How to get a car accident report in Texas

Where to get the report

• TxDOT Crash Report Online Purchase System (statewide) $6 regular, $8 certified, online

  Every CR-3 an officer completes must be filed electronically with TxDOT within 10 days (§550.062(b)), so TxDOT holds reports from the Department of Public Safety, sheriffs and city police alike. TxDOT says you may obtain a copy through its Crash Report Online Purchase System and receive it by email after purchase; an open records request is not required for a CR-3. Its Purchase User Guide (V29.0, June 23, 2025) says you can search by the first and last name of anyone involved (drivers, occupants, pedestrians, cyclists, property owners), narrowed by county, city and crash date, or by a driver license or ID card number. Fees: $6 for a regular copy and $8 for a certified copy, which is stamped and carries a certification with TxDOT’s seal for legal proceedings; additional processing fees may apply to credit card payments, and the guide says electronic check payments carry no fee but a ten-day hold before the report is released. A full (non-redacted) report requires certifying how you qualify under §550.065(c)(4); paid by card, it is available immediately, but if you pick the option that you meet none of the listed qualifications and write your own justification, the report is not released immediately and a redacted copy is sent if the justification does not qualify. The guide also says only one non-redacted report can be bought in an order (further reports in the cart must be redacted), redacted reports are released within 10 business days for orders of up to 99 reports, and once purchased a report can be downloaded for 10 days. TxDOT says it cannot provide multiple crash reports in a bulk request (it supplies the matching crash ID numbers instead, so each report can be bought) and cannot release the results of a search for all crashes involving a particular person unless the requester is entitled to the information under §550.065(c).

  Official page

• Texas Department of Public Safety (state troopers) Buy trooper CR-3s from TxDOT

  The Department of Public Safety points you to TxDOT for trooper crash reports: its public information page says you may obtain a Texas Peace Officer’s Crash Report (CR-3), regular or certified, through TxDOT’s Crash Report Online Purchase System, so the TxDOT fees above apply. Anything beyond the crash report, such as video or other records, goes to DPS as a separate public information request through the DPS Public Information Center (txdps.govqa.us), by email to publicrecords@dps.texas.gov, or by mail to Texas Department of Public Safety, Office of General Counsel, Public Information, Box 4087, Austin, Texas 78773-0140. TxDOT’s crash records page likewise says that, for subpoena and affidavit requests, any information needed from DPS takes a separate request to DPS.

  Official page

• City police and sheriff’s offices TxDOT, or the agency that responded

  If city police or a sheriff’s office worked the crash, its CR-3 is on TxDOT’s system too, and the investigating agency can also release the report; the $6 and $8 fees in §550.065(d) apply to the department or the governmental entity that releases it. Example, Houston Police Department only: its crash report request form (rev. 12/25) says to mail the request and $6.00 for a non-certified report or $8.00 for a certified report, by check or money order payable to City of Houston, to the HPD Records Division, Public Counter Unit, 1200 Travis Street, Houston, Texas 77002, or to buy it online through policereports.lexisnexis.com (State: Texas, Jurisdiction: Houston PD). The form asks for the incident number, crash address, date and the people involved, requires you to certify your §550.065(c)(4) qualification under penalty of perjury, and says not to request the report until at least 10 days after the crash. Each agency sets its own process, so check the department’s records page before you send anything.

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When you must report a crash in Texas

Injury or undrivable car: call police

Texas puts the duty on the scene, not on paperwork afterward. Under Transportation Code §550.026(a), the operator of a vehicle involved in a collision resulting in injury to or death of a person, or damage to a vehicle to the extent that it cannot be normally and safely driven, must immediately, by the quickest means of communication, notify the local police department if the crash happened in a city; the local police or the sheriff’s office if it happened not more than 100 feet outside city limits; and otherwise the sheriff’s office or the nearest office of the Department of Public Safety. Under §550.022(d), a vehicle can be normally and safely driven only if it does not require towing and can be operated under its own power in its usual manner without further damage or hazard. Before that, you must stop. In a crash that results or is reasonably likely to result in injury or death, §550.021 requires you to stop at or as close as possible to the scene, return if you did not stop, determine whether anyone needs aid, and remain until you comply with §550.023; failing to do so is a second-degree felony if someone died, a third-degree felony with serious bodily injury, and otherwise punishable by up to five years in prison or one year in county jail, a fine of up to $5,000, or both (§550.021(c)). In a crash that damages only an attended vehicle, §550.022 requires the same stop; not stopping is a Class C misdemeanor if damage to all vehicles is under $200 and a Class B misdemeanor at $200 or more (§550.022(c)). In both, §550.023 requires you to give your name and address, your vehicle’s registration number and the name of your liability insurer, to show your driver’s license if asked, and to give reasonable help to anyone injured, including arranging transport to a doctor or hospital. On a metropolitan freeway, if every vehicle can be normally and safely driven, each driver must move to a designated collision investigation site, the frontage road, the nearest suitable cross street or another suitable place to exchange information (§550.022(b)). If you hit an unattended vehicle, find the owner or leave a written note with your name and address, the owner’s name and address and what happened (§550.024); if you damage a fixture or landscaping beside a highway, take reasonable steps to notify the property owner (§550.025). Section 550.026 itself states no penalty; the general rules-of-the-road provisions make failing to perform a required act a misdemeanor (§542.301) with a fine of $1 to $200 where no other penalty is provided (§542.401).

