Police recorded road collisions: July to September 2025 (provisional)
Data on severity of injury and type of road user for July to September 2025.
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Introduction
The provisional data presented here reflect the personal injury road collisions reported by police in Wales from July to September (Q3) 2025. While these data are the most detailed and reliable source of information on road collisions and casualties, they do not include road collisions:
- that were not reported to the police
- that occurred on private land i.e. car parks or fields
- where no personal injury was recorded
- where the collision was later confirmed by a medical professional or coroner to be a suicide or medical episode
Given the increased interest in collisions data since the roll out of the 20mph default speed limit on 17 September 2023, we published a Chief Statistician’s update on ‘understanding road collisions and casualty statistics’ on 24 May 2024.
All the underlying data is published on StatsWales, and our road collisions dashboard. This includes additional detail on collisions and casualties by:
- geographical area
- speed limit
- severity
- vehicle type
Data for 2025 Q3 are provisional and subject to potential revision in the future. Detailed quality information is published in the accompanying quality report.
Collisions data is seasonal and impacted by factors such as traffic volume and weather. It is advisable and meaningful to compare quarterly data with the same quarter in previous years rather than with the previous quarter. However, longer term trends give a better indication of patterns and changes in police recorded road collisions.
Collisions
Time series data over the long term are presented in our annual statistical release. This shows a long-term decrease in road collisions reported by police in Wales.
The number of quarterly road collisions in Wales has generally been declining steadily over the last decade and quarterly figures can be volatile. Care should be taken when interpreting this data over a short time period.
In 2025 Q3, there were 747 police reported road collisions in Wales. Of these collisions:
- 18 (2%) were fatal
- 269 (36%) were serious
- 460 (62%) were slight
The number of collisions is 6% lower than in the same quarter in 2024 (795) and is 19% lower than the same quarter in 2023 (923) which was the last quarter 3 period before the change in default speed limit.
Figure 1: quarterly police reported road collisions in Wales, 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3
Description of figure 1: the line chart shows a time series for the number of police reported road collisions in Wales each quarter from 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3. The number of quarterly road collisions has declined steadily over the last decade.
Source: Police recorded road collisions, Welsh Government
20 and 30mph road speed limit
Most roads that were 30mph became 20mph on 17 September 2023. Therefore, significantly more roads are now 20mph roads (an increase from approximately 870km to 13,000km), and significantly fewer are 30mph (a decrease from approximately 13,100km to 980km).
This section considers collisions that occurred on all 20mph and 30mph roads (combined) to allow direct comparisons for the same set of roads before and after the change in default speed limit on restricted roads.
Road collisions data after the change to the 20mph default speed limit is currently limited to a relatively short period of time (17 September 2023 to 30 September 2025) and can be volatile over the short term. Care should be taken when interpreting this data over a short time period, we will continue to monitor this over time as more data becomes available. Our Chief Statistician’s update includes more information.
In 2025 Q3, there were 337 road collisions on roads with 20 and 30mph speed limits (combined). Of these:
- 9 were fatal
- 101 were serious
- 227 were slight collisions
The number of collisions on 20 and 30mph roads (combined) is 6% lower than the same quarter in 2024 (358). It is 33% lower than the same quarter in 2023 (502) which was the last quarter 3 period before the change in default speed limit.
This number has generally been declining over the last decade.
Figure 2: quarterly police recorded road collisions on roads with a 20 or 30mph speed limit (combined) in Wales, 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3
Description of figure 2: the line chart shows a time series for police-recorded road collisions on roads with a 20 or 30mph speed limit (combined) in Wales each quarter from 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3. The number of quarterly road collisions on 20mph or 30mph has declined steadily over the last decade.
Source: Police recorded road collisions, Welsh Government
Casualties
Individual collisions can result in multiple casualties with different levels of injury severity.
In 2025 Q3, there were 1,047 road casualties reported in Wales. Of these casualties:
- 19 (2%) were killed
- 307 (29%) people were seriously injured
- 721 (69%) had slight injuries
The number of casualties is 6% lower than in the same quarter in 2024 (1,116) and is 17% lower than the same quarter in 2023 (1,260) which was the last quarter 3 period before the change in default speed limit.
This number has generally been declining over the last decade.
Figure 3: quarterly road casualties in Wales, 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3
Description of figure 3: the line chart shows a time series for the number of casualties in police recorded road collisions in Wales each quarter from 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3. The number of quarterly casualties has declined steadily over the last decade.
Source: Police recorded road collisions, Welsh Government
20 and 30mph road speed limit
In 2025 Q3, there were 420 road casualties from collisions on roads with 20 and 30mph speed limits (combined). Among these:
- 9 were killed
- 106 were seriously injured
- 305 were slight injuries
The number of casualties on 20 and 30mph road speed limits is 3% lower than the same quarter in 2024 (431). It is 33% lower than the same quarter in 2023 (627) which was the last quarter 3 period before the change in default speed limit.
This number has generally been declining over the last decade.
Figure 4: quarterly casualties reported on roads with a 20 or 30mph speed limit in Wales, 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3
Description of figure 4: the line chart shows a time series for the quarterly number of casualties in police-reported road collisions on roads with a 20 and 30mph speed limit (combined) in Wales each quarter from 2011 Q1 to 2025 Q3. The numbers have declined steadily over the last decade.
Source: Police recorded road collisions, Welsh Government
Notes
In May 2023, Dyfed Powys police force was the first force in Wales to move to an injury-based reporting system for road collisions. This affects the way in which collision severity is recorded, but has no impact on the overall number of collisions. The Department for Transport have found that police forces using injury-based reporting are likely to report more severe collisions and fewer less severe collisions than with the previous system. We are currently considering how to report on this data when other Welsh police forces move to injury-based reporting. Further information will be communicated in the next quarterly publication.
Some data quality issues have been identified relating to the recorded speed limit of the road where collisions occurred. This is explained in more detail at the beginning of the Police recorded road collisions: 2023 statistical bulletin and in the data quality report.
