If you ride in Massachusetts, two rules shape almost every conversation about a crash. You have to wear a helmet, and you can't split lanes. Both are settled state law, and both can affect what you recover if another driver hurts you.
The roads here are crowded. Thatcarhitme.com's crash data recorded 128,769 reported crashes across Massachusetts in 2025 1, and Boston alone logged 451 in a single month, April 2026 2. Riders absorb the worst of those numbers. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety counted 70 motorcyclist deaths in the state in 2024 3.
The helmet law covers everyone on the bike
Massachusetts has a universal helmet law. Under M.G.L. c. 90, section 7, every person operating a motorcycle, riding as a passenger, or riding in an attached sidecar must wear protective headgear that meets the standards set by the Registrar of Motor Vehicles 4. No age exception, no experience exception. The registrar's standard follows the federal one, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 218, which sets the minimum performance requirements for motorcycle helmets and exists to reduce head-impact deaths and injuries 5. The short version is that your helmet has to be DOT-compliant. Novelty helmets don't qualify.
The only exception is narrow. Section 7 waives headgear if you are 18 or older and taking part in a properly permitted public parade 4. That is the whole carve-out.
Massachusetts is among the minority of states that require a helmet for every rider. The CDC, which tracks these laws, credits helmets with saving an estimated 1,872 motorcyclists' lives nationwide in 2017, and says another 749 lives could have been saved that year if all riders had worn one 6.
Section 7 also protects your eyes. If your motorcycle has no windshield or screen, you have to wear eyeglasses, goggles, or a protective face shield while operating it 4.
Lane splitting is illegal in Massachusetts
Riding the line between lanes of slow or stopped traffic, usually called lane splitting, is not legal here. M.G.L. c. 89, section 4A is direct about it: motorcyclists "shall not pass any other motor vehicle within the same lane, except another motorcycle" 7. Threading between two cars means passing a vehicle inside its lane, which the statute forbids.
The same section adds two related rules. You must ride single file when passing, and you cannot ride abreast of more than one other motorcycle 7. So two bikes sharing one lane side by side is allowed. Three across is not. And filtering forward past stopped cars, the maneuver riders can legally make in California, stays off the table in Massachusetts.
This matters after a collision. A rider who was splitting lanes hands the other driver's insurer a ready-made fault argument.
How the helmet and lane rules affect a claim
Massachusetts uses modified comparative negligence. Under M.G.L. c. 231, section 85, you can recover even if you were partly at fault, but only if your share of the negligence was "not greater than" the other party's 8. At 51% or more, you recover nothing. At 50% or less, your damages are reduced by your percentage of fault.
That is where the helmet and lane rules come back around. If you were splitting lanes or riding without a compliant helmet, expect the defense to point at you. Because nearly everyone wears a helmet under the universal law, non-use is rare, but when the injury involves the head or face, an insurer may argue that a missing or non-DOT helmet made the harm worse. NHTSA treats a DOT helmet as the most effective safety equipment a rider has 9, and the CDC's research agrees 6, so an adjuster will raise the question if there is any opening.
Fault often runs the other way. Many motorcycle crashes happen because a driver never saw the rider or was looking at a phone. Massachusetts has banned handheld phone use for every driver since February 23, 2020, with fines that start at $100 and climb to $500 for repeat offenses 10. A distracted driver who turns across your path is the one at fault, and that conduct is worth documenting at the scene.
Insurance works differently for riders
Here is the part that catches people off guard. Massachusetts is a no-fault state for cars, so a car policy includes Personal Injury Protection (PIP) that pays your first medical bills no matter who caused the crash. Motorcycles sit outside that system. The Massachusetts Division of Insurance puts it plainly: your insurer "is not legally obligated to provide personal injury protection (PIP) for the operators or passengers of a motorcycle who incur bodily injury while on the motorcycle" 11.
So a rider gets no automatic $8,000 PIP benefit. To cover early medical costs, the Division recommends buying Medical Payments coverage, or MedPay, which works much like PIP 11. Health insurance and, after a serious crash, the at-fault driver's liability coverage handle the rest.
The basics are still required. Motorcyclists must carry compulsory bodily injury and property damage liability at the state minimum limits, the same as any driver 11. For policies issued or renewed on or after July 1, 2025, those minimums rose to $25,000 per person and $50,000 per crash for bodily injury, plus $30,000 for property damage, under the 2024 auto-insurance law 12. Uninsured motorist coverage is mandatory at the same bodily injury limits 13, which matters for riders, since the driver who hits a motorcycle is often carrying too little insurance.
Deadlines, reports, and next steps
To sue the at-fault driver for pain and suffering, Massachusetts applies a tort threshold. Under M.G.L. c. 231, section 6D, your reasonable medical expenses generally have to exceed $2,000, unless the injury caused death, a fracture, permanent and serious disfigurement, loss of a body member, or loss of sight or hearing 14. Motorcycle crashes clear that bar often, because a single broken bone satisfies it regardless of the dollar total.
The filing deadline is firm. You have three years from the date of the crash to bring a personal injury lawsuit, and the same three-year limit applies to property damage to your bike, both under M.G.L. c. 260, section 2A 15. Once it passes, the claim is gone.
A few practical steps. Get the police crash report, which the RMV's Crash Records Unit maintains 16; you can pull one through the Massachusetts crash reports page. If your motorcycle was damaged and its resale value dropped, that loss is a separate diminished value claim. And when injuries are serious or fault is contested, talk to a lawyer early; you can find one through the legal directory.
This article is general information, not legal advice.
Sources
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Thatcarhitme.com, Massachusetts statewide year-over-year crash report, 2025. https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/massachusetts/statewide/2025-annual-report
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Thatcarhitme.com, Boston, MA crash report, April 2026. https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/massachusetts/boston/april-2026-report
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Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, Fatality Facts 2024: State by state. https://www.iihs.org/research-areas/fatality-statistics/detail/state-by-state
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, section 7 (motorcycle protective headgear and eye protection). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXIV/Chapter90/Section7
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49 C.F.R. section 571.218, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 218 (Motorcycle helmets). https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-49/subtitle-B/chapter-V/part-571/subpart-B/section-571.218
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Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Universal Motorcycle Helmet Laws (updated July 28, 2025). https://www.cdc.gov/transportation-safety/calculator/mchelmet.html
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 89, section 4A (motorcycles operating within lanes). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXIV/Chapter89/Section4A
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 231, section 85 (comparative negligence). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIII/TitleII/Chapter231/Section85
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National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Motorcycle Safety. https://www.nhtsa.gov/road-safety/motorcycles
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, section 13B (hands-free requirement and handheld device ban). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXIV/Chapter90/Section13B
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Massachusetts Division of Insurance, "Get Your Motor Runnin'….But First, Get Your Insurance Needs Sorted." (June 17, 2025). https://www.mass.gov/news/get-your-motor-runninbut-first-get-your-insurance-needs-sorted
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Acts of 2024, ch. 275 (amending Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, sections 34A and 34O; effective July 1, 2025). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/SessionLaws/Acts/2024/Chapter275
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 175, section 113L (uninsured motorist coverage). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXXII/Chapter175/Section113L
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 231, section 6D (tort threshold for pain and suffering). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIII/TitleII/Chapter231/Section6D
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 260, section 2A (three-year statute of limitations). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIII/TitleV/Chapter260/Section2A
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Massachusetts RMV, Request a Copy of a Police Crash Report. https://www.mass.gov/how-to/request-a-copy-of-a-police-crash-report