Standalone product liability filings in the US district courts hit a 10-year high in 2025 amid a sharp rise in automotive disputes, according to Lex Machina.
The 2026 Product Liability Litigation Report found that non-MDL filings – cases brought individually rather than grouped into mass litigations – reached 5,692 cases in 2025, a 31% increase compared to 2024 and the highest annual total in a decade. Lex Machina says about 1,400 product lawsuits were also filed in the first half of this year, putting it on track to be in line with 2025’s levels.
Vehicle-related product liability filings hit 3,281 cases in 2025, accounting for more than half of all non-MDL filings – a 39% increase on 2024’s levels and a whopping 269% increase from 2016, when just 890 lawsuits were filed.
Lex Machina says the rise in vehicle-related lawsuits coincides with a general increase in recalls issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and increases in the use of tech features that were not present in older cars, such as automatic collision-avoidance systems and lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles.
On average, standalone non-MDL product liability cases reached a time to termination of just 303 days, compared to a median time to termination of 1,305 days when including MDL cases. Lex Machina says the data highlights how corporate risk management teams, defence counsel and insurers face an accelerating volume of standalone consumer defect lawsuits that move rapidly through federal dockets.
Courts awarded almost $3bn in product liability damages last year across 38 cases, more than double the $1.4bn paid out across 39 cases in 2024. That was the most damages awarded since 2017, though a single judgment against Ford Motor Company related to an unsafe roof design accounted for $2.53bn of that total – a record single verdict.
General Motors was the most active defendant from 2023 to 2025 with 1,404 cases in 56 districts, followed by Ford with 1,193 cases in 69 districts and Mercedes-Benz USA with 893 cases in 33 districts, reflecting the rise in vehicle-related lawsuits. The most active non-vehicle defendant was Amazon.com, Inc, with 241 cases in 57 districts.
Meanwhile, the most active districts for non-MDL cases over that period were the Central District of California (3,004 cases, or 21% of the total), the Northern District of California (835 cases) and the Southern District of California (742 cases). Overall, California’s federal districts accounted for more than one-third of all non-MDL cases during that period. The Western District of Texas was the leading venue outside of California, with 555 cases.
Email your news and story ideas to: [email protected]
