Driver death rates by make and model

IIHS periodically calculates driver death rates for individual models. Beginning with 2020 models, we also calculate the rate at which drivers of other vehicles are killed in crashes with a given model.

Both these rates provide perspectives on the relative safety of passenger vehicles across size and class. They take into account only deaths of drivers, not passengers, since every vehicle that crashes has a driver, but not every vehicle has passengers.

Rates are given as the number of driver deaths per million registered vehicle years. A registered vehicle year is one vehicle registered for one year.

A vehicle must have at least 100,000 registered vehicle years or at least 20 deaths in the four-year study period to be included. To increase the sample size and thereby improve the accuracy of the calculations, results are included for earlier model years (up to three) if the vehicle wasn’t substantially redesigned during that time. This is indicated in the model-year span column.

Death rates are adjusted for driver age and gender. Information on deaths is from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System. Data on vehicle registrations come from Mobility Global.

The numbers in parentheses next to the overall death rate are 95% confidence bounds. The narrower the confidence interval, the more statistically reliable the estimate.

Read more about the methodology.

Driver death rates are not available for the newest models. We provide driver death rates for the most recent model years for which we can gather the registration and fatality data needed to provide statistically significant results. If you are looking for information on newer models, earlier model year results are good predictors if the vehicles haven’t been redesigned.