An accident typically stays on a state driving record for 2 to 10 years, depending on the state and the type of violation.
State-by-state DMV retention periods for accidents, sourced from statutes and agency pages where confirmed, with explicit gaps marked rather than guessed at.
By Jules Mercer · · 1 min read
An accident sits on three different clocks at once: the state DMV driving record, the insurer’s own surcharge lookback, and the LexisNexis C.L.U.E. claims database. DMV retention alone ranges from 2 to 10 years depending on the state, and most states fold accidents into a broader points system rather than tracking them separately. Only 14 of 50 states have a fully sourced retention figure with a verified statute citation below; the rest are marked as explicit not-found rows or left out entirely rather than filled in with a guess.
Pick your state. Use the jump menu to scroll straight to your state’s row.
9 of 50 states shown — only where the source data gave one clear, unambiguous base retention figure; ties broken alphabetically.
| California | Accidents and most other violations: 3 years from the date; violations designated as 2 points: 7 years; DUI (Veh. Code §§23140, 23152, 23153): 10 years | Vehicle Code §1808(b) | not sourced | — | Source | statute | direct |
| New York | DMV keeps crash reports for 4 years from the crash date, with rare statutory exceptions | Vehicle and Traffic Law §201(i) | not sourced | — | Source | state DMV page | direct |
| Texas | DPS/DHSMV may disclose an individual's cited collisions and moving-violation convictions for the 3 years preceding the request | Transportation Code §521.046 | not sourced | — | Source | statute | direct |
| Florida | FLHSMV issues two official record products — a 3-year and a 7-year driving record; guilty dispositions and crash entries with a citation appear within 3 or 7 years of the disposition date | FLHSMV driving-record policy (no single Florida Statutes section confirmed for this specific rule) | not sourced | — | Source | state DMV page | r.jina.ai proxy (direct fetch returned 403) |
| Pennsylvania | Point-system records: retained until 1 year after the driver's point total returns to zero; habitual-offender records: 7 years after the offense (plus 1 year after point reduction); certain major-offense records: retained indefinitely | 67 Pa. Code §207.2 | not sourced | — | Source | state administrative code | direct (after redirect) |
| Washington | Violations/convictions and non-commercial collisions: 5 years from the date; commercial-vehicle collisions: 10 years; departmental actions (suspensions/revocations): 5 years; major commercial withdrawals: for life | RCW 46.52.130 | not sourced | — | Source | statute cited on state DMV page | direct |
| Virginia | Demerit points are valid for 2 years from the date the offense was committed; points used as grounds for a suspension/revocation remain in effect until that action concludes | Code of Virginia §46.2-493 | not sourced | — | Source | statute | direct |
| Michigan | Points: 2 years from the conviction date; most convictions: at least 7 years; certain convictions/licensing actions: at least 10 years; fatality or impaired-driving convictions: permanent | Michigan Vehicle Code (MCL 257.1 et seq.), general — no single section cited in the source document | not sourced | — | Source | state DMV publication (Dept. of State driver's manual) | r.jina.ai proxy (direct fetch returned 403) |
| New Jersey | Driver history abstract shows moving violations, points, accidents, and suspensions for the past 5 years | N.J. MVC driver-history policy (no statute number confirmed on page) | 6 or more points within 3 years of the driver's last posted violation triggers a point surcharge | N.J. MVC surcharge policy (no statute number confirmed on page) | Source 1 · Source 2 | state DMV page | direct |
