If a car hit you while you were walking in Delaware, the amount you can recover depends less on a national average and more on a few state rules: how much insurance the driver carries, whether Delaware's mandatory injury-protection benefits reach you on foot, and how much of the blame a jury puts on you. Those rules set the floor and the ceiling on any settlement. Here is how they work in Delaware.
The insurance limits usually set the ceiling
Most pedestrian settlements are paid by the at-fault driver's auto liability policy, and Delaware requires only a thin layer of it. The state minimum is $25,000 for injury to one person, $50,000 for two or more people in one crash, and $10,000 for property damage.1 A driver who bought only the minimum can leave you with a $25,000 ceiling on the liability side no matter how badly you were hurt, which is why one policy rarely covers a catastrophic pedestrian injury by itself. Your claim can be worth far more than that. Collecting it means finding additional coverage.
Delaware PIP pays you even though you were on foot
This is the part that surprises injured pedestrians. Delaware requires personal injury protection (PIP) on every registered vehicle, and the statute extends that coverage to pedestrians who are "injured by an accident with any motor vehicle within the State."2 You do not need to own a car, and you do not need to be the one at fault. The vehicle that struck you carries PIP that pays medical bills and lost wages up to $15,000 per person and $30,000 per accident, plus up to $5,000 in funeral benefits, for expenses you incur within two years of the crash.2
PIP is first-dollar money. It pays regardless of who caused the collision, and it does not stop you from also suing the at-fault driver for everything PIP did not reach. Delaware law also puts the insurer on a clock. It must send you a claim form within 10 days of learning about the claim and either pay or deny within 30 days of a complete proof of loss, or it owes interest that climbs from 1.5% to 2.5% a month the longer it waits.3
How much fault a jury assigns you changes the number
Delaware uses modified comparative negligence. You can still recover if you were partly to blame, but only if your share of the fault was "not greater than" the driver's, and your award drops by your percentage.4 Cross that 51% line and you get nothing. A claim worth $200,000 at zero fault is worth $140,000 if you are found 30% responsible, and zero if you are found 51%.
Where you were walking drives that fault analysis. A driver in Delaware must yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk, slowing or stopping if need be.5 A pedestrian who crosses outside a marked or unmarked crosswalk, on the other hand, has to yield to vehicles on the roadway,6 and insurers lean on that rule to argue you were mostly at fault. Drivers still owe a separate duty, though: they must use due care to avoid hitting anyone on the road and take extra caution around a child or someone obviously confused or incapacitated.7 Walking outside a crosswalk lowers your recovery. It rarely ends the claim outright.
Your own coverage can stack on top
If you own a car, your own policy can add money even though you were on foot. Delaware requires uninsured and underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage on every auto policy unless you rejected it in writing on the insurer's form, at the same limits as your liability coverage.8 Insurers must also offer you the option to buy UIM up to $100,000 per person and $300,000 per accident.8 When the driver who hit you had no insurance, or carried only that $25,000 minimum against a much larger injury, your UM/UIM steps in to fill the gap. In a lot of Delaware pedestrian cases, that stacked coverage is the difference between a token settlement and a fair one.
Delaware puts no cap on what you can recover
Delaware does not cap compensatory damages in an ordinary crash case. There is no statutory ceiling on pain and suffering, medical expenses, or lost earning capacity, so a serious pedestrian claim is limited by the available insurance and the evidence, not by a number the legislature picked. Punitive damages are on the table too, but only on clear and convincing proof that the driver acted willfully, wantonly, or recklessly under Delaware common law, the kind of conduct a drunk or fleeing driver can supply.
The deadlines that can quietly erase a claim
Delaware gives you two years from the date of the crash to file a personal injury lawsuit.9 Miss it and the court will almost certainly dismiss the case, however strong it was. If the injured pedestrian is a child, the clock is paused while they are under 18, so a minor's own claim generally runs from their 18th birthday.10 Do not confuse the lawsuit deadline with the PIP deadlines above. They are separate, and the 10- and 30-day PIP windows move much faster.3
Delaware's pedestrian crash numbers
People on foot are a stubborn share of Delaware's road toll. The state recorded 137 traffic deaths in 2023, down from 164 in 2022, with pedestrian fatalities falling about 13% year over year, according to the Delaware Office of Highway Safety.11 Even with that drop, Delaware stays dangerous for pedestrians: its 2024 pedestrian death rate ran above 3 per 100,000 residents, higher than the national rate of roughly 2.1, per the Governors Highway Safety Association.12 A small state carrying an outsized pedestrian toll is part of why these cases turn on the fine points of fault and coverage.
Documenting the crash protects the number
Whatever your case is worth, the settlement follows the evidence. The police crash report is a common starting point, filed through the Delaware State Police Traffic Operations Section.13 You can read more about getting a Delaware crash report and the deadlines that apply. Photos of the scene and where you were crossing feed the fault analysis that decides how much of your claim survives comparative negligence. If your injuries are serious or the driver's coverage looks too thin to pay for them, talking to a Delaware attorney early helps you find every layer of coverage before a deadline closes it off.
This article is general information, not legal advice.
Sources
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21 Del. C. § 2902(b)(2), Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title21/c029/sc01/index.html
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21 Del. C. § 2118, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title21/c021/sc01/index.html
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21 Del. C. § 2118B, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title21/c021/sc01/index.html
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10 Del. C. § 8132, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title10/c081/index.html
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21 Del. C. § 4142, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title21/c041/sc05/index.html
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21 Del. C. § 4143, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title21/c041/sc05/index.html
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21 Del. C. § 4144, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title21/c041/sc05/index.html
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18 Del. C. § 3902, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title18/c039/index.html
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10 Del. C. § 8119, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title10/c081/index.html
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10 Del. C. § 8116, Delaware Code Online. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title10/c081/index.html
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Delaware Office of Highway Safety, "Road Fatalities Decrease in 2023 From 2022 High" (Jan. 12, 2024). https://news.delaware.gov/2024/01/12/road-fatalities-decrease-in-2023-from-2022-high/
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Governors Highway Safety Association, Pedestrian Traffic Fatalities by State: 2024 Data. https://www.ghsa.org/resource-hub/pedestrian-traffic-fatalities-2024-data
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Delaware State Police, Traffic Operations Section. https://dsp.delaware.gov/traffic-unit/