You may hear that the insurance market is “softening.” Some broad averages have cooled this year. That does not mean your Trucking Insurance renewal will go down, or even that it will be a small increase.
The Ivans Index, which measures year-over-year premium change on the same policy, reported a 2.80% average Commercial Auto premium renewal rate change for October 2026, down from 3.29% in September. In the third quarter of 2026, the Commercial Auto average was 3.63%, compared with 4.93% in the second quarter. Ivans says those increases have been trending down since April 2026. In the third quarter of 2025, the same average was 7.6%.
Those numbers are useful context. They are not a quote, a forecast, or a promise for your account. Ivans is a broad U.S. commercial auto average. It mixes many kinds of accounts, not just for-hire trucking. Individual renewals can be higher or lower. Some accounts can still see double-digit increases. Your result depends on your losses, drivers, equipment, radius, filings, and how insurers view the risk, among other things.
Trucking has also been dealing with a longer stretch of higher liability costs. Research published in May 2026 by the American Transportation Research Institute found that from 2021 to 2024, liability insurance premium costs rose 18.6% to 10.2 cents per mile, even as heavy-duty truck-involved crash rates fell 2.6% industry-wide. Among the fleets in that study, per-mile liability losses rose by an average of 33.1% over the same period. Premiums for excess layers rose even faster. In ATRI’s 2026 update on the operational costs of trucking, the cost of liability and cargo insurance premiums rose 3.9% in 2025, to $0.106 per mile.
The short version is this: fewer crashes have not automatically meant cheaper insurance, because the cost of the claims that do happen has been rising. A cooler commercial auto index is not the same thing as a lower bill for a trucking operation.
If your renewal is coming up, start early and look at your own loss runs, driver records, and equipment list. Do not wait to see whether a market average “shows up” on your invoice. It might not.
Questions? Call or text (847) 874-6263, or request a quote.
This article is general information, not legal or coverage advice. Market averages describe the market, not your policy. Coverage is subject to underwriting.
Sources: Ivans Index, November 5, 2026; Insurance Journal, November 10, 2026; ATRI, May 19, 2026; ATRI, Analysis of the Operational Costs of Trucking: 2026 Update.
