Florida Uninsured Motorist Insurance: 2026 UM/UIM Guide

A driver in Hialeah is stopped at a red light on Palmetto when a pickup truck blows through the intersection and t-bones the driver-side door. The pickup keeps going. Witnesses get a partial plate and a description. The driver in the sedan wakes up in Memorial Regional with a fractured pelvis, three days in the hospital, and $84,000 in medical bills before discharge. The sedan is totaled. The driver calls their auto insurer expecting the policy to cover the catastrophe. The adjuster pulls the file and reports the policy minimums: $10,000 PIP, $10,000 property damage, zero bodily injury, zero uninsured motorist. PIP pays $10,000. The sedan is paid through collision coverage. The remaining $74,000 of medical, the lost wages, the pain and suffering, the future surgery — all of it is the driver's problem. The pickup, if it is ever found, is registered to a 24-year-old with a suspended license and no assets. The lawsuit goes nowhere because there is nothing to collect.

Florida has more uninsured drivers than almost any state in the country. The Insurance Research Council's most recent estimate puts the figure at roughly 20 percent of Florida drivers, or one in five. Florida is also one of only two states (the other being New Hampshire) that does not require bodily injury liability coverage to register a car. The combination produces a market where a serious collision with another driver is, statistically, very likely to involve someone who has no meaningful way to pay for the harm they cause. Uninsured Motorist (UM) coverage is the policy provision that fills that gap. Underinsured Motorist (UIM) coverage is the second half of the same provision, paying when the at-fault driver carries some bodily injury liability but not enough. This guide walks through what UM and UIM actually pay in Florida, what Florida Statute § 627.727 requires every carrier to offer, the stacked-versus-non-stacked decision that is unique to Florida, the written rejection trap that strips coverage off most minimum-limit policies, how the hit-and-run rules work, and how much coverage you should actually carry in 2026.

What UM and UIM Coverage Actually Pay

Uninsured Motorist coverage pays for the bodily injuries you and your household members suffer when an at-fault driver has no liability insurance. Underinsured Motorist coverage pays when the at-fault driver has liability insurance but the limits are too low to cover the actual damages. In Florida, both coverages are written into the same policy provision, often abbreviated UM/UIM, and the limit you select applies to both situations. The coverage steps in only after the at-fault driver's liability coverage is exhausted, and it pays only the difference between the at-fault driver's limits and your UM/UIM limit.

The damages covered are the same categories a bodily injury claim against the at-fault driver would recover: past and future medical expenses, lost wages, loss of earning capacity, pain and suffering, mental anguish, loss of consortium, and in fatal cases the wrongful-death damages allowed under Florida's Wrongful Death Act. PIP pays the medical bills first under the no-fault rules, but PIP caps at $10,000 and pays only 80 percent of the medical portion. Everything beyond PIP, and anything PIP does not touch (pain and suffering, full wage loss, future damages), is what UM/UIM picks up.

• check_circleA driver with no insurance at all rear-ends you on the Turnpike. Your UM coverage steps in as the primary source of recovery for everything above PIP.
• check_circleA driver with the state minimum $10,000 in bodily injury liability hits you and your medical bills run $90,000. The at-fault carrier pays $10,000. Your UIM coverage pays up to your UIM limit, less the $10,000 already collected.
• check_circleA hit-and-run driver strikes your car and disappears. Your UM coverage applies if the physical-contact requirement is met or if independent witness evidence corroborates the phantom-vehicle claim.
• check_circleYou are a pedestrian or a bicyclist struck by an uninsured driver. Your UM coverage on your own auto policy follows you off the vehicle and pays for the injury.
• check_circleYour child is a passenger in a friend's car that is hit by an uninsured driver. Your child is covered under your UM policy as a resident relative, with no requirement to be in your vehicle.

What Florida Statute § 627.727 Requires

Florida Statute § 627.727 is the central provision governing UM/UIM coverage. The statute does three things every Florida driver should understand. It requires the insurer to offer UM coverage with every bodily injury liability policy issued in the state. It sets the default limit at the bodily injury liability limit unless the policyholder selects a lower limit in writing. And it imposes specific form requirements on any rejection or limit reduction, with severe consequences for any carrier that fails to follow them.

