Almost every Las Vegas visitor rides in an Uber or Lyft, from the airport to the hotel, over to a golf course or convention center, another resort for dinner or a show, and back again at the end of the night. So it is no surprise that rideshare crashes injure a lot of visitors. What surprises people is what happens next.
When you are hurt in a rideshare crash, the first question that decides your case is usually not who was at fault. It is whose insurance applies, and the answer turns on something you would never think to ask: what the driver’s app was doing at the exact moment of the crash.
Why a Rideshare Crash Is an Insurance Puzzle
An ordinary car accident involves the drivers and their personal auto policies. A rideshare crash adds another layer: a large commercial insurance policy carried by the rideshare company—Uber and Lyft today, with autonomous operators like Zoox and the coming Robotaxi close behind—but that policy only applies during certain phases of a driver’s work, and a much smaller policy (or none from the company at all) applies during others. The framework below describes the traditional, human-driver services; driverless rideshare is newer and fast-changing, its liability and insurance rules are still developing, and a crash involving one deserves a current, close look.
Rideshare coverage in Nevada is divided into periods based on the driver’s status in the app, a framework the Nevada Division of Insurance uses to explain rideshare coverage, and state law (NRS 690B.470 and NRS Chapter 706A) sets a minimum level of coverage for each:
- Period 0—app off. The driver is not working, and only their personal auto insurance applies, subject to Nevada’s standard minimum limits (currently $25,000 per person and $50,000 per accident for bodily injury, and $20,000 for property damage).
- Period 1—app on, waiting for a request. The driver is available but has not accepted a ride. The rideshare company provides contingent coverage—at least $50,000 per person and $100,000 per accident for bodily injury, plus $25,000 for property damage—on top of the driver’s personal policy.
- Periods 2 and 3—en route to you, and with you in the car. From the moment a ride is accepted through drop-off, the company’s full commercial coverage applies—currently $1,000,000 per incident in Nevada.
The practical effect is meaningful: the same crash, with the same drivers, can be backed by a small personal policy or by a seven-figure commercial policy, depending entirely on which period the driver was in.
A Recent Change Every Rider Should Know: Ab 523
How much that commercial coverage is worth changed recently, and not in the riders’ favor. Until October 1, 2025, Nevada required $1.5 million in coverage during Periods 2 and 3. Assembly Bill 523, effective that date, amended NRS Chapter 706A and reduced the required coverage to $1 million per incident, and it did more than lower the number. It also limited the rideshare companies’ vicarious liability for their drivers’ conduct and narrowed when an injured person can sue Uber or Lyft directly.
For a minor injury, $1 million is usually more than enough. For a catastrophic one—a spinal cord injury, a brain injury, permanent disability—the drop from $1.5 million to $1 million, together with the new limits on suing the companies directly, can matter a great deal. It also makes the uninsured-motorist question below more important than ever.
If You Were the Passenger
Here is the reassuring part, and it covers most people who find this page: if you were a passenger in the Uber or Lyft, you were in Period 3, and the rideshare company’s full commercial coverage almost certainly applies. You also were not driving, so you are not the one whose fault is in question. Your case is generally not about whether you are covered, you are, but about which policy or policies pay and for how much.
That does not always make it simple. A serious injury can exceed even a large policy, more than one party may share fault, and the rideshare company’s insurer is not on your side no matter how routine the claim looks. But as a passenger, you start from a strong position.
When Another Driver Caused the Crash
Often the rideshare driver did nothing wrong; another vehicle caused the crash. In that case the at-fault driver’s insurance is the first source of recovery. But Las Vegas draws drivers and visitors from everywhere, and plenty of them are underinsured or uninsured. Ordinarily, uninsured/underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage is what fills that gap, but the recent changes to Nevada’s rideshare law have left real questions about how much UM/UIM protection actually reaches an injured rideshare passenger, a gap many riders do not know exists. Whether and how it applies to your crash is exactly the kind of thing worth checking early.
Untangling which policies respond to the at-fault driver, the rideshare company, and any UM/UIM coverage is much of the work in these cases, and it is easy to leave money unclaimed if a policy is missed.
Proving the Rideshare App Period at the Time of the Crash
Because everything turns on the driver’s app status at the moment of impact, the app data is the most important evidence in the case, the trip record showing whether a ride was accepted, when pickup occurred, and exactly what the driver’s status was. That data is held by the rideshare company, not by you, and it is not something a visitor can preserve alone.
So the same lesson that runs through every Las Vegas visitor injury applies here too: act early. Save your own trip receipt and any in-app records immediately, get the names, insurance, and vehicle information for every driver involved, and get a demand to preserve the rideshare company’s trip and status data before it becomes something you have to fight to obtain. Report the crash, seek medical care before you fly home if you can, and be cautious about recorded statements to any insurer.
Nevada law also gives you a direction for exactly this. Under NRS 690B.490, the rideshare company, the driver, any autonomous-vehicle provider, and their insurers must cooperate and share information during an investigation into a crash, including the precise times the driver logged in and out of the app in the twelve hours before and after the crash, and a clear description of the coverage, exclusions, and limits that apply. Those login and logout records are what pin down which period was in effect, and the statute obligates the company to hand them over. Knowing this requirement exists and how to use it is part of what a Nevada firm brings to a rideshare case.
The Out-Of-State Layer
For a visitor, a rideshare crash scatters everything across state lines. You are the passenger from another state; the rideshare driver is local; the at-fault driver could be from anywhere; and your own auto and health insurance are from home. That can raise questions about which coverage stacks and in what order—the same coordination issue we cover for rental car and shuttle accidents. And if there is any suggestion that you share some fault—rare for a passenger, but it can arise—how that works in Nevada is covered in our article on comparative negligence.
How Benson & Bingham Handles a Rideshare Case
The difference in these cases is knowing where the coverage is and proving which period applied, then holding the right insurer to it.
We recently represented a passenger who was hurt in an Uber crash. Immediately after the accident, the Uber driver turned off his app, an attempt to keep Uber’s insurance out of it and avoid being reprimanded, suspended, or dropped by the company. When we opened the claim, we obtained the time-sensitive trip data that placed our client in Period 3 at the moment of the crash, forcing Uber’s commercial policy to cover it. That is exactly the kind of case where knowing the data exists and how to get it changes the outcome.
One warning worth taking seriously: never let a rideshare driver take you anywhere off the app. If a driver offers to run you somewhere “just a few blocks” without a trip in the system—as a favor, or to skip a fare—say no. Driving passengers for hire off-app is against the law for the driver, and it can leave you with no coverage at all: the rideshare company’s insurance does not apply because there is no trip on record, and the driver’s own policy will likely exclude the ride because he was acting as a rideshare driver against his insurance policy. A serious injury in that situation could cost you millions with no policy behind it.
For the full picture of how a visitor’s claim works, start with our overview: Injured While Visiting Las Vegas: What Out-of-State Visitors Need to Know.