New York Car Accident Settlements: What 2026 Reform Changed

New York combines several features that pull in different directions, and a major 2026 reform just moved two of them. It is a no-fault state, so pain and suffering damages are gated behind a statutory threshold that generates more litigation than almost any provision in American auto law — and that threshold got narrower this year. It historically applied pure comparative negligence with no cap of any kind, but a new carve-out specifically for motor vehicle cases changed that too, for any lawsuit filed from May 26, 2026 onward.

Practically, most New York auto litigation is a fight about one question: did the injury clear § 5102(d)? — but the answer to that question, and what happens once it’s met, both depend on when the lawsuit is filed following this year’s reform.

For general procedure, see our guides on what to do after a car accident and how insurers calculate settlements.

Quick answer: No-fault pays $50,000 basic economic loss regardless of fault. To recover pain and suffering you must meet a serious injury threshold — eight categories, not nine, for any lawsuit filed on or after May 26, 2026, since the 90/180-day category was eliminated. A new CPLR § 1411(b) carve-out also bars non-economic damages in a motor vehicle case, for suits filed from that same date, if your fault exceeds the defendants’ combined fault — a real change from New York’s traditional pure comparative negligence rule. Filing deadline is 3 years — but only 90 days to serve a notice of claim on a municipality.

Illustrative New York Settlement Ranges

Below the § 5102(d) serious-injury threshold, there is no pain-and-suffering figure at all — the claim recovers no-fault benefits only. Everything below assumes the threshold is met.

New York City verdicts run higher than upstate, and insurers price venue into their evaluations. Available coverage remains the practical ceiling in serious cases. The figures above also assume comparative fault isn’t a significant factor — see how the 2026 reform to New York’s comparative negligence rule can change this, below.

No-Fault: What It Covers

Basic economic loss under New York’s no-fault scheme provides $50,000 per person, paid by your own insurer regardless of who caused the crash:

• Medical expenses — reasonable and necessary treatment
• Lost earnings — 80%, subject to a monthly maximum
• Other reasonable and necessary expenses — a modest daily allowance for household help, transportation to treatment and similar costs
• Death benefit — a limited additional amount

See our no-fault / PIP benefits calculator for how this $50,000 combined pool splits between your medical bills and lost earnings once you enter your own numbers.

Two procedural points that cost people benefits:

The 30-day application. A no-fault application (form NF-2) generally must be submitted to the insurer within 30 days of the accident. Late filing can result in denial of benefits.

The 45-day billing rule. Providers generally must submit bills within 45 days of treatment. This is mostly the provider’s responsibility, but it becomes your problem when unpaid bills surface later.

Optional additional PIP coverage is widely available and inexpensive, and $50,000 is exhausted quickly by any serious injury.

The Serious Injury Threshold: Eight Categories Now, Not Nine

Insurance Law § 5102(d) defines serious injury as personal injury which results in:

1. Death
2. Dismemberment
3. Significant disfigurement
4. Fracture
5. Loss of a fetus
6. Permanent loss of use of a body organ, member, function or system
7. Permanent consequential limitation of use of a body organ or member
8. Significant limitation of use of a body function or system

A ninth category — the 90/180 day category — existed until 2026. It was satisfied by a medically determined injury or impairment of a non-permanent nature preventing the person from performing substantially all of the material acts constituting their usual and customary daily activities for not less than 90 days during the 180 days immediately following the occurrence. It was eliminated for any action or proceeding commenced on or after May 26, 2026. What controls is the lawsuit’s filing date, not the accident date — an older accident can still lose access to this category if the case is filed after the cutover.

Economic damages exceeding the no-fault benefit are recoverable without meeting the threshold either way. It gates non-economic damages specifically — which in most serious claims is the larger share.

Which categories actually decide cases

Fracture (4) is the cleanest. A documented fracture generally satisfies the threshold outright, which is why radiology reports receive such close attention in New York practice.

Significant limitation (8) and permanent consequential limitation (7) are where most litigation happens, and their importance has only grown now that the 90/180 category is gone for newer filings. New York case law has developed detailed expectations here: quantified range-of-motion measurements compared against normal values, objective findings rather than subjective complaints, and — critically — contemporaneous measurements taken shortly after the accident, not only at a later examination. Gaps in treatment are used to argue the limitation resolved.

The eliminated 90/180 category required documentation created during that 180-day window showing you could not perform substantially all your usual activities. It was a real option for plaintiffs whose injuries resolved without becoming permanent — a category of claim now materially harder to bring for any lawsuit filed after May 26, 2026, since a claimant in that position has to fit within one of the remaining eight categories or has no serious-injury path at all.

Deadlines

Claim	Deadline
No-fault application (NF-2)	30 days from the accident
Personal injury lawsuit	3 years from the accident (CPLR 214)
Wrongful death	2 years from date of death (EPTL 5-4.1)
Notice of claim on a municipality	90 days (Gen. Mun. Law § 50-e)
Suit against a municipality	Generally 1 year and 90 days
Claim against the State	Notice or claim within 90 days (Court of Claims Act § 10)
Medical malpractice	2 years 6 months, with discovery rules
UM/SUM claim	Governed by policy terms — confirm separately

The 90-day municipal notice is New York’s most unforgiving deadline. A collision with a city bus, a sanitation truck, a police vehicle, or a claim about a dangerous roadway condition requires a properly served notice of claim within 90 days. Miss it and the claim is generally barred, even though a private-defendant claim would have nearly three years remaining. Late notice applications exist but are discretionary and frequently denied.

