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Despite what you may have heard, women don’t always get cheaper rates on car insurance.
We compared rates across insurance companies for a sample driver in New York to get a view on how much gender plays into the premiums you pay.
Our analysis of Quadrant data found that men under the age of 18 pay 17% more for car insurance than women of the same age. However, between ages 31 and 35, women see 5% higher rates than men.
The higher premium varies by a driver’s age. But it turns out that over a lifetime of driving, men end up paying about 3% more than women.
Age | Men | Women |
---|---|---|
Under 18 | $7,560 | $6,304 |
18-21 | $4,144 | $3,571 |
22-25 | $2,929 | $2,709 |
26-30 | $2,518 | $2,591 |
31-35 | $2,480 | $2,602 |
36-45 | $2,533 | $2,650 |
46-55 | $2,460 | $2,471 |
56+ | $2,426 | $2,454 |
The average car insurance rates don’t tell the whole story about how much you might pay based on your gender.
For example, median rates for men ages 31 to 35 were only $18 higher than for women, at $1,870 versus $1,898, respectively. And the absolute cheapest rate for men at $601 was only $80 more than the $681 for women.
We pulled data from Quadrant for 47 car insurance companies and compared hundreds of thousands of car insurance rates using the same driver profile:
Charging different premiums by gender boils down to statistics, which suggest that men may be more likely to make bad decisions behind the wheel — especially when they’re young.
Men account for almost three-quarters or 73% of all road fatalities, according to 10 years of data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Men are also 2.8 times more likely to be behind the wheel during a fatal accident than women.
Using NHTSA data, we dive into car accident statistics for men versus women to discover which types of accidents and factors are most common.
Type of accident | Men | Women | Unknown | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
Drivers involved in nonfatal accidents, 2010-2019 | 60,902,780 | 47,239,953 | – | 108,142,733 |
Drivers involved in fatal accidents, 2010-2019 | 348,746 | 123,144 | 8,836 | 480,726 |
Men ages 16 to 25 get in the most car accidents when compared to women or other age groups.
However, the gap between genders widens over time. Drivers in age groups 51 to 55 and 56 to 60 have the widest gender gap for accidents. In these groups, men get into accidents 1.4 times more often than women.
Age group | Male drivers involved in accidents | Female drivers involved in accidents | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
16-20 | 7,220,220 | 6,078,220 | 17% |
21-25 | 8,208,164 | 6,660,681 | 21% |
26-30 | 6,737,640 | 5,491,449 | 20% |
31-35 | 5,935,255 | 4,694,848 | 23% |
36-40 | 5,246,820 | 4,156,538 | 23% |
41-45 | 5,078,710 | 3,839,385 | 28% |
46-50 | 4,995,282 | 3,690,621 | 30% |
51-55 | 4,781,165 | 3,347,679 | 35% |
56-60 | 5,054,154 | 3,565,476 | 35% |
61-65 | 3,102,128 | 2,206,176 | 34% |
66-70 | 2,190,289 | 1,596,253 | 31% |
71-75 | 1,410,854 | 1,044,990 | 30% |
76-80 | 935,366 | 691,471 | 30% |
Men see more car accident troubles from driving violations than women.
We analyzed which gender was driving during crashes after specific violations, including drunk driving, speeding and not wearing a seatbelt.
Men get in over 103,000 fatal drunk driving accidents,nearly four times the fatal accidents for women. This stat applies to drivers with a blood alcohol content of 0.08 or higher.
Violation | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Drunk driving | 103,600 | 28,487 | 114% |
Another major safety risk that men take — not using their seatbelt every time they get behind the wheel. Men are thrown from vehicles in an accident nearly 2.1 times more often than women.
That means that men don’t buckle up as much as women, or they’re at least caught in accidents unbuckled the most. We looked at data for both fatal and nonfatal accidents.
Violation | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Ejected from vehicle (no seat belt) | 109,150 | 52,863 | 69% |
Considering both fatal and nonfatal accidents, men get in over 250,000 more speeding-related accidents each year compared to women.
