The Hanover auto insurance review 2026
An independent-agent insurer with a decent complaint record, the most expensive average premium in this review, and the worst-rated app in it.
- Market share
- Outside NAIC top 25
- AM Best rating
- Not published
- Availability
- 19 states, through independent agents only
A national average is not a quote. Compare The Hanover against 50+ insurers on your own ZIP, vehicle, and record.
How The Hanover scores
Each category is scored against a published figure, then weighted into the overall score. Where a figure is not published, we say so rather than estimate one.
Sources: average premiums from NerdWallet's August 2026 rate analysis (Quadrant Information Services), for a 35-year-old driver with a clean record and good credit in a 2023 Toyota Camry LE at 12,000 miles a year, 100/300/50 limits with $1,000 deductibles — national average $2,356. Claims satisfaction from the J.D. Power 2025 U.S. Auto Claims Satisfaction Study (segment average 700). Complaint record from NerdWallet's analysis of NAIC complaint data, 2022–2024. Financial strength from AM Best. Discounts and app data from each carrier's published pages and the Apple App Store / Google Play, retrieved August 2026. Updated August 2026.
Strengths and trade-offs
What The Hanover does well
- Fewer complaints than its size predicts
- Twelve discounts, with unusually thoughtful provision for households with teen drivers
- Tiered account products and collector-car coverage through independent agents
- Independent agents can quote it alongside competitors in one conversation
Where it falls short
- Most expensive average premium in this review at $4,038 a year
- 1.99-star iOS app — the worst here by a clear margin
- No AM Best rating we could verify
- No online quote; you must go through an agent
The full review
The Hanover writes personal auto in 19 states exclusively through independent agents — there is no way to quote or buy online. It also writes collector-car coverage and runs tiered account products under the Hanover Platinum and Prestige names.
The price
$4,038 a year for full coverage on our benchmark profile. The national average is $2,356. That makes Hanover the most expensive carrier in this review — ahead of Farmers, ahead of Mercury, roughly double what Geico charges the same driver. Nothing else in this review has to overcome a gap that large.
What works in its favour
Hanover draws fewer complaints than a company its size would be expected to, which is a real signal and not a common one. Its discount list is also more considered than most: alongside the usual multi-policy and good-student credits, it offers a teen driver safety course discount, a new-teen-driver account separation, and a discount for a vehicle a teen does not use. Someone at Hanover has clearly thought about the most expensive problem in household auto insurance.
1.99 stars on the App Store across 154 ratings, and 2.98 on Google Play across 173.
Every other carrier in this review rates above 2.4 on iOS, and most are above 4. If you expect to manage your policy yourself rather than through your agent, this is a real cost.
What we could not verify
We could not confirm Hanover's AM Best financial strength rating from any page we were able to read. AM Best blocks automated access, and the secondary sources that carry ratings for other carriers do not publish one for Hanover. That is a gap in our research rather than a judgment about the company, and it is the field a prospective customer should ask their agent about first.
Hanover's complaint record says it treats customers reasonably, and its teen-driver discounts are better thought through than most. Neither of those survives contact with the price: at $4,038 a year it is the most expensive carrier in this review, roughly double Geico. Take it seriously if an independent agent has a specific reason to recommend it for your situation; do not take it as a default.
Compare The Hanover head-to-head
Every pairing gets its own side-by-side breakdown across the same six categories.
The Hanover questions, answered
The things people actually ask before switching.
Where The Hanover sits in the market
Not plotted, because no public rate data exists for them: Liberty Mutual, NJM, Clearcover, Elephant, Lemonade, Root, Texas Farm Bureau. Complaint bands from NerdWallet’s analysis of NAIC complaint data, 2022–2024 (2021–2023 for Liberty Mutual and Mercury). We show the band rather than a numeric complaint index on purpose — the per-carrier indexes published by different compilers contradict each other badly enough to be unusable, because the index is reported per underwriting subsidiary and most sources do not say which one they used.
The Hanover by state
The Hanover writes in 19 states. If yours is not listed, it is not an option there at any price.
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