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Two drivers can live in the same state, drive the same car, and still get opposite news at renewal this year. One sees a double-digit cut. The other gets hit with a double-digit hike. The only thing that changed was the name on the policy.
We call this the car insurance rate gap, and it’s the real story of 2026. We sorted every auto rate filing in our tracking corpus by state and by carrier. In 39 of the 44 states with rate moves on file, drivers faced both a cut and a hike in the same 90-day window. The car insurance rate gap between the best and worst move in a typical state ran about 25 points, and your carrier, not your ZIP code, decides which side you land on.
That pattern is the clearest signal in spring 2026 rate data, and it flips the usual advice on its head. People obsess over which state is cheapest. The filings say the bigger swing is sitting inside your own state, between the carrier cutting rates and the one raising them. This study shows how wide that gap runs and how to use it at your next renewal.
Same State, Opposite Bills
State regulators logged 1,633 auto filings in our queue over the trailing 90 days. Of those, 820 carried an actual rate move, a real increase or decrease rather than a rate-neutral paperwork update. Those moves span 44 states and 133 consumer brands. That’s a big enough pool to see how carriers in the same state pull apart.
Here’s the headline number. In 39 of 44 states, at least one carrier filed a cut while another filed a hike during the same window. That’s 89% of states sending drivers in two directions at once. Only five states moved in a single direction, and most of those simply had too few filings to show a split.
So the question for most drivers isn’t whether rates are going up or down. Both are happening in your state right now. The question is which carrier you’re sitting with when your renewal prints.
This is what we call the car insurance rate gap. It’s the distance between the carrier cutting rates and the carrier raising them in the same place at the same time. Most coverage of 2026 rates talks about national averages. The filings show the action is local and carrier-specific, and that’s where a driver can actually save.
The Car Insurance Rate Gap Lives Inside Your State
We measured the car insurance rate gap in each state, the distance from its biggest cut to its biggest hike. We limited this to states with at least four rate moves and both a cut and a hike on file, which left 39 states. The median spread came to 25.5 points, and the average was 27.9. So in a typical state, the gap between the best and worst rate move ran about 25 to 28 percentage points.
A few states blew past that. Vermont ran from a 20% cut to a 53% hike, a 73-point spread between two carriers in the same state. Rhode Island and Louisiana each topped 49 points. Even Texas, with 88 moves on file, stretched from a 21% cut to a 21% hike.
| STATE | RATE MOVES ON FILE | BIGGEST CUT | BIGGEST HIKE | SPREAD (POINTS) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vermont | 12 | -20.0% | +53.4% | 73.4 |
| Rhode Island | 10 | -20.7% | +32.9% | 53.6 |
| Louisiana | 10 | -19.5% | +29.9% | 49.4 |
| California | 9 | -6.2% | +37.5% | 43.7 |
| Texas | 88 | -20.9% | +20.5% | 41.4 |
| Idaho | 11 | -9.2% | +28.4% | 37.6 |
| South Dakota | 10 | -9.0% | +28.1% | 37.1 |
| Illinois | 39 | -20.0% | +16.8% | 36.8 |
| Colorado | 33 | -24.4% | +11.8% | 36.2 |
| Maryland | 32 | -11.5% | +23.5% | 35.0 |
Source: InsuranceRateGuard.com analysis of SERFF auto rate filings, 90-day window ending June 21, 2026.
Look at Colorado. One carrier filed a 24% cut while another filed a 12% hike in the same state. A driver shopping across those two offers could swing their rate by 36 points without leaving home. That car insurance rate gap is a far bigger move than switching states would usually buy.
The same logic holds in Texas, California, and Illinois. Each one is running cuts and hikes side by side. The savings aren’t hiding in another state. They’re hiding behind a different logo in your own.
The Same Insurer Cuts in One State and Hikes in Another
The split isn’t just between companies. It shows up inside a single company too. We pulled every carrier group with rate moves in five or more states, which gave us 31 groups. Of those, 27 both cut rates in some states and raised them in others.
So even loyalty to one brand doesn’t lock in a direction. The carrier that rewards drivers in one state can be the same one squeezing them next door.