The gender gap rings in at a 38% difference between men and women. In other words, you’ll find a male driver at the wheel during an accident 1.5 times more often than a woman.
Violation | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Speeding | 8,011,980 | 5,464,542 | 38% |
Men are prone to a higher involvement in each type of collision we analyzed. Men get in rear-end collisions more often than women, and they’re three times as likely for that rear-ender to kill someone.
When it comes to nonfatal accidents, men are more often at the wheel during a sideswipe than women.
Type of collision | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Angle | 86,523 | 35,728 | 83% |
Head-on | 47,821 | 19,888 | 83% |
Rear-end | 38,893 | 12,693 | 102% |
Sideswipe | 15,521 | 5,475 | 96% |
Other/unknown | 2,906 | 825 | – |
Not collision with another motor vehicle | 157,082 | 48,535 | 106% |
Type of collision | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Angle | 14,545,593 | 12,431,136 | 17% |
Head-on | 1,650,215 | 1,300,997 | 27% |
Rear-end | 23,486,080 | 19,777,080 | 19% |
Sideswipe | 8,374,067 | 5,865,026 | 43% |
Other/unknown | 1,148,472 | 794,077 | – |
Not collision with another motor vehicle | 11,698,354 | 7,071,637 | 65% |
North Dakota has the widest gender gap in spades with men getting into accidents 4.8 times more often than women.
Then, South Dakota and Washington, D.C. stick close together. In South Dakota, men get into accidents 3.7 times more often than women, and 3.6 times more often in D.C.
We ranked the states based on the difference between the number of fatal car accidents for men versus women, not considering crashes reported as gender unknown. We sourced 10 years of crash data from the NHTSA.
Rank | States | Male driver in fatal crash | Female driver in fatal crash | Unknown gender | % of difference between men vs. women |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
44 | Alabama | 8,733 | 3,348 | 128 | 89% |
48 | Alaska | 645 | 254 | 9 | 87% |
41 | Arizona | 8,335 | 3,158 | 509 | 90% |
19 | Arkansas | 5,318 | 1,852 | 69 | 97% |
13 | California | 32,978 | 10,954 | 1,626 | 100% |
25 | Colorado | 5,477 | 1,916 | 104 | 96% |
13 | Connecticut | 2,776 | 923 | 56 | 100% |
35 | Delaware | 1,165 | 431 | 36 | 92% |
3 | District of Columbia | 239 | 66 | 13 | 113% |
39 | Florida | 28,015 | 10,515 | 1,047 | 91% |
50 | Georgia | 13,412 | 5,409 | 285 | 85% |
8 | Hawaii | 1,072 | 339 | 32 | 104% |
28 | Idaho | 2,028 | 734 | 6 | 94% |
19 | Illinois | 10,114 | 3,523 | 274 | 97% |
11 | Indiana | 8,574 | 2,809 | 170 | 101% |
4 | Iowa | 3,626 | 1,080 | 14 | 108% |
13 | Kansas | 4,000 | 1,341 | 37 | 100% |
35 | Kentucky | 7,400 | 2,749 | 78 | 92% |
28 | Louisiana | 7,175 | 2,592 | 182 | 94% |
39 | Maine | 1,424 | 533 | 3 | 91% |
11 | Maryland | 5,256 | 1,726 | 172 | 101% |
19 | Massachusetts | 3,461 | 1,198 | 40 | 97% |
46 | Michigan | 9,756 | 3,797 | 274 | 88% |
35 | Minnesota | 3,962 | 1,457 | 42 | 92% |
35 | Mississippi | 5,998 | 2,214 | 69 | 92% |
28 | Missouri | 8,446 | 3,035 | 181 | 94% |
27 | Montana | 1,728 | 614 | 9 | 95% |
17 | Nebraska | 2,235 | 766 | 19 | 98% |
32 | Nevada | 2,955 | 1,073 | 80 | 93% |
50 | New Hampshire | 1,084 | 437 | 2 | 85% |
19 | New Jersey | 5,803 | 2,022 | 174 | 97% |
17 | New Mexico | 3,421 | 1,165 | 109 | 98% |
6 | New York | 10,747 | 3,343 | 372 | 105% |
46 | North Carolina | 13,259 | 5,181 | 193 | 88% |
1 | North Dakota | 1,368 | 287 | 4 | 131% |
41 | Ohio | 11,138 | 4,205 | 204 | 90% |
32 | Oklahoma | 6,673 | 2,422 | 120 | 93% |
19 | Oregon | 3,924 | 1,366 | 53 | 97% |
9 | Pennsylvania | 12,694 | 4,139 | 194 | 102% |
