Florida Still Doesn’t Require Drivers to Carry Bodily Injury Insurance — And a New Law to Change That Just Failed (Again)

Right now, Florida drivers are not required to carry a single penny of insurance to cover the injuries of people they hit with their cars. That’s not an exaggeration. That’s the law.

Florida only requires most drivers to carry a $10,000 PIP policy (there are some narrow exceptions requiring more). PIP — Personal Injury Protection — covers the policyholder’s own medical bills. It does nothing for the people in the other car. The only type of coverage that provides money for those injured in other vehicles is something called bodily injury coverage, also known as BI coverage. And in Florida, it’s optional.

Many people have no idea what’s happening from year to year in the Florida legislature, even though legislative actions in Tallahassee often have a far bigger real impact on our daily lives than anything happening in Washington D.C. As an Orlando car accident lawyer, I try to inform and educate Florida citizens about laws being considered — and not being passed — in Tallahassee that directly affect their lives and their families’ financial security.

What the Florida Legislature Tried to Do

Last year, Florida plaintiff lawyers and consumer advocates tried — again — to get the Florida legislature to pass a law requiring a minimum bodily injury insurance requirement of $25,000 per person and $50,000 per incident. This would have been a meaningful step toward protecting accident victims across Florida, including here in Orlando and throughout Central Florida, where our highways are among the most dangerous in the entire country. (Interstate 4, which runs right through Orlando, has been ranked the deadliest highway in the United States, averaging over one fatality per mile.)

Most other states already require far more insurance coverage than Florida. The proposed law was intended to protect accident victims who are currently left with nothing after an accident they didn’t cause — in those cases where the person who hit them carried only the required minimum $10,000 PIP policy and no bodily injury coverage at all. For Orlando drivers dealing with the volume of traffic we see every day on I-4, the 408, and throughout Orange, Seminole, and Osceola counties, this is not a hypothetical problem. It happens constantly.

How the 2023 Tort Reform Law Made This Even Worse

This new insurance coverage law would have still been subject to the devastating “tort reform” law passed in 2023, which added many technical requirements to insurance claims. Among other things, the 2023 law says that anyone a jury decides is more than 50% at fault recovers nothing. That sounds reasonable in theory, but in practice, it gives insurance companies the ability to use any minor mistake while driving — changing the radio, glancing at a GPS, maybe going a few miles over the speed limit — to argue that an accident victim was more than 50% at fault and should therefore recover zero. The law also added other more technical but similarly limiting legal requirements that ultimately made it much harder for many victims to prevail or to get their full claims paid.

I’m not overstating this. I still remember the Facebook post from a colleague I deeply respect — a fellow Florida injury lawyer with over 30 years of experience and countless multimillion-dollar results — saying that this law would mean the end of his career trying to help victims. He wasn’t kidding. I’ve been practicing personal injury law in Orlando for almost 15 years, after starting my career on the defense side in Atlanta in 1997, and I have never seen a single law narrow the rights of accident victims this dramatically. We can still help people, and we do every day here in Orlando. But the available remedies have significantly narrowed, and we have been forced to decline far more cases than before that law passed. Cases involving real injuries to real people, where someone else was clearly at fault, but where the legal math no longer works under the 2023 rules.

But at least this new insurance coverage requirement would have increased the available funds for those claimants who can still overcome the 2023 law’s requirements. At least there would be something to recover.

Both Bills Died – One in The Florida House & The Other in The Florida Senate

Unfortunately, both bills to increase auto insurance coverage requirements in Florida died in their respective committees. HB 1181’s last action was June 16, 2025 — “Died in Judiciary Committee” in the Florida House. SB 1256’s last action was also June 16, 2025 — “Died in Banking and Insurance” in the Senate. Neither bill even made it out of committee, let alone to the Governor’s desk.

And even if they had passed, Governor DeSantis remained a vocal opponent, saying, “I don’t see how you can say it’s going to be cheaper to have more robust coverage mandated on people.”

It is true that more coverage would cost drivers more in premiums. And thankfully, many Florida drivers do carry more than the minimum — otherwise, I would never have any clients. But far too many drivers on Orlando roads are driving around with zero bodily injury coverage. When one of those drivers causes a serious accident, we often have no choice but to decline the case, because there is simply no money available to pay for the victim’s lost income, pain and suffering, or even medical care (sometimes while they’re also losing their jobs — and therefore their health insurance — because the injuries from the accident have left them unable to work). That’s not fair to the people who have been injured on Orlando’s roads through no fault of their own. And it’s a tradeoff the legislature continues to make — the wrong one.

What Many Websites Are Getting Wrong

Here’s something worth knowing: if you search online right now, you’ll find dozens of websites — including law firm websites and insurance company sites — confidently stating that Florida is eliminating PIP and requiring bodily injury coverage starting July 1, 2026. That is not true. That was the proposed effective date in bills that never passed. Florida’s no-fault PIP system remains fully intact. There is no new statute.

As someone who has practiced personal injury law in Orlando for almost 15 years, I can tell you that getting the law right matters. If you’ve been in an accident in Orlando or anywhere in Central Florida and you’re trying to understand your rights, you need accurate information — not recycled headlines from websites that didn’t bother to check whether the law actually passed.

What Orlando Drivers Should Do Right Now

Since Florida still does not require bodily injury coverage, the single most important thing you can do to protect yourself and your family is to make sure your own auto insurance policy includes uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage (UM/UIM). This coverage protects you if you’re hit by someone who has no BI coverage — which, in Florida, is completely legal. Given the volume of traffic on Orlando’s roads and the number of underinsured drivers out there, UM/UIM coverage is not optional in any practical sense, even though it’s technically optional under the law.

Talk to your insurance agent. Make sure you have it. And if you’ve been in an accident and you’re not sure what coverage applies to your situation, talk to an Orlando car accident lawyer before you talk to the insurance company.

If you’ve recently been in an accident, and are searching for an Orlando car accident lawyer, please call Tina Willis Law Injury Accident Lawyer. You can reach us 24/7 at (407) 803-2139 for a free case evaluation. Our office is located at 390 N. Orange Avenue, Suite 2310, Orlando, FL 32801.

The information in this post was accurate as of the date it was published in February 2026. Florida insurance laws and requirements can change at any time through new legislation. If you have questions about current Florida insurance requirements or about a specific accident, please call our office for the most up-to-date information. This post is for general educational purposes and does not constitute legal advice.