Allstate is the clearest example. Its filings ranged from a 21% cut in one state to a 53% hike in another, a 74-point swing under one corporate roof across 36 states. Liberty Mutual and Farmers showed wide ranges too. The table below shows the biggest multi-state carriers and how far their moves stretched.
| CARRIER GROUP | STATES WITH MOVES | BIGGEST CUT | BIGGEST HIKE | RANGE (POINTS) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Allstate | 36 | -20.9% | +53.4% | 74.3 |
| American Family | 18 | -3.7% | +28.4% | 32.1 |
| Liberty Mutual | 23 | -6.2% | +23.1% | 29.3 |
| Farmers | 29 | -12.2% | +16.8% | 29.0 |
| Progressive | 25 | -9.9% | +6.5% | 16.4 |
Source: InsuranceRateGuard.com analysis of SERFF auto rate filings, 90-day window ending June 21, 2026.
This is why brand reputation is a weak guide on its own, and why the car insurance rate gap matters so much. The carrier that’s cutting hard in your neighbor’s state might be the one raising rates in yours. The only way to know is to quote your own state directly. A carrier like Progressive stayed in a tighter band, but most of the big names did not.
Most Moves Are Small, but the Tails Run Wild
The car insurance rate gap looks dramatic because of the extremes, so it helps to see the full shape. Two-thirds of all rate moves landed within five points of flat, up or down. Most renewals won’t feel a 25-point swing. The wide spreads come from a handful of carriers at the edges, and those edges are where the money is.
| SIZE OF MOVE | NUMBER OF FILINGS |
|---|---|
| Cut over 15 points | 17 |
| Cut 10 to 15 points | 23 |
| Cut 5 to 10 points | 95 |
| Cut 0 to 5 points | 226 |
| Hike 0 to 5 points | 304 |
| Hike 5 to 10 points | 103 |
| Hike 10 to 15 points | 24 |
| Hike over 15 points | 28 |
Source: InsuranceRateGuard.com analysis of SERFF auto rate filings, 90-day window ending June 21, 2026.
The biggest single cut on file was about 24 points. The biggest hike topped 53. Those outliers don’t hit many drivers, but they set the width of the gap in each state. When you shop, you’re trying to land near the cutting edge of that range instead of the hiking edge.
Hikes also slightly outnumbered cuts, 459 to 361 across the 820 moves. That tilt matches what most drivers feel at renewal. But the car insurance rate gap means a hike-heavy market still hides plenty of cuts, and they sit right next to the increases in the same state.
How We Analyzed 1,633 Filings
We started with our SERFF filing corpus, which tracks public auto rate filings logged with state insurance departments. For this study we used 1,633 filings from the trailing 90-day window ending June 21, 2026. Each filing lists the state, the carrier, and the statewide percentage rate change for that legal entity’s program.
We kept the 820 filings that carried an actual rate move and set aside the rate-neutral ones, since a 0% change adds nothing to a spread. All percentages come from the per-filing statewide figure, not a blended company average, so each number reflects one real program in one state. For the within-state car insurance rate gap ranking, we required at least four moves and both a cut and a hike in a state, which left 39 states.
One caveat matters. A statewide filing is an average across that carrier’s book, so your personal renewal can land above or below it based on your record, vehicle, and coverage. The spreads here measure the range of carrier behavior in a state, not a guaranteed quote for any one driver. Treat them as a map of where the savings are, then confirm with live quotes.
What This Means for Your Renewal
The takeaway is simple. Shopping carriers inside your own state is likely to move your rate more than anything else you can control this year. In a typical state, the car insurance rate gap between the cutting carrier and the hiking carrier was about 25 points. That’s a wide door, and most drivers never walk through it because they auto-renew.
Loyalty works against you here. The carrier you’ve held for years may be the one filing a hike while a competitor down the list files a cut. You can track pending moves for your state on our rate tracker before you renew. Then quote two or three carriers to see who’s on the cutting side in your state right now.
How to Save on Insurance
The filing data points to a clear routine you can run before your next renewal:
- Check pending rate moves for your specific state on the rate tracker before you renew, since cuts and hikes are happening side by side.
- Quote at least three carriers in your state, because the gap between the best and worst offer averaged about 25 points.
- Don’t trust brand reputation alone. The same carrier cuts in one state and hikes in another, so your own state’s quote is what counts.
- Raise your deductible and confirm every discount while you shop. A pricing tailwind plus policy tweaks beats either one alone.
- Re-shop every 12 months. The cutting carrier this year may be the hiking carrier next year.
None of this takes more than an afternoon, and the payoff is the widest lever you control. Check your state, quote a few carriers, and aim for the cutting side of the gap before you renew.
Sources Used
- SERFF, System for Electronic Rates and Forms Filing, public auto rate filings, 90-day window ending June 21, 2026
- National Association of Insurance Commissioners, rate filing system documentation
- InsuranceRateGuard.com SERFF filing corpus, 1,633 filings across 44 states with rate moves, refreshed June 21, 2026