44 | Rhode Island | 563 | 217 | 7 | 89% |
32 | South Carolina | 9,010 | 3,283 | 156 | 93% |
2 | South Dakota | 1,254 | 343 | 2 | 114% |
41 | Tennessee | 10,141 | 3,842 | 167 | 90% |
9 | Texas | 35,567 | 11,504 | 1,088 | 102% |
49 | Utah | 2,506 | 999 | 38 | 86% |
19 | Vermont | 585 | 204 | 2 | 97% |
28 | Virginia | 7,563 | 2,728 | 179 | 94% |
25 | Washington | 5,030 | 1,770 | 116 | 96% |
6 | West Virginia | 3,010 | 934 | 25 | 105% |
16 | Wisconsin | 5,871 | 1,972 | 64 | 99% |
5 | Wyoming | 1,232 | 375 | 3 | 107% |
Both genders get in more car accidents during the day compared to night. However, men get in nighttime crashes 1.5 times more often than women.
Men are at the wheel during 1.8 million nighttime crashes per year, compared to 1.1 million for women.
Time of day | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Morning | 43,446,799 | 35,950,737 | 21% |
Night | 17,802,947 | 11,411,924 | 56% |
Reported as unknown | 1,779 | 436 | – |
Friday is the most troublesome day for car accidents across both genders.
However, the gender gap between the number of car accidents widens on Saturday and Sunday. Men get in car accidents about 1.5 times more often on those days than women.
Day of week | Male drivers | Female drivers | % difference between genders |
---|---|---|---|
Sunday | 6,129,221 | 4,067,773 | 51% |
Monday | 8,857,643 | 7,075,730 | 25% |
Tuesday | 9,343,303 | 7,565,058 | 24% |
Wednesday | 9,215,642 | 7,587,686 | 21% |
Thursday | 9,396,815 | 7,583,144 | 24% |
Friday | 10,537,623 | 8,195,727 | 29% |
Saturday | 7,771,280 | 5,287,982 | 47% |
How your insurance company evaluates your gender largely depends on how you’re represented on your ID. The majority of states don’t make it easy to change the gender on your ID, which may mean getting lumped in with the gender you were assigned at birth.
You might be able to speak directly to your insurer about more affordable rates while you work through the process of changing your gender marker on your driver’s license. But there’s no guarantee you’ll get a rate break.
All US states allow you to change your gender on your driver’s license, though the formal process — and frustration — varies by state. As of February 2022, 15 states and Washington DC allow gender marker changes simply by self attesting. All other states require either medical documentation, a court order or an updated passport or birth certificate.
Contact the National Center for Transgender Equality for your state’s policies or to learn more from an attorney who specializes in changes to government-issued ID.
Sixteen states and Washington DC allow X gender markers as of this writing. Because the option is fairly new, data on how it affects car insurance rates is fairly limited.
The Oregon Department of Consumer and Business Services issued a notice in 2018 to insurers that use gender when determining premiums that they must accommodate drivers who select the X gender marker. It’s yet to be seen how other states that allow factoring gender into rates will handle the change.
Ultimately, paying too much for car insurance is more complicated than factoring in your age or your gender. Insurance companies use a variety of factors to set car insurance premiums, and not every company weighs each factor the same.
To find the cheapest rates and most comprehensive coverage you’re eligible for, compare several quotes from both big and small companies.
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Chelsea Wells-Barrett, PR, Media Relations and Communications
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