Mandatory offer at BI limits

Under § 627.727(1), no motor vehicle liability policy that includes bodily injury coverage may be delivered in Florida unless UM coverage is provided in an amount equal to the bodily injury liability limits of the policy. The statute does not require the driver to buy the coverage. It requires the carrier to offer it, and to offer it at the same limits as the bodily injury liability already on the policy. A driver buying $100/300 bodily injury limits is being offered $100/300 in UM by default. The premium for the UM portion is added unless the driver signs a separate document either rejecting UM entirely or selecting a lower limit.

The written rejection form

The rejection or selection of lower limits must be made on a form approved by the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation. The form has to fully advise the applicant of the nature of the coverage. It must state that the coverage is equal to bodily injury liability limits unless lower limits are requested or the coverage is rejected. The warning language has to appear in 12-point font, and the form must be signed by the named insured. If the carrier cannot produce a properly executed rejection form when a claim is filed, the policy is deemed to include UM coverage at the same limits as the bodily injury liability already on the policy.

That last sentence is the most consumer-protective provision in Florida auto insurance, and it is the basis for hundreds of reported decisions every year. A policyholder with $250,000 in bodily injury liability and a UM section that reads "$10,000" or "REJECTED" can often pull the full $250,000 in UM coverage if the carrier never obtained a compliant rejection at policy issue. Anyone with a serious injury claim and a thin UM limit should have the claim file pulled and the original rejection form reviewed before settling for the dec-page number.

Stacked vs Non-Stacked: A Florida-Specific Choice

Florida is one of the few states that lets a policyholder choose between stacked and non-stacked UM coverage. The difference is whether the UM limit applies once per policy or once per insured vehicle. On a stacked policy, the UM limit is multiplied by the number of vehicles on the policy. A policy with $100,000 in stacked UM and three insured vehicles provides $300,000 of total UM coverage on any one accident. On a non-stacked policy, the same $100,000 applies once, regardless of how many vehicles are insured.

Stacking is the statutory default under § 627.727(9). The carrier must offer non-stacked coverage as a discount option, and the policyholder must affirmatively reject stacking in writing to land on the non-stacked form. The statute requires the non-stacked premium to be at least 20 percent lower than the stacked premium, and most carriers price the discount at roughly 20 to 25 percent of the UM premium itself. On a typical Florida auto policy where UM might be $200 to $400 a year, the non-stacked discount runs $40 to $100 a year. The protection it gives up is several multiples of that.

Stacked coverage also extends to the named insured and resident relatives outside the insured vehicle. A stacked policyholder hit by an uninsured driver while a pedestrian, a bicyclist, or a passenger in someone else's car gets the full stacked limit. Non-stacked coverage in that situation pays the single non-stacked limit only. The stacked-versus-non-stacked decision is the most consequential single line item on a Florida UM policy, and it is the one most drivers do not realize they made.

Hit-and-Run and Phantom Vehicle Claims

A hit-and-run driver is treated as an uninsured driver for UM purposes. The catch is the proof. Florida law generally requires either physical contact between the unidentified vehicle and the insured's vehicle, or independent corroborating evidence (a witness, a dashcam, a traffic camera) that the unidentified vehicle caused the loss. The physical-contact rule keeps the UM market from paying every single-car accident a driver later claims was caused by a swerving phantom vehicle that left no trace. The corroborating-evidence exception preserves the right to recover when the evidence is genuinely there.

The practical lesson is to document the scene the same way you would document any other crash. Photograph the impact point on the vehicle. Locate any witnesses on the scene before they leave. Pull the names and phone numbers; police reports often do not capture them. If there is a chance a traffic or business camera caught the event, ask the property owner to preserve the footage within 48 hours, before the recorder overwrites it. The carrier cannot deny a hit-and-run UM claim on the physical-contact rule alone if there is independent evidence of a phantom vehicle's role.

The UIM Exhaustion Clause and the 30-Day Notice

Underinsured Motorist coverage does not pay until the at-fault driver's bodily injury liability limits have been exhausted. That is the exhaustion clause, and it is on the policy form of every Florida UIM carrier. The practical mechanic is that the injured person settles with (or obtains a judgment against) the at-fault driver's liability carrier first, collects the policy limits, and then turns to their own UIM carrier for the balance up to the UIM limit.

