Estimate your potential car accident settlement based on medical expenses, lost wages, property damage, injuries, and other factors.
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Answer a few questions about your accident. Nothing you enter here is saved or sent anywhere unless you choose to submit the case-evaluation form at the end.
This is an educational estimate based only on the numbers you entered — not a prediction of what any insurer, attorney, or court would actually pay.
This calculator provides an educational estimate based on the information you entered. It is not a prediction of what an insurance company, lawyer, arbitrator, or court will award. Real claims are evaluated using far more information than a calculator can collect.
Factors that can increase or decrease actual compensation include:
No two accidents are alike. These are some of the biggest variables that shape how a claim is actually valued.
Who caused the accident, and how clearly that can be shown, has a direct effect on whether a claim is paid at all and how much leverage you have in negotiations.
Injuries that require surgery, ongoing care, or that leave a lasting impairment typically support a higher estimate than injuries that resolve quickly with minimal treatment.
Consistent treatment, clear diagnoses, and detailed medical records are often what insurers and courts rely on most heavily when evaluating a claim.
A claim can only be paid from an available source of funds — the at-fault driver's liability limits, your own UM/UIM coverage, or other applicable policies.
Comparative and contributory negligence rules, damage caps in some states, and statutes of limitations all vary and can meaningfully change an outcome.
Photos, witness statements, police reports, and expert opinions can strengthen a claim, while weak or missing evidence can weaken it.
The calculator follows a simplified version of a process commonly used in early claim evaluation. Here's what happens with your answers, step by step.
Medical bills, projected future medical costs, lost wages, projected future lost income, property damage, and other documented expenses are added together.
Using your injury severity and related answers (surgery, permanence, treatment length, and impact on work and daily life), the calculator applies a multiplier to your medical damages to estimate pain and suffering.
Economic and non-economic damages are added together to produce a gross, pre-adjustment estimate.
If you indicated any percentage of fault, the calculator reduces the gross estimate proportionally, similar to how many (but not all) states apply comparative negligence.
Because real settlements depend on negotiation, evidence, and judgment calls a calculator can't make, the tool presents a low and high estimate rather than one exact figure.
Economic damages are the financial losses that come with a paper trail: bills, receipts, pay stubs, and repair estimates. They're generally the easiest category of damages to document and the starting point for most settlement discussions. Common examples include:
Because these losses are usually verifiable with documentation, they tend to carry significant weight in a settlement negotiation, and they form the foundation that non-economic damages are often calculated from.
Non-economic damages compensate for losses that don't come with a receipt: pain, suffering, emotional distress, disfigurement, and the loss of ability to enjoy daily life. Because these harms are inherently subjective, there's no universal formula for calculating them — every insurer, attorney, and jurisdiction may approach it somewhat differently.
A commonly discussed estimation approach applies a multiplier to your medical damages, where more severe or longer-lasting injuries generally support a higher multiplier. This calculator uses that general concept, with the following educational ranges:
Roughly 1.0–1.5× medical damages
Roughly 1.5–2.5× medical damages
Roughly 2.5–3.5× medical damages
Roughly 3.5–5.0× medical damages
These ranges are estimation parameters built into this calculator for educational purposes only. They are not a universal legal formula, and no insurer, attorney, or court is bound to use them. Actual non-economic damage awards depend on the specific facts, evidence, and applicable law in your case.
Most states use some form of comparative negligence, which reduces your compensation by your percentage of fault for the accident. For example, if you were found 20% at fault and your total damages were $50,000, a straightforward comparative-fault reduction would bring your recoverable amount to $40,000.
The details vary considerably by state:
This calculator applies a single, simplified proportional reduction regardless of which state you select, so it will not always match how your specific state's law would actually apply the adjustment. Your true fault percentage is also not something you can reliably self-assess — it's typically established through evidence such as police reports, witness statements, traffic camera footage, and accident reconstruction.
