Road accidents - 2025

In 2025, mobility returned to pre-pandemic levels, showing no significant impact from structural or temporary factors such as energy price trends and urban traffic regulation policies. As regards road safety, the latest year saw a decline in the number of road fatalities, despite an increase in both road accidents and injuries.

In 2025, there were 2,868 road fatalities (-5.3% compared with 2024), 237,822 injuries (+1.7%), and 177,207 road accidents (+2.2%). Compared with 2019, fatalities and injuries decreased by 9.6% and 1.5%, respectively, while the number of road accidents increased by 2.9%.

The number of fatalities increased among riders and passengers of bicycles, e-bikes, e-scooters, and occupants of heavy goods vehicles, while it declined for all other categories of road users. Overall, 253 people using active and micromobility modes lost their lives (+21.6% compared with 2024), including 198 cyclists (+20%), 30 e-bike users (+50%), and 25 e-scooter riders (+8.7%). For the second consecutive year, fatalities among occupants of heavy goods vehicles increased, reaching 166 (+13.7%). By contrast, fatalities declined among car occupants (1,125; -10.1%), motorcyclists (802; -3.4%), moped riders (56; -8.2%), and pedestrians (419; -10.9%).

Compared with 2024, although road accidents increased on urban roads (+1.8%) and rural roads (+4.7%) and decreased on motorways (-2.4%), it was on motorways that the number of fatalities recorded a slight increase (+0.8%). Fatalities declined on both urban and rural roads, with the sharpest decrease occurring on urban roads (-7.1%). Compared with 2019, road accidents increased across all road types, particularly on rural roads (+7.6%), while the overall number of fatalities fell by 9.6%, with the largest reduction recorded on motorways (-16.8%).

In 2025, the number of road fatalities also declined across the EU-27, although less markedly than in Italy (-2.4% compared with 2024), a decrease similar to that recorded in the previous year (-2.5%). Compared with 2019, fatalities fell by 14.7%. In absolute terms, 19,463 people died in road accidents in the EU-27 in 2025, compared with 19,945 in 2024 and 22,823 in 2019. Although Italy’s road fatality rate declined from 51 to 49 deaths per million inhabitants between 2024 and 2025, the country ranks 20th among EU Member States for road mortality. The EU-27 average stands at 43 road deaths per million inhabitants.

The most frequent contributing factors in road accidents are driver distraction, failure to give way, excessive speed, and improper manoeuvres. Together, these account for 43.1% of all road accidents.

Speeding is the second most frequently sanctioned traffic offence, after illegal parking, accounting for 37% of all traffic violations. Penalties increased for failure to wear seat belts and to use child restraint systems (2.1% of all violations). Sanctions for the improper use of electronic devices while driving remained high, while penalties for driving under the influence of drugs increased and those for drink-driving declined. In provincial capitals, partly as a result of the new regulations, penalties issued to e-scooter riders more than tripled compared with 2024.

Although the Italian new passenger car market contracted by 2.6% in 2025 compared with 2024, contrary to the overall European market, which grew by 2.4%, traffic volumes on the motorway network continued to increase. Average annual vehicle kilometres travelled rose by 1.9% (+1.6% for heavy vehicles and +2.0% for light vehicles), while total motorway traffic exceeded 86 billion vehicle-kilometres.

Road fatalities decline in 2025: for the first time since 2020, the total falls below 3,000

In 2025, 177,207 road traffic accidents involving personal injuries were recorded in Italy. These accidents resulted in 2,868 fatalities and 237,822 injuries (Table 1). Compared with the previous year, the number of road deaths decreased by 5.3%, while both the number of accidents and injuries increased (+2.2% and +1.7%, respectively). The road mortality rate fell from 51.4 to 48.7 deaths per million inhabitants.

Compared with 2019, the benchmark year for the 2021–2030 Decade of Road Safety, the number of road fatalities declined by 9.6%, corresponding to a decrease in the road mortality rate from 53.1 deaths per million inhabitants.

The social cost of road traffic accidents involving personal injuries, calculated using the methodology updated by Istat and ACI in 2023, amounted to just over 18 billion euros, in 2025, equivalent to almost 1% of Italy’s GDP. When the estimated costs of property-damage-only crashes (around 4.4 billion euros, according to ANIA) are also included, the total social cost rises to approximately 22.6 billion euros.

Mobility in 2025: demand remains stable, but travel patterns change compared with 2024

In 2025, mobility continued its post-pandemic consolidation, with mixed trends in travel demand and distances travelled.

According to data from the Isfort Audimob Observatory, updated to the first half of 2025, the total number of trips made on an average weekday by people aged 14–85 reached 102.7 million, an increase of 6.4% compared with the first half of 2024.

Pre-pandemic mobility levels have therefore been almost fully restored, considering that 105.7 million trips were recorded in 2019. A different trend emerges, however, for passenger-kilometres travelled on an average weekday. In the first half of 2025, this indicator stood at 944.5 million passenger-kilometres, down slightly (-0.85%) from the same period of 2024 and still 20% below 2019 levels. This suggests that the expansion in medium- and long-distance travel, which had characterised the recovery in mobility demand during the gradual exit from the health emergency (2021–2022), has now come to an end.

