Practice area · Car accidents
Find out what your car accident case is worth.
A realistic settlement range, calculated for the facts of your crash — not a number meant to make you call back.
Get a free car accident case estimateHow the estimate works
01
Tell us what happened
Describe the incident in plain language. Five minutes, no forms, no legal jargon.
02
Our AI analyzes
We weigh liability, treatment, jurisdiction, and insurance to sketch a realistic value range.
03
A vetted attorney calls
If your case has merit, a licensed attorney in your state follows up within 24 hours — free.
What drives the value of a car accident case
Car accidents produce more personal-injury claims than any other category, and the range of outcomes is enormous. A rear-end with whiplash settles for a few thousand. A T-bone with a herniated disc and surgery settles for hundreds of thousands. The difference between the two comes down to a small number of specific factors.
- Severity and duration of treatment
- ER visit only is one tier. ER plus weeks of physical therapy is another. Injections, imaging, or surgery move the case up dramatically.
- Liability clarity
- A rear-end on a clean police report is a different case than an ambiguous intersection collision. Cleaner liability means a higher percentage of full value.
- Insurance policy limits
- Most state-minimum policies are $25,000–$50,000. Even a strong case is functionally capped at the limits unless the at-fault driver has assets or you carry under-insured motorist coverage.
- Your own UM/UIM coverage
- Under-insured motorist coverage on your own policy stacks on top of the at-fault driver’s limits. A lot of money is left on the table by people who don’t realize they have a second pool of coverage.
- Lost income and earning capacity
- Wages missed during recovery, plus any long-term effect on what you can do for work, are recoverable on top of medical specials.
- Comparative fault in your state
- Most states reduce your recovery by your percentage of fault. A few still bar recovery entirely above a threshold. Where you crashed matters.
Realistic settlement ranges
Realistic bands for cases that settle without trial. The actual number depends on the specifics; treat these as orientation, not a quote.
Minor soft-tissue
$3,000 – $30,000
Whiplash or strain that resolves with a short course of treatment. No imaging-confirmed injury, no permanent restriction.
Significant injury
$25,000 – $100,000
Persistent pain, sustained PT, imaging that confirms soft-tissue damage. Some lasting limitation but no surgery.
Surgical
$100,000 – $500,000+
Herniated disc with surgery, orthopedic fixation, fusion, or other operative intervention with documented recovery period.
Catastrophic
$500,000 – $5M+
Traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, amputation, or fatality. Often limited by policy or asset ceilings rather than case theory.
Common questions
What people ask before they call.
- I was rear-ended at low speed and feel mostly fine. Do I have a case?
- Possibly. Adrenaline masks injuries for the first 24–48 hours, and soft-tissue injuries often surface the next morning. The honest answer depends on whether symptoms appear once you see a doctor; the worst move is signing a quick settlement before that visit.
- The other driver was uninsured. Can I still recover anything?
- Often yes — through your own under-insured/uninsured motorist coverage. This is one of the most overlooked recovery paths. It also requires reporting the accident to your own insurer promptly, so do that even if the other driver was at fault.
- The police didn’t issue a citation. Does that hurt my case?
- It’s a factor, not a deal-breaker. The police report is independent evidence, but liability can be proven by witness statements, dash-cam, vehicle damage patterns, and the physics of the collision regardless of the citation.
- How long after a car accident do I have to file?
- Most states give you 2 or 3 years from the date of the crash. A handful are shorter — Louisiana and Tennessee are notably 1 year — and a government-vehicle claim can require notice in as little as 60–180 days. Don’t assume.
Related
More tools and reading on cases like yours.
Worried about a deadline? See the statute of limitations in your state.
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