A settlement can only be paid from an actual source of funds. In most cases, that means the at-fault driver's bodily injury liability insurance, up to their policy limit. If your damages exceed that limit, additional avenues may include:
This calculator does not automatically cap your estimate at a policy limit you enter, because doing so would ignore these other potential sources of recovery. Instead, if your estimated range appears to exceed a coverage amount you provided, the results page will flag it as something worth discussing with a professional.
Personal injury law is governed at the state level, and rules on comparative fault, damage caps, no-fault insurance requirements, and filing deadlines differ across all 50 states and Washington, DC. This calculator does not implement state-specific legal rules for every jurisdiction — it applies the same general formula regardless of which state you select, purely for educational estimation purposes. Nothing about your selected state changes this into a legal determination of your claim's value.
There's no single number that answers this question, and anyone who promises one without knowing the details of your accident is oversimplifying. A car accident claim's value depends on the interaction of several variables: how badly you were hurt, how much medical treatment you needed, how much income you lost, who was at fault, how much insurance is available, and what evidence supports your version of events.
What a calculator like this one can do is walk through the same general categories that insurers and attorneys consider — economic losses, non-economic harm, fault, and coverage — and combine them into a reasonable, transparent range. What it can't do is weigh the strength of your evidence, predict how an adjuster or jury will react to your specific facts, or account for every quirk of your state's law. That's why the output is framed as an educational estimate rather than a valuation.
Most settlement calculators, including this one, follow a version of the same basic process:
The specific multipliers, weightings, and adjustments used behind the scenes will differ from tool to tool, and from how an actual insurance adjuster or attorney might value the same case. Treat any calculator's output, including this one, as a starting point for a conversation, not a final answer.
Depending on the facts of your case and your state's law, you may be able to pursue several categories of damages:
This calculator focuses on economic and non-economic damages, since punitive damages depend on specific conduct and legal standards that vary by state and aren't something a general calculator can evaluate.
Economic damages reimburse you for money you've actually spent or lost, and money you're reasonably projected to spend or lose in the future because of the accident. Because these losses are typically documented with bills, pay records, and estimates, they form the most concrete part of a claim. The stronger your documentation — itemized medical bills, an employer letter confirming missed work, a repair shop estimate — the easier it generally is to support this part of your claim.
Non-economic damages compensate for the harder-to-quantify impact of an injury: physical pain, emotional distress, loss of enjoyment of life, and similar harms. Unlike economic damages, there's no receipt to point to, which is why estimation approaches like severity-based multipliers exist. Even so, the final number in a real case is shaped by negotiation, the strength of your medical records, and sometimes a jury's judgment, not a fixed formula.
Pain and suffering is the most familiar example of non-economic damages. It's meant to compensate for physical discomfort and the broader toll an injury takes on your life, from missed milestones to the inability to do things you used to enjoy. Because pain is inherently subjective, thorough documentation matters: consistent treatment notes, a clear timeline of symptoms, and, where relevant, statements from family or coworkers about how your daily life changed can all help substantiate this part of a claim.
If your injuries kept you out of work, lost wages are typically calculated based on your normal pay rate and the time you missed, supported by pay stubs or an employer statement. If your injuries are expected to limit your ability to work going forward — whether by reducing your hours, preventing you from returning to your previous role, or ending your ability to work altogether — you may also be able to claim a loss of future earning capacity. These future-facing claims are often supported by medical opinions about your prognosis and, in larger cases, by vocational or economic experts.
Fault is one of the most significant variables in any car accident claim. If you were partially responsible for causing the accident, most states will reduce your compensation by your percentage of fault under comparative negligence rules, while a few states can bar recovery entirely above a certain fault threshold. Because fault percentages are typically contested and determined by evidence rather than self-assessment, the fault slider in this calculator is meant to help you see the general effect of a fault adjustment, not to establish what your actual fault percentage is or would be found to be.