The overall mobility rate, the share of the population making at least one trip on an average weekday, reached 80.8%, up from 80.1% in the first half of 2024, although still below the pre-pandemic level of 85.3% recorded in 2019. The local mobility rate, measuring the proportion of people making only very short walking trips during the day, remained stable at 6.7%, above the 6.0% recorded in 2019.

The average number of trips per mobile person increased to 2.53, compared with 2.41 in the first half of 2024, slightly exceeding the 2019 level. By contrast, the average daily distance travelled per mobile person declined slightly, from 23.8 km in the first half of 2024 to 23.3 km in the first half of 2025.

The post-Covid trend towards shorter travel distances also continued, despite annual fluctuations. The average trip length declined from 11.2 km in 2019 to 9.6 km in 2024 and 9.2 km in the first half of 2025. More specifically, the reduction was particularly pronounced for urban mobility, where the average trip length fell to 3.4 km, the lowest value recorded since 2019. Conversely, non-urban travel showed an increase in average trip distance, reaching 25.1 km, although still below the 26.8 km recorded in 2019. Overall, travel within urban areas continued to shorten, while journeys beyond the municipality of residence became slightly longer.

Cycling and micromobility recorded the strongest growth in modal share during the first half of 2025, exceeding 5% for the first time (5.2%), compared with 3.3% in 2019. The modal share of motorcycles also increased, reaching 4.5%, one percentage point higher than in the first half of 2024 and well above the 3.3% recorded in 2019.

The private car remained the dominant mode of transport in Italy, where car ownership is among the highest in Europe, with 709 passenger cars per 1,000 inhabitants. Nevertheless, the car’s modal share declined slightly, falling to 60.8% in the first half of 2025 from 63.1% in the same period of 2024. The annual figure for 2024 (61.1%) also represented a decline compared with both 2023 (-3.5 percentage points) and 2019 (-1.5 percentage points). At the same time, the use of shared cars increased, reaching 12.9% in the first half of 2025, three percentage points higher than in 2024.

The modal share of public transport reached 8.9% in the first half of 2025, an improvement over the same period of 2024. The consolidated annual figure for 2024 (9.1%) also showed an increase compared with 2023. However, public transport use remained well below the 10.8% recorded in 2019.

According to the National Sharing Mobility Observatory, the supply of shared vehicles continued to decline. Around 96,000 shared vehicles were available in Italy in 2024, 15% fewer than in 2022. Preliminary estimates for 2025 indicate a further reduction of more than 4,000 vehicles, mainly due to decreases in shared e-scooters (-6%) and shared cars (-17%). In 2025, the long-established car-sharing operator Enjoy significantly reduced its fleet, while several e-scooter operators also downsized their services.

The shared e-scooter sector experienced a marked contraction. The number of services declined from 99 in 2022 to 68 in 2024 and 62 in the first months of 2025, largely reflecting the strategic repositioning of operators across multiple cities and the withdrawal of some providers from the Italian market. Since 2023, the number of rentals has stabilised at just under 25 million per year. However, estimates for 2025 suggest a possible 27% increase, bringing the total to more than 31 million rentals. Given the progressive reduction in fleet size over recent years, this would indicate a more intensive use of the remaining vehicles. Consistently, vehicle-kilometres travelled are expected to increase by 34% in 2025, surpassing the levels recorded in 2022.

Traffic volumes on the motorway network, measured in vehicle-kilometres travelled, increased by 1.9% in 2025 compared with 2024. Vehicle-kilometres travelled by heavy vehicles rose by 1.6%, while those by light vehicles increased by 2.0%. In absolute terms, total traffic exceeded 86 billion vehicle-kilometres in 2025.

On an annual basis, the IMR (Mobility Index), calculated by ANAS from average monthly daily traffic by vehicle category—showed a slight increase of 0.1 percentage points for the overall road network in 2025 compared with 2024. The IMR for heavy vehicles increased by 2.2%.

As regards bicycle sales, after the exceptional growth experienced during the pandemic years, the market contracted in 2025 compared with 2024. Sales of traditional bicycles fell by 3%, to 1.047 million units, while e-bike sales declined by 7%, to 256,000 units, still 31.3% higher than in 2019. These figures indicate that one out of every four bicycles sold was an e-bike, compared with 11% of total bicycle sales in 2019.

The Italian new passenger car market closed 2025 with a 2.6% decline compared with 2024. This decrease was mainly driven by sharp contractions in June (-16.9%), August (-13.5%), and February (-8.2%). By contrast, the European new car market recorded modest growth in 2025, with 13,271,270 new registrations, up 2.4% from 12,962,714 in the previous year, although still 16% below pre-pandemic 2019 levels. Among Europe’s five largest car markets (including the United Kingdom), Spain (+12.9%), the United Kingdom (+3.5%), and Germany (+1.4%) recorded growth over the year, while Italy and France both registered declines of 5%. In terms of new car registrations, Italy remained the fourth-largest market in Europe in 2025.