| Massachusetts | not found — no RMV/Merit Rating Board page located stating a general record-retention period for accidents or points | not confirmed | Safe Driver Insurance Plan (SDIP) uses a 6-year policy experience period; no surcharge points are assigned in the 6th (oldest) year, i.e. roughly a 5-year full-weight surcharge lookback | Safe Driver Insurance Plan (specific 211 CMR section not confirmed) | Source | state page (insurer-surcharge program, not the DMV record itself) | r.jina.ai proxy (direct fetch returned 403) |
| Colorado | Driving records maintained by the DMV cover a minimum of 7 years of data; a longer "full history" record is available on request | not confirmed (no statute cited on the page) | not sourced | — | Source | state DMV page | r.jina.ai proxy (direct fetch returned 403) |
| Indiana | Points stay active on a driving record for 2 years from the conviction date | Point values are set by 140 IAC; the specific citation for the 2-year duration is not stated on the page itself | not sourced | — | Source | state BMV page | direct |
| Minnesota | Record of revocations, suspensions, cancellations, disqualifications, convictions, AND ACCIDENTS is cumulative and kept at least 5 years; out-of-service violations: at least 10 years; certain felony and alcohol-related offenses: retained permanently | Minn. Stat. §171.12, subd. 3 | not sourced | — | Source | statute | direct |
| Arizona | MVD sells a 3-year (uncertified) and a 5-year (certified) driving-record product | Arizona law implementing the federal DPPA, Title 28 Ch. 2 Art. 5 (record-type framework; no specific retention-length statute confirmed) | not sourced — secondary sources widely report a 39-month record supplied to insurers, but this could not be confirmed on a primary azdot.gov page | — | Source | state DMV page (partial — record products only, not a stated retention rule) | direct |
| Maryland | not found — MVA page confirms points are tracked and remain "part of your official driving record" but states no fixed expungement or retention period | not confirmed | not sourced | — | Source | not found | direct |
| Ohio | not found — ORC §4510.036 defines a rolling 2-year window, but only to count points toward a 12-point suspension threshold for one specific offense (§4511.204); no general point or accident retention period located in the primary statute text | not confirmed | not sourced | — | Source | not found | direct |
| North Carolina | not found — G.S. 20-16 confirms points are counted in a rolling 3-year window for suspension purposes but does not state a general point-retention or expungement period | not confirmed | not sourced | — | Source | not found | direct |
| Tennessee | not found — TN Dept. of Safety materials reference a 24-month lookback used to flag suspensions, but a general point-retention period could not be confirmed (primary page fetch for the duration failed/timed out) | not confirmed | not sourced | — | Source | not found | direct attempt failed (connection reset) |
| Georgia | not found — DDS page confirms up to 7 points can be reduced once every 5 years but states no general point-retention or expungement period | O.C.G.A. §40-5-86 (reduction eligibility only, not retention) | not sourced | — | Source | not found | direct |
| Illinois | not found — no primary ilsos.gov page or Illinois statute located confirming a specific retention period for points or accidents | not confirmed | not sourced | — | Source | not found | search only — no page fetched contained the figure |
| Wisconsin | not found — no primary dot.wi.gov / Wisconsin DMV page located stating a point or accident retention period | not confirmed | not sourced | — | — | not found | search only — no primary source located |
Hover a column header for what it means. Click a header to sort. “Not sourced” / “not confirmed” / “not found” are the source’s own words for a figure that could not be verified, kept as written rather than left blank.