Even a well-documented, high-value claim can be limited in practice by how much insurance is actually available. If the at-fault driver carries a low liability limit and has few personal assets, your realistic recovery from that source may be capped, regardless of your total damages. This is one of the main reasons carrying your own uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage is often recommended — it can provide a source of recovery when the at-fault driver's coverage isn't enough.
Timelines vary widely based on the complexity of the claim. A simple property-damage claim might resolve in a few weeks. An injury claim usually can't be reasonably settled until you've reached "maximum medical improvement," meaning your treating providers have a clear picture of your prognosis and future medical needs, which can take months. If a claim isn't resolved through negotiation, filing a lawsuit can add significantly more time, sometimes a year or more, depending on the court's schedule and whether the case settles before trial.
Strong evidence doesn't just help prove that the accident happened — it helps show how it happened, who was responsible, and how it affected you. Commonly useful evidence includes:
The more of this documentation you can gather and preserve early, the easier it generally is to support a claim later, whether you're negotiating with an insurer directly or working with an attorney.
There is no single "average" settlement that applies to every case, because the amount depends heavily on injury severity, medical costs, lost income, liability, and the at-fault driver's insurance limits. Minor soft-tissue claims often settle for a few thousand to the low tens of thousands, while claims involving surgery, long-term care, or permanent impairment can be worth substantially more. Published averages you see online are historical statistics, not a prediction for your case.
Most approaches start by adding up economic damages (medical bills, lost wages, property damage) and then estimating non-economic damages such as pain and suffering, often using a multiplier tied to injury severity. That subtotal is then adjusted for comparative fault and considered against available insurance coverage. This calculator uses a simplified version of that process for educational purposes; insurers, attorneys, and courts may weigh these factors differently.
Pain and suffering doesn't have a fixed dollar value. It's commonly estimated using a multiplier applied to medical damages, with more severe, longer-lasting, or permanent injuries generally supporting a higher multiplier. The final number depends on medical evidence, credibility, jurisdiction, and negotiation.
Yes. The type, length, and consistency of your medical treatment is often central evidence of how serious your injuries are. Gaps in treatment, or a short treatment history, can reduce a claim's perceived value, while documented surgery, therapy, or ongoing care tends to support a higher estimate.
Generally, yes. Lost wages from time missed at work, and in some cases a projected loss of future earning capacity, can be claimed as economic damages when they're documented with pay records, employer statements, or medical restrictions.
Many states reduce compensation by your percentage of fault (comparative negligence), while a smaller number of states can bar recovery entirely if you're found more than 50% at fault, or any percentage at fault in a pure contributory negligence state. The rules vary significantly, so your fault percentage should be evaluated based on the facts and the law of the state where the accident happened.
If you have uninsured or underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage, that policy may be able to step in to cover some or all of your damages. Without UM/UIM coverage or another applicable policy, recovering compensation can be significantly more difficult and may require pursuing the at-fault driver directly.
Timelines vary widely. Straightforward property-damage-only claims may resolve in weeks, while injury claims often take several months to over a year, especially if you're still receiving medical treatment or if the claim proceeds to litigation.
You can use tools like this calculator to get an educational, ballpark estimate. However, actual settlement value depends on evidence, legal argument, and negotiation strategy that a calculator cannot fully evaluate, which is why many people choose to at least consult with an attorney before accepting an offer.
This calculator is designed to give a reasonable, educational range based on commonly used estimation concepts. It is not a legal determination, and it cannot account for every fact, piece of evidence, or legal rule that could apply to your specific case.
No. States differ on comparative and contributory negligence rules, statutes of limitations, insurance minimums, and how certain damages are treated. This calculator applies the same simplified formula across states for consistency, which means it does not capture state-specific legal nuances.
An initial offer from an insurance company is often a starting point for negotiation rather than a final number. Before accepting, it can help to understand the full extent of your damages, including future medical needs, and to know whether you have room to negotiate.
Your actual claim value may depend on facts that a calculator cannot evaluate. You may be able to speak with a qualified personal injury attorney about your situation, at no cost to find out where you stand.