Occupant deaths in fatal crashes (FARS), by year, make and model

FARS counts every occupant death in a fatal crash, whatever the cause — it does not mean the vehicle was at fault or defective. Counts are not adjusted for how many of each vehicle are on the road.

The count is people who died while riding in that year, make and model: drivers and passengers. Pedestrians and cyclists killed in a crash are recorded against the crash in FARS, so they are not part of any vehicle's number here.

Each vehicle page also splits the total into driver deaths and passenger deaths. Every vehicle has exactly one driver seat, so driver deaths line up more fairly when you compare one model with another, while a total that includes passengers rises with the number of seats. IIHS publishes driver death rates on the same driver-only idea, but divides by registered vehicle years, a denominator we do not have. Treat neither number here as a safety rating.

Popular vehicles log more miles and appear in more crashes, so a higher count often just means more of them are on the road. Without registration data there is no honest way to turn these counts into rates, so we do not.

The window runs 1990–2024, so older models have had far more years on the road to appear in it. A 1995 model can show up in thirty years of crashes and a 2023 model in two. That difference alone moves the counts, which is why each vehicle page states the first crash year its model year appears in.

FARS publishes with a lag of one to two years, and the most recent year is an annual report file that NHTSA revises when the final file is published. Newer crashes are not in the data yet.