Sources
- Vehicle Code Section 1808California Legislative InformationOfficial statute text; 3/7/10-year retention tiers confirmed verbatim via WebFetch
- Records | NY DMVNew York State DMVStates 4-year crash report retention and cites VTL §201(i)
- Transportation Code Chapter 521Texas Legislature Council / statutes site§521.046 confirms the 3-year collision/conviction disclosure window
- Questions About Driving RecordsFlorida DHSMVFetched via r.jina.ai after a direct 403; describes 3-year and 7-year record types
- 67 Pa. Code §207.2 Traffic safety recordsPennsylvania Code and Bulletin (official state administrative code)Retention tiers for point-system, habitual-offender, and major-offense records
- Guide to driving recordsWashington State Dept. of Licensing5-year/10-year retention table, cites RCW 46.52.130
- §46.2-493. Demerit points valid for two yearsCode of Virginia (official state code site)Exact statute text quoted
- Chapter 2: Your Driving Record (What Every Driver Must Know)Michigan Dept. of StateFetched via r.jina.ai after a direct 403
- Get My Own Driving Record (Driver History Abstract)New Jersey MVCStates the abstract covers the past 5 years
- SurchargesNew Jersey MVCStates the 3-year window used for the point surcharge
- Safe Driver Insurance Plan (SDIP)Massachusetts RMV / Merit Rating BoardFetched via r.jina.ai after a direct 403; describes the 6-year policy experience period
- Driving Record (Also known as Motor Vehicle Records or MVRs)Colorado Dept. of Revenue, Division of Motor VehiclesFetched via r.jina.ai after a direct 403; states 7-year minimum record
- Driver Record PointsIndiana BMVStates 2-year point duration
- Minn. Stat. §171.12 Driving Record; Filing; Private DataOffice of the Minnesota Revisor of Statutes (official state code)Explicitly covers accidents: 5-year minimum retention, quoted verbatim
- Motor Vehicle RecordsArizona Dept. of Transportation, MVDConfirms 3-year (uncertified) and 5-year (certified) record products; did not confirm the widely-cited 39-month insurer figure
- Driver's License PointsMaryland MVAConfirms points are tracked but states no fixed retention period
- Section 4510.036 - Ohio Revised CodeOhio Laws (official Ohio Revised Code site)Only a 2-year rolling window for one specific offense; no general retention rule found
- G.S. 20-16North Carolina General Assembly (official statute site)Only a 3-year suspension-threshold window; no general retention rule found
- Driver Improvement points accumulationTennessee Dept. of Safety and Homeland SecurityFull-page fetch failed (connection reset); WebSearch snippet only referenced a 24-month suspension lookback, not a retention rule
- Points and Points ReductionGeorgia Dept. of Driver ServicesOnly a 5-year point-reduction eligibility window; no general retention rule found
- C.L.U.E. AutoLexisNexis Risk SolutionsCompany's own product page states up to 7 years of personal-auto claims history
- CLUE (Comprehensive Loss Underwriting Exchange)Washington State Office of the Insurance CommissionerIndependent state-government confirmation of the 7-year C.L.U.E. figure
Method
Ran 35+ targeted WebSearch queries (per-state DMV/BMV/statute site: queries) and verified every candidate fact with a direct WebFetch against the .gov or official-state-code URL before including it. Where a state site returned HTTP 403 (Florida, Michigan, Massachusetts, Colorado), refetched through the r.jina.ai reader proxy and flagged the method per-row. Excluded all law-firm and insurance-marketing content from the table itself; those pages were used only to identify which primary statute/regulation to go check, never as the cited source. Several statute/regulation fetches (Ohio, North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Illinois, Wisconsin, Arizona's insurer figure) came back without the specific retention number despite locating the correct section, so those are marked 'not found' rather than filled in from the secondary sources that surfaced them.
Gaps
Only 14 of 50 states have a fully sourced DMV driving-record retention figure with a verified statute/regulation citation (CA, NY, TX, FL, PA, WA, VA, MI, NJ, CO, IN, MN, MD-partial, AZ-partial); 6 more (OH, NC, TN, GA, IL, WI) were actively searched and fetched but yielded no primary-sourced retention number, so they're included as explicit 'not found' rows rather than omitted. The remaining ~29 states were not researched at all due to time constraints and are absent from the table entirely (not even as 'not found' rows) — a follow-up pass would need to cover AK, AL, AR, CT, DE, HI, IA, ID, KS, KY, LA, ME, MS, MO, MT, ND, NE, NH, NM, NV, OK, OR, RI, SC, SD, UT, VT, WV, WY. The insurer-surcharge-lookback column (clock #2) is confirmed for only 2 states (NJ, MA); most other states' insurance-regulation surcharge periods were not researched. The C.L.U.E. 7-year figure (clock #3) is a national, not state-by-state, fact and is documented once in the dataset note rather than repeated per row. Several states (MD, OH, NC, GA, TN) genuinely may not codify a single 'retention period' the way California or Washington do — their systems use rolling look-back windows tied to suspension thresholds rather than a fixed record-expiration date, which is a real structural finding, not just a research gap.
