By the Lapera Insurance Team · Reviewed by Joe Lapera, Licensed Illinois Insurance Agent (IL Lic #100722394)
Maybe a letter from the Secretary of State showed up asking you to verify coverage. Maybe your renewal jumped and nobody explained why. Maybe you just bought a car and the dealer wants proof of insurance before you drive it off the lot. Here is what Illinois law actually requires, why the legal minimum is a bad target, what drivers here are really paying, and how our team builds a policy that holds up after a real accident.
Illinois requires every driver to carry 25/50/20 liability, meaning $25,000 per person and $50,000 per accident for injuries plus $20,000 for property damage, and it also requires uninsured motorist bodily injury coverage of 25/50 that you cannot waive. Those are legal minimums, not adequate limits. Illinois drivers spent an average of $1,153 a year on auto insurance in 2023 according to NAIC data, below the national average. Collision and comprehensive are optional under state law but required by every lender.
Illinois is a comparatively reasonable state to insure a car in. The market is competitive, the state requires uninsured motorist coverage that many states leave optional, and average spending here still runs below the national number. The problem is that the legal minimum has not moved in years while the cost of a hospital stay and the cost of a new bumper both have. Almost every bad outcome we see on an auto claim traces back to one of three things: liability limits set at the state minimum, uninsured motorist limits left at the state minimum, or a lapse that nobody caught. This guide walks each one, in the order the questions come up.
What Auto Insurance Is Legally Required in Illinois?
TL;DR: Liability at 25/50/20 plus uninsured motorist bodily injury at 25/50, on every registered vehicle that carries plates, with proof you can produce at a traffic stop.
Illinois runs on a mandatory insurance law, 625 ILCS 5/7-601, administered by the Secretary of State. Every vehicle with license plates that gets driven has to carry liability insurance, and the Secretary of State verifies it electronically. According to the Secretary of State's mandatory insurance page, each vehicle's liability policy is checked at least twice a year through a third-party vendor connected to the insurers writing in Illinois. If the first check comes back unverified, the vehicle gets checked again after 30 days, which is how the office sorts out cars that were sold or put in storage from cars that are actually uninsured.
| Coverage | Illinois requirement | What it actually does |
|---|---|---|
| Bodily injury liability | Required $25,000 / $50,000 | Pays the other people you hurt. $25,000 is the cap per injured person, $50,000 the cap for everyone in the crash combined. |
| Property damage liability | Required $20,000 | Pays for the car, fence, garage door or light pole you damaged. Not your own car. |
| Uninsured motorist bodily injury | Required $25,000 / $50,000 | Pays your injuries when the at-fault driver has no insurance, or fled. Illinois does not let you waive this. |
| Underinsured motorist | Required above minimum | Fills the gap when the at-fault driver had insurance but not enough. Required when your UM limits exceed the state minimum. |
| Collision | Not required by law | Repairs your car after you hit something. Every lender and lessor requires it. |
| Comprehensive | Not required by law | Hail, theft, fire, glass, and the deer on the shoulder of Route 173. Also lender-required. |
One point people miss: proof of insurance is separate from having insurance. Keep the card in the glovebox or on your phone. A new policy can take a few days to show up in the state's verification system, so if you just switched carriers, keep the card handy.
Lapera Insurance Agency is a Farmers Insurance agency at 530 Barron Blvd in Grayslake, Illinois. Our team has written and serviced Illinois auto policies since 2007, with over 40 years of combined experience, and we stay with our clients through the claim rather than handing them a claims number and disappearing. Every guide on this site is reviewed by a licensed Illinois agent before it publishes.
Why Is the Illinois Minimum Too Low for Most Drivers?
TL;DR: Because $25,000 is roughly one ambulance ride, one ER visit and one MRI. Once the injured party's bills pass your limit, the rest comes out of your income and your assets.
Nobody sets out to under-insure. The 25/50/20 number is just what the quote engine defaults to when someone is shopping on price, and it has been the legal floor in Illinois for years while medical and repair costs kept climbing. Here is the sequence that goes wrong: you cause a two-car crash, the other driver has a broken wrist and a few weeks of physical therapy, the bills come in above $25,000, and the difference is yours personally. Your carrier pays its limit and steps back.
Property damage is the same story in miniature. A $20,000 property damage limit was written for a very different vehicle market. A late-model SUV with driver-assist sensors in the bumper and a camera in the windshield can pass that number on a single at-fault collision.
For most Illinois households we look at 100/300/100 as a starting point and match uninsured and underinsured limits to it. That is not an upsell reflex. The gap between minimum limits and 100/300/100 is usually a much smaller premium difference than people expect, because the first dollars of liability coverage are the expensive ones. If you own a home or have savings, we then talk about a personal umbrella on top.
Is Uninsured Motorist Coverage Required in Illinois, and How Much Do You Need?
TL;DR: Uninsured motorist bodily injury at 25/50 is mandatory and cannot be waived. Underinsured coverage kicks in when your UM limits are above the state minimum. Both should match your liability limits, not the legal floor.
