California's Two-Year Personal Injury Deadline (and the Six-Month One Most People Miss)

If you have been injured in California and someone else may be at fault, the most important number on your calendar is the deadline to file. Miss it and the case generally goes away, no matter how strong the underlying facts are.

Two deadlines come up most often. They are very different.

The two-year rule for most personal-injury claims

For most personal-injury matters in California — car collisions, slip-and-falls on private property, dog bites, and similar negligence claims — the deadline to file a lawsuit is two years from the date of the injury. That is set by Code of Civil Procedure § 335.1.

Two years feels like a long runway. In practice, it gets eaten quickly. Investigators need to interview witnesses while memories are fresh. Medical providers need time to document the injury and treat it through to a stable baseline. Insurance companies often spend months evaluating, then come back with low offers that have to be negotiated, then eventually denied. Filing on day 729 is risky even when the facts are clean.

There are exceptions that can shorten or lengthen the period — for example, claims involving minors, claims that were not reasonably discoverable until later, claims for medical malpractice (which has its own one-year-from-discovery rule and a separate three-year outer limit), and so on. The general rule is two years; the exceptions are the reason a careful evaluation matters early.

The six-month rule when a public entity may be at fault

If the at-fault party is a city, county, school district, transit agency, or any other California public entity, the timeline is dramatically shorter. Before you can sue a public entity, the Government Claims Act generally requires a written claim to be presented to the entity within six months of the incident (Government Code § 911.2).

That presentation is not a lawsuit. It is a separate, formal filing that has to identify the claimant, the date and place of the incident, the circumstances, the injuries, and the amount sought. If the entity rejects the claim, you then generally have six months from the rejection to file a lawsuit. If the claim was filed late or in the wrong form, the right to sue may be lost altogether unless you obtain leave to file a late claim.

Several types of cases routinely involve a public entity:

• A collision with a city bus, school bus, or government vehicle
• A slip-and-fall in a public building, on a sidewalk, or in a public park
• An incident involving a public hospital, jail, or transit station
• A dangerous-condition claim against a public roadway or trail

If there is any chance a public entity is involved — even partially — the safer assumption is that the six-month clock is running.

Why "I'll deal with it later" is the wrong instinct

Putting off the legal side after an injury is human. People want to see how they feel, see what the insurance company offers, see if the bills come together on their own. That is fine for a couple of weeks. After that, the gap between the injury and any preserved evidence keeps growing, and so does the risk that a critical deadline is missed without the client realizing it.

The earlier the firm sees a matter, the more it can do. Photos can be taken before scenes are repaired. Surveillance video can be requested before retention windows expire (some are as short as 30 days). Witnesses can be reached before they move or forget. Government claims can be presented well within the six-month window so the formal lawsuit is preserved.

If you have been hurt in California and are not sure which deadline applies, please contact the firm for a no-cost consultation. The deadline analysis is part of the initial review and does not commit you to anything.

The deadlines on this page are the general rules. Several exceptions can apply. Nothing here is legal advice and nothing here creates an attorney-client relationship.