Commercial pickup truck insurance 2025: What it covers and what it costs

What is commercial pickup insurance?

Commercial pickup insurance is a type of commercial auto insurance specifically designed for the pickup trucks businesses use to haul equipment, tools, goods or employees. It covers accidents and other damage, such as fire, theft and vandalism. 

The right policy can also provide coverage for cargo and hired or non-owned trailers and vehicles. 

Who needs commercial pickup insurance?

The following types of trucking businesses need commercial pickup truck insurance.

• Motor carriers: For-hire carriers under permanent lease can protect themselves with coverage for personal use and physical damage to their trucks, which a basic liability policy provided through a transport company usually doesn’t provide.
• Owner-operators: If you run your own trucking business, insurance can help protect you from accidents, cargo loss and more.
• Private carriers: If your business hauls its own goods, pickup truck insurance can provide accident and liability protection, which covers you against bodily injury and property damage if your vehicle is involved in a crash. 

What industries commonly need pickup trucks?

Pickup trucks are essential for many industries, including: 

• Agriculture and livestock haulers
• Expeditors
• General freight haulers
• Household movers
• Contractors
• Auto repair shops
• Car haulers
• Towing companies
• Roadside assistance 
• Dirt, gravel, and sand haulers
• Landscapers
• Plumbers
• Garbage and trash haulers
• Scrap auto, metal, and recycling services
• Septic waste removal companies
• Machinery and heavy equipment haulers
• HVAC installers
• Electricians
• Refrigerated goods haulers
• Farmers
• Courier and delivery companies

What does commercial pickup insurance cover?

Commercial insurance for pickup trucks typically includes:

• Liability coverage: Pays for injuries and property damage you cause to others when you’re at fault in an accident.
• Collision coverage: Pays for damage to your pickup from a collision, regardless of fault.
• Comprehensive coverage: Covers damage from non-collision events like fire, natural disasters, animals, theft and vandalism.
• Medical payments/personal injury protection (PIP): Covers medical expenses you and your passengers sustain in an accident.
• Uninsured motorist coverage: Protects you if your pickup is hit by another driver with no liability insurance or not enough to cover the damage.

You can customize pickup truck insurance to your business’s specific needs with optional coverages, including:

• Hired and non-owned auto (HNOA) coverage: Extends liability coverage to borrowed, hired, leased and rented vehicles, as well as employees who use their personal vehicles for business purposes.
• Motor truck cargo coverage: Provides cargo protection for losses or damage that occurs during transit.
• Refrigeration breakdown coverage: Covers perishable items if your truck’s refrigeration system malfunctions.
• Trailer interchange coverage: Provides coverage for non-owned trailers you pull for another company under a trailer interchange agreement.
• Non-trucking liability coverage: Covers you when you use your pickup for personal, non-business purposes when permanently leased to a motor carrier.
• Motor truck general liability coverage: Provides liability coverage for accidents related to your business operations that don’t directly involve your truck, such as incidents at loading docks or customer locations.
• Rental reimbursement with downtime: Covers a rental and lost income while your truck is being repaired from damage in a covered accident.

How much insurance coverage do you need?

The minimum amount of commercial vehicle coverage you need varies from state to state. 

Progressive notes that California requires commercial auto policies to have a minimum liability limit of $30,000 per person, $60,000 per accident for bodily injury and $15,000 for property damage, while New York requires a minimum liability limit of $25,000 per person, $50,000 per accident for bodily injury and $10,000 for property damage. 

But these are minimums. You need to make sure you have enough coverage to protect you and your company. Experts advise talking to an agent or broker to find out what you need.

How much is commercial insurance for a pickup truck?

We gathered average rates from several sources to give you a clearer picture of what commercial trucking insurance might cost.

• Insurance for a pickup truck can range from $1,500 to more than $4,000 per year, according to Carlos Gonzalez-Avila, a small commercial insurance specialist at insurance technology company Bold Penguin.
• Data from Insureon, a small business insurance brokerage, shows that commercial truck insurance averages about $816 monthly, or roughly $9,800 annually. However, rates vary according to the factors mentioned above, including which insurer you choose and where your company is located.
• Progressive Commercial offers average rates of $767 monthly, or $9,204 annually, for specialty truckers. Transport truckers' rates are a bit higher, around $1,041 per month or $12,492 per year.
• DAT Freight & Analytics, which offers freight data analytics and a freight marketplace, reports that Mississippi has the lowest pickup truck insurance rates, averaging $3,552 per year for local coverage and $4,664 for national. On the other end of the spectrum, Hawaii is the most expensive, with annual premiums for a semi-truck ranging from $10,000 to $30,000.

But pickup truck insurance rates can vary significantly and depend on many factors, including:

• Your coverage needs
• Whether you’re leased to a company or operating independently
• What type of pickup truck you have and how many
• What you haul
• Your operating radius
• Where your business is located
• Your industry
• The driving history of each truck driver operating your vehicles

Why commercial truck insurance is so expensive

While the prices above may look high, it’s important to remember that insurers take on a lot of risk when insuring trucks. Large trucks with over 10,000 gross vehicle weight ratings (GVWR) account for 10% of all vehicle miles driven and 9% of fatal crashes, according to the National Safety Council. 

Things have been getting better. Large truck crashes have dropped by 7.3%, according to a 2024 report on operational costs of trucking by the American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI).

Still, so-called “nuclear” lawsuit verdicts – those in excess of $10 million – have been a growing problem for the trucking industry, resulting in soaring insurance premiums.  

In 2023, average premiums increased by 12.5%, according to the ATRI report.

Commercial pickup insurance companies

Getting the best insurance for pickup trucks is essential to protect your small business. Here are just a few insurance companies selling pickup truck insurance:

• Progressive is the truck insurance market leader and one of the few companies where you can get a pickup truck insurance quote and buy coverage online without speaking to an agent.
• The Hartford has been working with small businesses for over 200 years, offering personalized service from local agents and online quotes from its partner, Tivly.
• Liberty Mutual offers industry-specific insurance packages for businesses with single pickups or an entire fleet. It also provides business tools such as telematics programs and tips for creating fleet safety programs.
• Old Republic offers specialty coverage options for large fleets' risk-control programs to help keep rates affordable.

What our expert says

Q: Should pickup owners focus on price?

Carlos Gonzalez Avila, a small commercial insurance specialist at Bold Penguin

"No. Focus on the right coverage to protect your business. “Often, business owners become fixated on price, and when I was an agent, I witnessed firsthand that this meant trimming or eliminating coverages to favor cost,” he says."

Q: How important is having the right insurance?

Kris Barber Managing partner of Texas-based The Barber Law Firm

"I've witnessed businesses destroyed by one accident due to the owners' assumption that they were covered when they were not. Commercial pickup truck insurance provides valuable liability coverage, state compliance and peace of mind against lawsuits that can destroy everything you have worked for."