the crash happened, 29.6% of fatal crashes were on 50-55 mph roads, 24.0% on 40-45 mph roads, 16.5% on 30-35 mph roads, 12.7% on 60-65 mph roads, 8.5% on roads posted 70 mph or above and 5.3% on roads posted 25 mph or less. 3.3% had no speed limit recorded. This is the limit, not the speed of the vehicles. For what the records say about speeding, drinking, distraction and seat belts in fatal crashes, see common causes of car accidents. NHTSA reports that speeding was a contributing factor in 29% of all 2024 traffic fatalities [6].

Methodology

• Fatal crash counts. NHTSA FARS annual national CSV files for 2015-2024. We kept every record in the accident table and grouped by the STATE field (FIPS code: 1 Alabama through 56 Wyoming) and year. Deaths are the FATALS field summed. 2024 is the latest year available as of 2026-11-09; NHTSA can revise recent years [3].
• Check against NHTSA's published totals. NHTSA's FARS Encyclopedia publishes deaths for every state and year. We compared all 510 state-years (51 jurisdictions times 10 years) with our own sums from the raw files: all 510 matched exactly, and the 10 national totals matched (for example 39,254 deaths in 2024 and 43,230 in 2021) [1]. The comparison is in the state-year CSV.
• Rates per 100,000 residents. Deaths divided by that year's Census Bureau resident population estimate for the state. 2020-2024 use Vintage 2024; 2015-2019 use Vintage 2019, so rates across the 2019/2020 line mix two estimate series. The 2015-2024 average is total deaths divided by the sum of ten annual populations [4] [5].
• Rates per 100 million vehicle miles. NHTSA's published rate, copied from the FARS Encyclopedia; we did not compute vehicle miles ourselves.
• Rankings. 1 is the highest rate among 50 states and DC. DC is a single city, not a state; compare it with care.
• Age, road user, collision type and speed limit. National figures from the person table (INJ_SEV = 4, killed), the accident table (manner of collision, MAN_COLL) and the vehicle table (VSPD_LIM, the highest posted limit among vehicles in the crash). The files label non-collision crashes differently in different years; we combined the two labels.
• Not counted. Non-fatal crashes, unreported crashes, Puerto Rico and U.S. territories.
• Reproduce it. The cleaned CSVs are on this page. Code is Python 3 standard library only (scripts/w1c-stats-state.py); charts are plain SVG.

Important notice

CrashFirst is not a law firm and does not give legal advice. This page is general, factual information from public records. It does not say who is at fault in any crash and cannot predict the outcome of any claim. An attorney can explain how the law applies to your facts.

Data can be quoted with attribution: 'CrashFirst Car Accident Statistics by State, 2026, based on NHTSA FARS and U.S. Census Bureau data.' Attorney review pending. Corrections: tell us and we will update the page.