Comparative Negligence: Still Pure, Except for a New 2026 Carve-Out

Under CPLR 1411, New York has long applied pure comparative negligence with no cutoff at any percentage of fault — and for the great majority of negligence claims (slip and fall, medical malpractice, premises liability, and any motor vehicle lawsuit filed before the date below), that remains true.

A new carve-out changes this specifically for motor vehicle cases. New CPLR § 1411(b), part of the same 2026 reform that eliminated the 90/180-day category, applies to any motor vehicle personal injury action under Article 51 commenced on or after May 26, 2026: if your fault exceeds the combined fault of the defendant or defendants, you are barred entirely from non-economic damages — pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life. This does not touch economic damages, which continue to follow the ordinary pure comparative rule with no bar at all.

Your fault (motor vehicle action, filed on/after May 26, 2026)	Economic damages	Non-economic damages
0%–50%	Reduced by your fault %	Reduced by your fault %
51%+ (exceeds defendants’ combined fault)	Still reduced by your fault % — no bar	Barred entirely — $0

This is a meaningfully different result from the old rule at higher fault percentages. A claimant found 70% at fault on a motor vehicle claim filed today recovers 30% of economic damages, exactly as before — but nothing at all for pain and suffering, where the old rule would have paid 30% of that too. For a claim filed before May 26, 2026, or for any non-motor-vehicle claim, none of this applies — the traditional no-bar, pure comparative rule still governs in full.

A New $100,000 Cap — Against the At-Fault Driver, Not You

The same reform added a genuinely counterintuitive provision. Insurance Law § 5104(d) now caps non-economic damages at $100,000 (outside of a wrongful death case) where the at-fault driver — not the claimant — was uninsured (with an exception for a brief coverage lapse under 30 days), was impaired and convicted of an impairment-related offense, or was convicted of a felony or felony-flight offense arising from the crash.

This cap applies regardless of how egregious the at-fault driver’s conduct was — an uninsured or impaired driver who caused a genuinely catastrophic injury still exposes only $100,000 in non-economic damages, no matter how much a jury might otherwise be inclined to award. It does not touch economic damages, which remain uncapped. This is worth knowing early, since it can shape the entire strategy of a claim where the at-fault driver falls into one of these categories — including whether pursuing your own SUM coverage, described below, becomes the more central part of the case rather than the at-fault driver’s own limited exposure.

SUM Coverage: New York’s Underinsured Protection

New York calls its underinsured motorist coverage Supplementary Uninsured/Underinsured Motorist (SUM) coverage. Two features matter:

• It applies where the at-fault driver’s limits are lower than yours, filling the gap
• Written consent is required before settling with the at-fault driver. Releasing them without your own insurer’s consent can void SUM coverage entirely

New York minimum liability limits are low relative to the cost of serious injury treatment, so SUM limits frequently determine the real recovery. See our guide to UM/UIM claims.

Other New York-Specific Points

No damages caps on compensatory damages in ordinary auto cases.

Labor Law §§ 240 and 241 impose heightened, in some circumstances absolute, liability on owners and contractors for certain height-related and safety-device failures — relevant where a vehicle collision occurs on a construction site, and the most claimant-favorable construction liability regime in the country. See our guide to construction accident claims.

Article 16 apportionment. Where multiple defendants are liable, a defendant 50% or less responsible generally has limited joint liability for non-economic damages — significant when one defendant is uninsured or insolvent.

Threshold motions are routine. Expect a summary judgment motion arguing the threshold is unmet in nearly every soft-tissue case. This is why the quality and timing of medical documentation matters more in New York than in most states.

Practical Checklist

1. File the no-fault application within 30 days. Nothing else on this list is as easy to lose.
2. Get medical care immediately, and ensure range-of-motion measurements are taken and quantified early.
3. Treat continuously — gaps are the primary argument against the limitation categories.
4. Don’t rely solely on the 90/180-day category if your lawsuit might be filed on or after May 26, 2026 — build the record toward a permanent or significant limitation category instead, since the 90/180 path is gone for filings from that date.
5. Obtain and read the radiology reports. A documented fracture resolves the threshold question and was unaffected by the 2026 reform.
6. Check for any municipal or State defendant immediately — 90 days, not three years.
7. Check your SUM limits, and get written consent before releasing the at-fault driver — especially important if the at-fault driver was uninsured, impaired, or fled, given the new $100,000 non-economic damages cap that can apply to their own exposure.
8. Expect a threshold motion, and build the record with that in mind from week one.
9. Confirm your lawsuit’s likely filing date relative to May 26, 2026, since that date — not your accident date — determines whether the 2026 threshold and comparative fault reforms apply to your case at all.

Sources & Further Reading

• N.Y. Insurance Law §§ 5102, 5104 — definitions, serious injury threshold, the tort exemption, and (as amended in 2026) the $100,000 non-economic damages cap for specific at-fault-driver conduct
• 11 NYCRR Part 65 — no-fault regulations, including the 30-day application and 45-day billing provisions
• CPLR 214 (limitations period); CPLR 1411 and new CPLR § 1411(b) (pure comparative negligence and the 2026 motor-vehicle carve-out); CPLR Article 16 (apportionment, unchanged by the 2026 reform)
• New York State Fiscal Year 2027 budget, Chapters 55 and 58 of the Laws of 2026 (signed May 26–27, 2026) — the tort reform package eliminating the 90/180-day category and adding the CPLR § 1411(b) fault bar, applicable to actions and proceedings commenced on or after May 26, 2026
• Gen. Mun. Law § 50-e (notice of claim); Court of Claims Act § 10 (claims against the State)
• EPTL 5-4.1 — wrongful death limitations period
• N.Y. Labor Law §§ 200, 240, 241 — owner and contractor liability