Measured by deaths per mile driven, Mississippi has the most dangerous roads: 1.79 per 100M miles in 2023. Massachusetts has the safest, at 0.56 per 100M miles. The national rate was 1.26 per 100M miles. Source: NHTSA and FHWA, FARS 2023 final file and Highway Statistics table VM-2, 2023.
“Worst drivers” rankings usually rest on a measure like this one. It counts people who died in crashes in each state, divided by the miles driven there, so it reflects roads, speeds, rural distances, seat belt use and impaired driving, not driving skill alone. Crashes are counted where they happen, including those involving visitors.
Data year: 2023Source released April 1, 2026·Last updated Oct. 23, 2026FARS 2023 / VM-2 2023
50 ranked states; DC and Puerto Rico appear as reference rows where the source supplies them. Highest does not mean best.
Lowest state estimate0.56 per 100M milesMassachusetts
Highest state estimate1.79 per 100M milesMississippi
Each dot is a state. The scale runs from the lowest to highest estimate;
intervals are not shown here. Read about uncertainty.
The middle of the 50-state distribution is 1.25 per 100M miles: the average of the 25th and 26th ordered state estimates. This treats each state equally, so it answers a different question from a population-weighted national estimate.
Are rural states’ roads deadlier per mile?
These states’ ranks change the most between traffic death rate and population density. These comparisons identify different questions worth investigating; a rank gap does not measure a causal effect or a statistical difference between unlike units.
No statistic measures driving skill directly. By traffic deaths per mile driven, Mississippi ranks worst, at 1.79 per 100M miles in 2023.
Which state has the safest roads?
Massachusetts has the lowest traffic death rate, at 0.56 per 100M miles in 2023.
Why use deaths per mile instead of per person?
People in rural states drive much farther. Dividing by miles driven compares the risk of each mile on the road, which is how NHTSA reports national road safety.
What this ranking measures
Traffic deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled in 2023: people who died within 30 days of a crash on a public road in the state, relative to how much driving happened there.
Deaths are counted where the crash happened, not where the driver lives. Rates reflect roads and speeds, rural driving, seat belt use, impairment and emergency care, as well as driver behavior.
The size of the gap
The difference between the highest and lowest state estimates is 1.23 per 100M miles. The U.S. benchmark is 1.26 per 100M miles. It is not a simple average of the states.
25 states have point estimates above the U.S. benchmark and 25 below it. These counts do not establish statistical significance.
How much should you read into a rank?
FARS is a census of fatal crashes, so the death counts have no sampling error. FHWA does not publish margins of error for vehicle miles, which states estimate from traffic counts. “Not published” means uncertainty is not quantified here, not that the estimates are exact.
Ranks use the full precision of the source file, so only truly equal values share a rank (1, 2, 2, 4).
100 × FARS deaths (sum of FATALS in the 2023 final accident file, by crash state; reproduced by scripts/research-fars.py) / annual vehicle miles in millions (VM-2, total of all roads). Reproduces NHTSA’s national rate of 1.26. Rank = 1 + number of eligible jurisdictions with a higher value.
Coverage
The 50 states are ranked. Washington, D.C., can be added with the toggle above the table; Puerto Rico is shown for reference only, where the source covers it.
Cadence
Annual; FARS final files follow the data year by about two years. 2024 final file expected with the 2025 annual report file in 2027.
Independence
Rank the States is independent. The agencies that produce the source data do not endorse these rankings.
Last updated Oct. 23, 2026. Earlier editions stay available on the data page, and every change is listed in the update log. If a number or definition looks wrong, report an error with the state, value, and source you checked.
Related rankings
State distributions: each mark is one state, from lowest to highest. Each row
uses its own scale.