Trends in road deaths

Updated December 2025, with fatalities to November 2025, population to June 2025, vehicle kilometres to 2024-25.

Data sources:

Total deaths

In the last year or so there has been an uptick in road deaths in NSW, Queensland, Vic, WA, Tasmania and the NT.

Deaths per capita

It’s hard to compare total deaths between states with very different populations, so here are road deaths per capita, for rolling four-quarter periods:

There is naturally more noise in this data for the smaller states and territories as the discrete number of deaths in these geographies is small (especially ACT, Tas, and NT). The sparsely populated Northern Territory has a death rate more than double the rest of Australia, while the almost entirely urban ACT has the lowest death rate.

Deaths per vehicle kilometre

Another way of looking at the data is deaths per vehicle kilometre (only possible for financial years):

This chart is very similar – as vehicle kilometres per capita haven’t shifted dramatically.

Deaths by road user type

Note: I’ve not distinguished between drivers and passengers for both vehicles and motorcycles.

Vehicle occupant fatalities were trending down until around 2020, but appear to be rising slowly again. Motorcyclist fatalities have been relatively flat for a long time but have been trending upwards since 2021.

Pedestrian fatalities have been trending up since mid-2024 (if you disregard the lull during the pandemic period).

Cyclist fatalities dropped in the early 1990s (around the same time as the introduction of mandatory helmet laws) and have have been relatively flat since then (apart from a small peak in 2014).

It’s possible to distinguish between motorcycles and other vehicles for both deaths and vehicle kilometres travelled, and the following chart shows the ratio of these across time. Note that I’ve had to use a log scale so you can see the trend details for other vehicles.

The death rate for motorcycle riders/passengers per motorcycle vehicle kilometre was 36 times higher than other motorised vehicle types in 2024-25 (motorcycle risk factor in the chart above). The death rate for motorcycles was trending down from 1991 to around 2015 but now appears to be trending up.

The better news is that the death rate for other vehicles has dropped from 9.8 in 1989-90 to 3 in 2024-25, although it has been relatively flat since around 2014, and of course we’d all aspire for these figures to be zero.

Deaths per capita by age and road user type

To gauge trends over time, I have calculated deaths per capita, over five year windows by selected age bands and road user types (excluding motorcycle pillion passengers who are very rare). The table is colour coded to show hot spots WITHIN each road user type.

Road deaths per capita remain a significant issue for the elderly – particularly as vehicle drivers, vehicle passengers, and pedestrians. However there have been significant reductions in elderly deaths per capita in the last 30 years.

There has been a dramatic fall in deaths per capita for young adults, but they are still over-represented for vehicle drivers, vehicle passengers, motorcycle riders, and pedestrians.

There have also been dramatic improvements for very young children as vehicle passengers, presumably related to improvements in child safety seats.

Curiously deaths are relatively common as vehicle passengers for children aged 15-16 – perhaps as often they might be travelling with slightly older drivers.

Deaths among motorcycle riders have changed from being concentrated amongst younger riders, to being more evenly distributed across age bands. Deaths per capita have mostly reduced for young adults, but notably, deaths per capita have increased for those aged 55 and over in recent years. However it’s important to note that these statistics do not take into account participation rates amongst age bands. As we saw above, deaths per motorcycle kilometre travelled was trending down until around 2018 but has since been trending up.

And curiously there are fatalities reported where vehicle drivers and motorcycle riders were aged under 10 (some might be reporting errors).

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