What to do after a car accident in Georgia

A crash on I-285 or a back road outside Macon leaves you facing the same first minutes anyone does: check for injuries, call 911, and get to safety if the cars can be moved. Those universal steps live on the national guide this page sits under. What actually changes from state to state is the legal machinery that decides who pays and how long you have to act. In Georgia, a short list of specific rules shapes your claim, and a couple of them changed in 2025. Here is what applies here.

The two-year clock is shorter than you think

Georgia gives you two years from the date of the crash to file a personal injury lawsuit under O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33.¹ Miss that window and the court will almost certainly dismiss the case, no matter how badly you were hurt. Damage to your vehicle gets a longer deadline, four years, under O.C.G.A. § 9-3-32.² The injury clock can pause in narrow situations: an injured minor, a person found mentally incompetent, or a defendant who fraudulently concealed the claim. A spouse's loss-of-consortium claim carries its own four-year deadline rather than two.¹ Don't count on those exceptions. Insurers know most people wait too long.

Georgia pays through the at-fault driver

This is the fact that trips up drivers coming from Florida or another no-fault state. Georgia repealed its no-fault law, the Motor Vehicle Accident Reparations Act, effective October 1, 1991. Since then the at-fault driver's liability insurance pays first for the injuries and damage they cause, under O.C.G.A. § 40-6-10.³ There is no mandatory personal injury protection here, and no 14-day treatment deadline like Florida's. Medical payments coverage (MedPay) is an optional add-on the driver chooses to buy.³ In practice, your recovery runs through the other driver's insurer, or through your own coverage when theirs falls short.

The 50 percent fault bar, and the 2025 seatbelt change

Georgia uses modified comparative negligence. You can still recover when you were partly to blame, but your award drops by your share of fault, and if you are 50 percent or more at fault you recover nothing, under O.C.G.A. § 51-12-33.⁴ So 49 percent fault still lets you collect the remaining 51 percent, while 50 percent ends the claim. That one percentage point is often the whole fight.

A long-standing rule here just flipped. For decades Georgia had a seatbelt gag rule that kept your belt use, or non-use, out of a car accident trial. Senate Bill 68, the tort reform law Governor Kemp signed on April 21, 2025, repealed that provision at O.C.G.A. § 40-8-76.1.⁵ A defendant can now put your non-use in front of the jury and argue it should raise your share of fault or reduce your damages. If you weren't buckled, that fact can cut against you in a way it couldn't before 2025.

Low minimums make uninsured motorist coverage matter

Georgia requires only 25/50/25 in liability coverage: $25,000 for bodily injury per person, $50,000 per accident, and $25,000 for property damage (O.C.G.A. § 40-6-10, confirmed in the state Office of Commissioner of Insurance's Consumer Guide for Automobile Insurance).³⁶ A serious injury runs past $25,000 quickly. That is why uninsured and underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage is the backstop that quietly saves Georgia drivers. It isn't mandatory on its own, but every insurer has to offer it, and it's automatically included at limits matching your bodily injury coverage unless you rejected it in writing (O.C.G.A. § 33-7-11).⁷ Georgia also lets you buy stacked, or added-to, UM that sits on top of the at-fault driver's limits instead of being reduced by them.⁷ Read your own declarations page. Plenty of people carry this coverage without realizing it.

Get the crash documented

Call the police and make sure a report is filed. Georgia's official crash form is the Georgia Motor Vehicle Crash Report, form GDOT-523, and the Georgia Department of Transportation runs the statewide crash database, GEARS, where those reports are stored.⁸ The report captures the responding officer's account, the other driver's insurance, and any citations, and all of it drives the insurance claim later. Getting a copy is covered on our Georgia crash reports page.

A distracted-driving ticket helps prove fault

Since July 2018, Georgia's Hands-Free Act (O.C.G.A. § 40-6-241) has barred drivers from holding or supporting a phone and from reading, writing, or sending any text-based message while driving.⁹ It's primary enforcement, so an officer can stop and cite a driver for that alone. Penalties run from 1 point and a $50 fine on a first conviction up to 3 points and a $150 fine on a third within two years.¹⁰ If the driver who hit you was on a phone, a citation under this statute is direct evidence of negligence, so flag it for the officer and keep it in your own records.

