Key Takeaways
- Dog bite and related injury claims totaled $1.862 billion in 2025, up 18.6% from $1.57 billion in 2024. The average claim cost reached $65,450, up 97% over the past decade.
- Standard homeowners and renters policies cover dog bite liability up to $100,000 to $300,000 in limits. A single serious bite claim in New York, where the average claim cost is $92,154, can exhaust those limits and leave the owner personally liable for the remainder.
- Pet sitters, dog walkers, and in-home pet care providers face significant coverage gaps under standard homeowners policies. Business activities and animals under a business’s care, custody, or control typically require separate coverage.
- California had the highest claim count in 2025 at 2,830 claims; New York had the highest average cost at $92,154. If you own a dog in a high-claim state, confirm your policy’s liability limits and check for breed exclusions.
Insurers paid $1.862 billion in dog bite and related injury claims in 2025, up 18.6% from $1.57 billion in 2024, according to an Issues Brief released May 13 by the Insurance Information Institute and State Farm. The number of claims filed rose 25.6% to 28,450. The average cost per claim was $65,450, up 97% from 2016 over the decade.
The claims data covers not only bites but any dog-related injury, including fractures and blunt-force trauma from a dog jumping on and knocking down a person. Triple-I CEO Sean Kevelighan described dog bites as “a serious public health concern,” and Janet Ruiz of Triple-I noted that children are especially vulnerable in the 4.5 million bites reported each year in the United States. The 10-year trend is accelerating: the 57% increase in claims since 2016 is not a single-year anomaly.
By state, California led in claim volume with 2,830 claims in 2025. Florida recorded 2,347 claims. New York had the highest average cost per claim at $92,154, followed by Connecticut and California.
For most dog owners, homeowners or renters insurance is the first line of defense. Standard policies typically cover dog bite liability up to $100,000 to $300,000 in limits. At $92,154 average per claim in New York, a single serious incident can push against those limits quickly, especially when medical costs, lost wages, and attorney fees compound. Any damages above the policy limit become the owner’s personal liability.
The disconnect between what homeowners think their liability coverage does and what it actually covers comes up constantly in claims. I watched it happen repeatedly at the agency: A dog owner gets hit with a lawsuit after their dog bites a neighbor’s child, they call assuming their homeowners policy handles it, and the first question we have to ask is whether the dog is on the excluded breed list. Many carriers exclude pit bulls, rottweilers, dobermans, and German shepherds by name in the policy endorsement. The owner either didn’t know the breed exclusion existed or thought it didn’t apply to a well-trained dog. Neither matters to the adjuster. The more complicated version of this conversation involves pet sitters, because now you have a business activity, a third party’s animal, and a homeowners policy that was never designed to cover any of those three things simultaneously.
That last point deserves emphasis. If you walk dogs, board pets in your home, or provide in-home pet care for compensation, your standard homeowners policy almost certainly does not cover liability arising from those business activities. The exclusion applies to three categories that nearly all pet-care business activity touches: business activities conducted in the home, property damage or injury involving animals under your care, custody, or control, and claims from clients who pay you for services. Specialized pet business liability coverage, a business owners policy, or an inland marine endorsement may be required depending on the scope of your operation.
The 95 million U.S. households with at least one pet, per the American Pet Products Association’s 2025 figures, include an enormous informal economy of pet sitters and dog walkers who have no idea this gap exists. About 45% of homes have at least one dog, totaling roughly 90 million dogs nationally. The overlap between the claims data and the coverage gap is not hypothetical.
For pet owners who do not run a business, the immediate question is whether their current liability limit is adequate for their situation. A homeowner in New York with a large dog and $100,000 in liability coverage is underinsured against the state’s average claim cost. An umbrella policy, typically available for $150 to $300 per year, can extend liability coverage to $1 million or more and cover amounts above the homeowners policy limit. It also travels with you, so if your dog bites someone at a park or on a hiking trail, you’re not limited to incidents on your property.
Pet insurance policies cover veterinary costs for the animal, not liability to third parties. The two products do different things. A pet insurance policy pays when your dog gets hurt; your homeowners liability coverage pays when your dog hurts someone else. Checking both is worthwhile given the claims trend.
U.S. pet care spending is projected to reach $165 billion in 2026, per the Triple-I brief, and the pet insurance market has grown more than 10% annually since 2018. More than 6.4 million pets were insured in the United States at the end of 2024, up from 3 million in 2020, according to the North American Pet Health Insurance Association. The best pet insurance options cover accident and illness costs, and pet insurance cost averages $62 per month for dogs on accident-and-illness plans. But if your primary concern is a bite lawsuit, the call to make is to your homeowners carrier, not your pet insurer.