Illinois is one of a small group of states that requires both uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage rather than leaving them optional, which is genuinely good consumer protection. It matters here because a meaningful share of the cars around you are uninsured. In the most recent Insurance Research Council estimate, 16.3% of Illinois drivers were uninsured in 2022, which works out to roughly one in six, and ranked Illinois 13th highest in the country (IRC data published by the Insurance Information Institute).
Here is the trap most people never think about. Your liability coverage protects other people from you. Your uninsured and underinsured coverage protects you and your family from everyone else. If you carry 100/300 in liability but leave UM/UIM at 25/50, you have insured the neighbors better than you insured your own kids in the back seat. Matching them is one of the cheapest fixes on a declarations page.
How Much Does Car Insurance Cost in Illinois?
TL;DR: Illinois drivers spent an average of $1,153 in 2023 against a national average of $1,281, but that figure rose about 23% in four years and your own number depends on the ZIP, the car and the driving record, not the state average.
Treat that as a temperature reading for the state, not a quote for your driveway. The NAIC number blends a minimum-limits policy on an old sedan in a rural county with a full-coverage policy on a new SUV in Cook County. Two houses on the same Grayslake street can price very differently.
Where you park it
ZIP-level claim history, theft rates, traffic density and repair costs. A garage in Grayslake and a curb in a dense city block are not the same risk.
What you drive
Repair cost drives this more than sticker price. Sensors, cameras and aluminum panels made bumpers expensive to fix.
Your record
At-fault accidents and moving violations, usually looked at over three to five years depending on the carrier.
Credit-based insurance score
Illinois permits it as one rating factor under the Use of Credit Information in Personal Insurance Act. It is one input, not the whole rate.
Who else drives
Adding a teen is the single largest premium change most families ever see. Adding a second experienced driver often helps.
Limits and deductibles
Higher liability limits cost less than people assume. Deductibles move the premium more than most drivers realize.
On the credit question: Illinois insurers may use a credit-based insurance score in personal auto and home rating, governed by the Use of Credit Information in Personal Insurance Act (215 ILCS 157). The Act sets limits on how it can be used, including a right to have your policy re-rated at renewal on a current report in most cases. If your credit has improved since you bought the policy, that is worth asking about.
What Does Full Coverage Mean in Illinois?
TL;DR: Full coverage is not a legal term. It usually means liability plus collision plus comprehensive, and it says nothing about whether your limits are high enough.
When a lender or a dealer says full coverage, they mean liability plus collision and comprehensive, usually with a deductible they will specify. That is a lender requirement, not an Illinois requirement. The phrase is worth being suspicious of, because a policy can be full coverage and still carry the bare 25/50/20 liability underneath. Full coverage protects the car. Limits protect you.
- Collision pays to repair your car when you hit another vehicle or an object, regardless of fault, minus your deductible.
- Comprehensive pays for the things that happen to a parked or moving car that are not collisions: hail, theft, vandalism, fire, flooding and animal strikes. In Illinois that last one is not theoretical.
- Gap coverage matters when you finance or lease. If the car is totaled and you owe more than it was worth, gap covers the difference. Standard collision does not.
- Rental reimbursement and roadside are small line items that make a bad week much less bad.
- Medical payments pays medical bills for you and your passengers regardless of fault. Useful alongside a high-deductible health plan.
The Illinois Department of Transportation counted 14,426 crashes involving deer in Illinois in 2024 (2024 Illinois Crash Facts). Hitting a deer is handled under comprehensive, which usually carries a lower deductible and is treated more gently at renewal than an at-fault collision. Swerving and hitting a tree instead is a collision claim. This is one of the better arguments against dropping comprehensive on an older car in a county with deer.
How Does Illinois Decide Who Pays After an Accident?
TL;DR: Illinois is an at-fault state with modified comparative negligence. If you are more than 50% at fault you recover nothing; at 50% or less your recovery is reduced by your share.
Illinois follows modified comparative negligence under 735 ILCS 5/2-1116. The Illinois Department of Insurance explains it plainly on its comparative negligence page: an injured party can recover damages only if their share of fault is not more than 50%, and whatever they recover is reduced in proportion to their own fault. If the other driver is 80% at fault and you are 20% at fault, you can still collect, but the payment reflects that 20%.
Two practical consequences. First, fault is rarely all or nothing, and the percentage is argued, which is why photos, a police report and witness names matter more than people think in the ten minutes after a crash. Second, since your own share reduces your recovery, your own coverages do real work. Collision pays your repair regardless of the fault argument, and medical payments coverage handles the ER bill while the adjusters sort it out.
Say you rear-end a car on Route 45 and the other driver has a fractured wrist, surgery and eight weeks of therapy, with bills and lost wages totaling $70,000. These are illustrative figures, not a quote or a promise of outcome. On 25/50/20 your carrier pays its $25,000 per-person limit and stops. The remaining $45,000 is a claim against you personally, and Illinois lets a judgment reach wages and assets. On 100/300/100, the same claim is covered inside the policy and the conversation ends there. The premium difference between those two policies is usually a small fraction of that gap.
What Happens After a Ticket, an Accident or a Lapse?
