What are the minimum insurance requirements in Texas, and are they enough?

What 30/60/25 actually buys

Texas law requires drivers to carry liability coverage of at least $30,000 for each injured person, capped at $60,000 total per crash regardless of how many people are hurt, plus $25,000 for property damage. Set those numbers against reality: an ambulance, an emergency department workup, and advanced imaging routinely approach or exceed $30,000 before a single day of treatment, therapy, or lost work is counted, and $25,000 does not replace the average new vehicle. The minimums exist to satisfy the financial responsibility law, and the state verifies compliance electronically. They were never sized to make a seriously injured person whole, and everyone in the insurance industry knows it.

The two gaps that swallow claims

The first gap is the underinsured at-fault driver: liability is clear, the injuries are large, and the policy is the minimum, leaving the difference nowhere unless other coverage exists. The second is the driver with nothing at all, a persistently large share of Texas traffic by every estimate, against whom a liability claim is an IOU from someone who cannot pay. Multi-victim crashes compound both problems, because every injured person shares the single $60,000 per-occurrence pool, first documented, first negotiated, best positioned. These gaps are not rare misfortunes; they are the ordinary arithmetic of Texas roads.

The coverage that actually protects you is your own

The practical answer is on your own declarations page. Uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage steps in when the at-fault driver carries nothing or too little, and it treats a hit-and-run as uninsured; personal injury protection pays medical bills and lost wages regardless of fault. Texas requires insurers to offer both, and they can only be dropped by a written rejection, which means many people have them without knowing, and many signed them away in a stack of paperwork for a few dollars a month. Raising UM/UIM limits is among the cheapest meaningful financial protection a Texas family can buy, and reading every household policy is the first coverage move in nearly every case this firm takes.

If you were hit by a minimum-limits driver

Do not assume the visible policy is the end. The coverage investigation looks for umbrella and excess layers, employer policies if the driver was working, other responsible parties, and every UM/UIM and PIP policy in your household that can stack on top. And when the limits truly are the ceiling, a properly built policy-limits demand extracts them quickly and preserves the leverage Texas law provides. The consultation that maps all of it costs nothing.

Injured in Arizona? Some rules on this page are Texas-specific. Arizona differs on points that change outcomes, including pure comparative fault and government-claim deadlines. See our Arizona answers or call (888) 508-6967.

Related: Policy Limits & Stowers · Uninsured & Hit-and-Run Drivers · Submit Your Case · All Common Questions

This page is general information about Texas law, not legal advice about your specific situation. Deadlines and outcomes depend on facts; talk to a lawyer about yours.