The driver report you may have to file

None to the state; some cities may

Texas no longer has a driver’s crash report filed with the state. TxDOT says that effective September 1, 2017, under Senate Bill 312 of the 85th Legislature, the Texas Driver’s Crash Report (form CR-2) is no longer retained by TxDOT, that the retention period for all CR-2 forms expired January 1, 2019, that TxDOT no longer hosts or provides copies of the form, and that any CR-2 or similar local form sent to TxDOT will be destroyed. Transportation Code §550.065(a)(1)(B) now refers to driver reports only as filed under former Section 550.061 or 601.004 before September 1, 2017. TxDOT advises drivers in a crash not investigated by a police officer who were given a CR-2 or similar local agency form to keep it for their own records. One exception remains: under §550.067(a), a city may by ordinance require the operator of a vehicle in a collision to file a report with a designated city department if the crash results in injury or death or apparent total property damage of $25 or more, or a copy of a report required by Chapter 550. Such a report is confidential under §550.067(b). We did not survey city ordinances, so ask the police department in the city where the crash happened whether it requires one.

What the report costs

$6, or $8 certified, set by statute

Transportation Code §550.065(d) sets the fee statewide: $6 for a copy of the crash report, an additional $2 to have it certified, and $6 for a certification that no report is on file. TxDOT charges $6 for a regular copy and $8 for a certified copy, and says additional processing fees may apply to card payments; its Purchase User Guide describes this as a minimal Texas.gov fee and says electronic check payments carry no fee but are held ten days. TxDOT also charges $8 for a subpoena (state or federal court) or affidavit request through its CRIS request system. The guide says there is no fee for a certified letter of no crash record when a report is not found, although §550.065(d) allows $6. A local agency’s online vendor may add its own fee, so check the total before you pay.

When the report is ready

Filed within 10 days; online in up to 14

The investigating officer must file the CR-3 with TxDOT electronically not later than the 10th day after the crash (§550.062(b)). TxDOT’s Purchase User Guide says it can take up to 14 days from the crash date for a report to appear in search results; if your crash was within the last two weeks, try again in a few days, and if it was more than two weeks ago and the report is still missing, ask the investigating agency whether it was submitted. A non-redacted report paid by card is available immediately; a redacted report is released within 10 business days for orders of up to 99 reports. TxDOT keeps crash reports for the previous 10 full calendar years plus the current year. Example, Houston police only: wait at least 10 days after the crash before requesting a report. Note that an officer must write a CR-3 only when the crash caused injury, death, or apparent property damage to any one person of $1,000 or more (§550.062(a)), so a minor crash may have no CR-3 at all.

Who can get a copy

Parties in full; anyone else redacted

Crash reports are privileged and confidential in Texas except as §550.065 allows. On written request and payment of the fee, the full report must be released to any person directly concerned in the collision or having a proper interest in it (§550.065(c)(4)), including: anyone involved in the crash and their authorized representative; a driver; an employer, parent or legal guardian of a driver; the owner of a vehicle or property damaged; a person who established financial responsibility for a vehicle in the crash, such as the policyholder; an insurer that covered a vehicle or a person involved and its claims contractors; licensed radio and television stations and qualifying newspapers; anyone who may sue for a death resulting from the crash; and a vehicle storage facility that stored a vehicle from the crash. The investigating agency, government agencies using it for crash prevention or a criminal investigation, and a court where a related case is pending (if subpoenaed) may also get it (§550.065(c)(1) to (3)). Anyone else may request a redacted report (§550.065(c-1)), which omits names, driver’s license numbers, full dates of birth, addresses other than ZIP code, phone numbers, license plate numbers, insurer names and policy numbers, and other items listed in §550.065(f)(2). TxDOT says a person who does not meet the criteria will receive a redacted copy. The Attorney General’s Public Information Act Handbook (2026) says that even if a crash report relates to a pending criminal investigation, the agency must release it to a requestor with a right of access under §550.065(c).

What to do now

1. 1

   Call police from the scene if required

   If anyone is hurt or killed or a vehicle cannot be safely driven, notify the local police, sheriff or DPS immediately. Exchange name, address, registration and insurer with the other driver in every crash.

2. 2

   Get the agency name and case number

   Ask the officer which agency is writing the report and for the case or incident number. Texas has no driver report to the state, so keep your own notes and any form the officer gives you.

3. 3

   Buy the CR-3 after about two weeks

   Search TxDOT’s Crash Report Online Purchase System by name or driver license number: $6 regular, $8 certified. If it is not there after 14 days, call the investigating agency.

4. 4

   Request video separately, now

   The crash report does not include video. Body camera and dashcam video are requested from the investigating agency under the Public Information Act, and TxDOT says its traffic cameras do not record, so act quickly.

Frequently asked questions