Before that settlement is finalized, § 627.727(6) requires written notice to the UIM carrier by certified or registered mail of any proposed settlement that would exhaust the at-fault driver's liability limits. The UIM carrier then has 30 days to either authorize the settlement (and lose subrogation rights against the at-fault driver) or to pay the proposed settlement amount itself to the injured person and preserve subrogation. If the UIM carrier does nothing during the 30-day window, the injured person can proceed with the settlement and the carrier loses its subrogation rights by default.

Missing the certified-mail notice can void UIM coverage entirely on the claim. The notice is mechanical, but it is mandatory. Anyone settling a bodily injury claim against an at-fault driver who carries less coverage than the injured person's UIM limit needs to send the certified letter, hold the settlement for the 30-day clock, and confirm in writing how the UIM carrier responded before signing the release.

How Much UM Coverage to Actually Carry

Florida law does not require any UM coverage. The state-minimum policy ($10,000 PIP, $10,000 property damage, no bodily injury, no UM) is legal and is what a meaningful share of Florida drivers carry. It is also the policy most likely to leave the policyholder personally exposed after a serious crash. The right UM number is the one that protects against the worst plausible loss the policy might have to absorb, sized against the policyholder's assets and earning capacity.

A useful rule for most Florida households is to carry UM/UIM at the same limit as bodily injury liability. The statute starts the policy there by default for a reason: the same logic that drives BI limits (protecting your assets from a lawsuit if you injure someone else) drives UM limits (protecting your own injury recovery if someone uninsured injures you). A driver with $250/500 BI should carry $250/500 UM, stacked, unless there is a clear reason to drop one and not the other. Drivers with significant assets, an umbrella policy, or a high earning capacity should consider $500/500 or $500/1,000 in UM, since the underlying umbrella will almost always require an underlying $250/500 in UM to attach excess limits.

The numbers above are typical 2026 ranges across the Florida private market and vary materially by zip code, age, driving record, and carrier. Two structural points hold across all of them. First, the marginal cost of buying up from $50/100 to $250/500 is small relative to the protection added, often under $300 a year on a typical two-vehicle policy. Second, dropping stacked for non-stacked saves around 20 percent of the UM premium and gives up several multiples of that in worst-case coverage on a multi-vehicle policy. Both decisions reward leaning into more coverage rather than less.

When UM Does Not Apply

UM coverage is not unlimited, and a handful of exclusions reliably surprise policyholders.

• check_circleProperty damage. Florida UM coverage is bodily injury only. Damage to your vehicle caused by an uninsured driver is covered under collision coverage, not UM. Collision is a separate decision and a separate deductible.
• check_circleSingle-vehicle accidents with no second vehicle alleged. Spinning out on a wet road and hitting a tree is not a UM claim. The only injury-coverage path is PIP plus MedPay if the policy has it.
• check_circleAn at-fault driver who is excluded by name on your own policy. Some Florida carriers attach a named driver exclusion to a household member with a poor driving record. A crash caused by that excluded driver is not covered as UM against your own policy.
• check_circleSettlements with the at-fault carrier without the certified-mail notice. As discussed above, settling out the BI limits without giving the UIM carrier the statutory 30-day notice can void the UIM claim.
• check_circlePunitive damages in some carriers' forms. Some Florida UM policies exclude punitive damages from what UM coverage will pay, even when compensatory damages exceed the UM limit. The exclusion is form-specific and worth confirming on a serious claim.

The Bottom Line

Florida is the toughest state in the country for uninsured-driver risk and one of only two that does not require bodily injury liability to register a vehicle. Roughly one in five Florida drivers carries no insurance at all, and many of the ones who do carry only the state minimum, with no bodily injury coverage to pay anyone they injure. Uninsured Motorist coverage is the policyholder's own protection against that reality, and Florida Statute § 627.727 forces every carrier to offer it at limits equal to the bodily injury liability on the policy unless the policyholder rejects it in writing on a strictly compliant form. Stacked coverage multiplies the limit by the number of insured vehicles for roughly a 20 percent premium difference. Hit-and-run claims require either physical contact or independent witness evidence. UIM claims require certified-mail notice to the UIM carrier of any settlement that would exhaust the at-fault driver's bodily injury limits, with a 30-day clock that decides subrogation rights. The single most important move for any Florida household is to match the UM limit to the bodily injury liability limit, keep stacking on, and confirm the dec page actually shows the coverage the household thought they bought. The cost of the upgrade is usually a few hundred dollars a year. The cost of the gap, after a single serious crash with an uninsured driver, is everything else.