TL;DR: Violations affect rate, not eligibility, with most carriers. A lapse or certain suspensions trigger an SR-22 filing with the Secretary of State, which runs three years and restarts if the policy lapses.
An SR-22 is not insurance. It is a certificate your insurer files with the Illinois Secretary of State proving you carry at least the required liability coverage. According to the Secretary of State's financial responsibility page, the insurance must be maintained for three years. If it expires or is cancelled, the insurer is required by law to file an SR-26 cancellation certificate, and the driving record is suspended on receipt. That suspension does not come off until the filing is reinstated.
- Renew early. The Secretary of State's guidance is to renew an SR-22 policy at least 45 days ahead. If the insurer has not received a renewal 15 days before expiration, it is required to notify the state.
- A lapse is expensive twice. You pay the reinstatement cost and you restart the clock, so a missed payment can add months or years to the filing.
- Non-owner filings exist. If you need an SR-22 but do not own a car, a non-owner policy satisfies the filing.
- There is an alternative to insurance, though almost nobody uses it: the state allows a deposit of $70,000 in cash or securities with the Illinois State Treasurer, a surety bond, or a court-approved real estate bond.
- A ticket is not the end of your rate. Carriers weight violations differently, and this is exactly where having more than one market to work with matters.
Need the filing itself handled, not just explained? Our Illinois SR-22 page walks the process, and our auto insurance page covers the coverage set line by line.
How Can You Lower the Premium Without Gutting the Coverage?
TL;DR: Bundle, claim the discounts you already qualify for, tune the deductible rather than the limits, and get the policy re-rated when your record or credit improves.
Bundle home and auto
Usually the largest single discount available, and it applies to both policies. Renters plus auto counts too.
Claim what you already earned
Good student, defensive driving, multi-car, paid in full, auto-pay, paperless, safety features, low mileage. Most households are missing at least one.
Consider telematics
Farmers Signal and similar programs price on how the car is actually driven. Worth a look for low-mileage drivers and worth skipping for heavy commuters.
Tune the deductible
Moving from $500 to $1,000 on collision often saves more than the difference over a few years. Only do it if you would comfortably write that check tomorrow.
Review every year
The Farmers Friendly Review is free. Cars depreciate, teens turn 21, records clear, credit improves. Last year's policy is rarely this year's best fit.
What we would never suggest
Dropping to 25/50/20, cutting UM/UIM below your liability limits, or dropping comprehensive on a financed car. That is the coverage you will want.
One more that is not a discount but saves real money: never let a policy lapse to save a month. A gap in coverage follows you into the next quote as a rating factor, and in Illinois it can also cost you the registration.
The Bottom Line
Illinois asks less of drivers than most people assume and more than the minimum suggests. The law gets you 25/50/20 plus uninsured motorist coverage, which keeps you legal and does very little else. The three lines that decide whether a real accident is an inconvenience or a financial event are your liability limits, your uninsured and underinsured limits, and whether the policy stayed in force.
If your renewal jumped, if a verification letter showed up, or if you are staring at a quote and have no idea whether the limits are right, the useful next step is a short conversation with someone in Grayslake who will read the declarations page with you and tell you what is actually on it.
Related Questions
What is the minimum car insurance required in Illinois?
Liability of $25,000 per person and $50,000 per accident for bodily injury, plus $20,000 for property damage, written as 25/50/20. Illinois also requires uninsured motorist bodily injury coverage at 25/50, which you cannot waive. Collision and comprehensive are not required by state law, though lenders require them on financed and leased vehicles.
Can you waive uninsured motorist coverage in Illinois?
No. Uninsured motorist bodily injury coverage at the 25/50 minimum is mandatory on Illinois auto policies. Underinsured motorist coverage is required when your uninsured motorist limits are higher than the state minimum. You can raise these limits, and in our experience most drivers should match them to their liability limits.
How much is car insurance in Illinois?
Illinois drivers spent an average of $1,153 per insured vehicle in 2023, compared with $1,281 nationwide, according to the NAIC's 2023 Auto Insurance Database Average Premium Supplement published in June 2025. Your own premium depends on ZIP code, vehicle, driving record, credit-based insurance score, drivers in the household, and the limits and deductibles you choose.
How long do you need an SR-22 in Illinois?
Three years. The Illinois Secretary of State requires the filing to be maintained continuously. If the policy lapses or is cancelled, the insurer files an SR-26 and the driving record is suspended until a new filing is in place, which in practice restarts the three-year period.
Does Illinois car insurance cover hitting a deer?
Yes, under comprehensive coverage rather than collision, assuming you carry comprehensive. Illinois recorded 14,426 crashes involving deer in 2024 according to Illinois Department of Transportation crash data. If you swerve and hit a tree or another car instead, that is usually a collision claim.
Is Illinois a no-fault state?
No. Illinois is an at-fault state using modified comparative negligence under 735 ILCS 5/2-1116. An injured party who is more than 50% at fault recovers nothing, and at 50% or less the recovery is reduced by their share of fault.
Last reviewed August 2026 by Joe Lapera, Licensed Illinois Insurance Agent (IL Lic #100722394). Figures verified against the sources linked above on that date.