Nationwide auto insurance review 2026
A mid-sized national insurer with the fourth-best claims score in this review, a strong complaint record, and two distinct telematics programs.
- Market share
- 1.3% of U.S. auto
- AM Best rating
- A
- Availability
- 45 states and D.C. — not available in Alaska, Hawaii, Louisiana or Massachusetts
A national average is not a quote. Compare Nationwide against 50+ insurers on your own ZIP, vehicle, and record.
How Nationwide 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 Nationwide does well
- Fourth-highest claims satisfaction score in this review
- Fewer complaints than its size predicts
- Two separate telematics programs — SmartRide for behavior, SmartMiles for low mileage
- Won J.D. Power's usage-based insurance segment three years running
- Vanishing Deductible takes $100 off per safe-driving year, up to $500
Where it falls short
- 13% above the national average on our benchmark profile
- AM Best A, lower than eight other carriers here
- SmartRide's final discount can be zero — the enrollment credit is not a floor
- Its published minimum-coverage average of $950 is one of the highest in this review
The full review
Nationwide writes in 45 states and D.C. — not Alaska, Hawaii, Louisiana or Massachusetts, and its California status could not be confirmed — and holds 1.34% of the private passenger auto market on 2024 premiums. It sits in an unusual position: large enough to be a household name, small enough that it competes on product design rather than scale.
How claims go
729 out of 1,000 in the J.D. Power 2025 study, fourth overall and 29 points above the segment average. Only Erie, NJM and Liberty Mutual scored higher. It also draws fewer complaints than its size predicts, which makes it one of the few carriers here where both service measures point the same way.
What it costs
$2,671 a year for full coverage, 13% above the $2,356 national average — and $950 a year for minimum coverage, one of the highest minimum-coverage figures in this review. Nationwide publishes an average saving of $1,032 for bundling home and auto, which is a substantial number if you have a home to bundle.
Telematics is where it leads
Nationwide runs two programs rather than one: SmartRide scores driving behavior, SmartMiles prices by the mile for low-mileage drivers. J.D. Power has ranked Nationwide first in its usage-based insurance segment three years running, most recently in 2026. SmartRide gives an instant 10% for enrolling and publishes up to 40% based on behavior.
Nationwide states it directly: 'Enrollment discount applies during data collection; final discount is calculated on driving behavior and could be zero.'
The 10% you get for signing up is not a floor. That is unusually candid disclosure, and worth taking at face value.
Vanishing Deductible
An optional feature that takes $100 off your deductible for each year you drive without a claim, up to $500. It is one of the clearer versions of this idea on the market — Progressive's Deductible Savings Bank works in $50 increments per claim-free period, and several competitors do not offer anything comparable at all.
Nationwide is a quietly good insurer that costs more than it should have to. The claims score, complaint record and telematics offering are all genuinely strong — the UBI programs in particular are best in class by J.D. Power's own measure. The price is the problem: $2,671 a year is $650 more than Geico for a company with a lower financial strength rating.
Compare Nationwide head-to-head
Every pairing gets its own side-by-side breakdown across the same six categories.
Nationwide questions, answered
The things people actually ask before switching.
Where Nationwide sits in the market
No published rate data, so no honest position on the horizontal axis: Liberty Mutual, NJM, Clearcover, Elephant, Lemonade, Root, Texas Farm Bureau. Below the J.D. Power study’s size threshold, so no position on the vertical axis: Kemper, Shelter, Chubb, COUNTRY Financial, MAPFRE, Plymouth Rock, The Hanover. That study samples only the largest insurers, so these carriers will not appear in a future wave either. Premiums from NerdWallet’s August 2026 analysis; claims scores from the J.D. Power 2025 U.S. Auto Claims Satisfaction Study. USAA is scored but not ranked in that study because it serves the military community only.
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.
Nationwide by state
Nationwide writes in 45 states. If yours is not listed, it is not an option there at any price.
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