Drunk drivers and uncapped punitive damages

When the at-fault driver was impaired, Georgia opens doors that stay shut in an ordinary fender-bender. Punitive damages are normally capped at $250,000 in most tort cases, but O.C.G.A. § 51-12-5.1 removes that cap entirely when the defendant was driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, and in product liability cases.¹¹ Georgia's dram shop law is narrower than in many states. A bar, restaurant, or social host is liable only if it knowingly served alcohol to a minor, or to a noticeably intoxicated person it knew would soon be driving, under O.C.G.A. § 51-1-40.¹² Those facts are hard to prove, but when they hold up they add a defendant with real insurance behind it.

What Georgia doesn't cap

In an ordinary car accident case there is no cap on your compensatory damages, the money for medical bills, lost income, and pain and suffering. Georgia's attempt to cap noneconomic damages, the $350,000 medical-malpractice limit, was struck down as unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court in Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery, P.C. v. Nestlehutt, 286 Ga. 731 (2010), which held it violated the constitutional right to a jury trial.¹³ That ruling was about malpractice, but it's the reason a Georgia jury, rather than a fixed statutory number, decides what your injuries are worth. If you were riding a motorcycle, note that Georgia's universal helmet law requires every operator and passenger to wear DOT-compliant headgear with no age exception, under O.C.G.A. § 40-6-315.¹⁴

Your car's lost value, and getting help

Even a well-repaired vehicle sells for less once a wreck sits on its history, and Georgia lets you claim that diminished value from the at-fault insurer. How to calculate and demand it is covered on our Georgia diminished value page. If your injuries are real, fault is disputed, or an adjuster is pushing a fast lowball, talk to a Georgia attorney well before the two-year deadline runs. You can start with our legal directory.

This article is general information about Georgia law, not legal advice for your specific situation.

Sources

1. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33 (two-year limitation for injuries to the person; loss of consortium). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-9/chapter-3/article-2/section-9-3-33/

2. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 9-3-32 (four-year limitation for injuries to personalty). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-9/chapter-3/article-2/section-9-3-32/

3. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 40-6-10 (motor vehicle liability insurance requirements). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-40/chapter-6/article-1/section-40-6-10/

4. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 51-12-33 (comparative negligence and apportionment of damages). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-51/chapter-12/article-1/section-51-12-33/

5. Georgia General Assembly, Senate Bill 68 (2025-2026 Regular Session), signed April 21, 2025 (tort reform; repeal of the seatbelt evidence rule at O.C.G.A. § 40-8-76.1). https://www.legis.ga.gov/legislation/69756

6. Georgia Office of Commissioner of Insurance and Safety Fire, Consumer Guide for Automobile Insurance. https://oci.georgia.gov/document/document/guide-auto-insurance/download

7. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 33-7-11 (uninsured motorist coverage). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-33/chapter-7/section-33-7-11/

8. Georgia Department of Transportation, Crash Data & Reporting (Georgia Motor Vehicle Crash Report form GDOT-523; GEARS database). https://www.dot.ga.gov/GDOT/pages/CrashReporting.aspx

9. Georgia Department of Driver Services, Chapter 2: Traffic Laws & Safe Driving (Hands-Free Act, O.C.G.A. § 40-6-241). https://dds.georgia.gov/chapter-2-traffic-laws-safe-driving

10. Georgia Governor's Office of Highway Safety, Hands-Free Law (penalties). https://www.gahighwaysafety.org/hands-free-law/

11. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 51-12-5.1 (punitive damages; product-liability and impaired-driver exceptions to the cap). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-51/chapter-12/article-1/section-51-12-5.1/

12. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 51-1-40 (liability for acts of intoxicated persons; dram shop and social host). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-51/chapter-1/section-51-1-40/

13. Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery, P.C. v. Nestlehutt, 286 Ga. 731, 691 S.E.2d 218 (2010). CourtListener. https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1300373/atlanta-oculoplastic-surgery-v-nestlehutt/

14. Georgia Code, O.C.G.A. § 40-6-315 (motorcycle protective headgear and eye protection). https://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/2020/title-40/chapter-6/article-13/part-2/section-40-6-315/