For every collision involving a commercial vehicle, organizations now observe seven near-collisions — early warning signals that allow intervention before damage occurs, according to Motive’s 2026 AI Road Safety Report.

The analysis, based on AI-detected safety events captured across 1.2 billion hours of dashcam video from commercial drivers in the U.S., Mexico and Canada, found that driver behavior — not road conditions, mileage or external factors — is the primary predictor of collision risk.

The report arrives as preliminary 2025 data shows encouraging signs for risk managers. Severe collisions involving injuries, tow-aways and fatalities trended 9.5% lower year over year, with reported injuries down 7.7%, concentrated among long-haul, heavy-duty interstate fleets. Motive said.

Those findings align with National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data showing an 8.2% decrease in traffic fatalities in the first half of 2025 — the largest mid-year decline in more than a decade — even as Americans drove more than 12.1 billion additional miles.

Late-Night and Dusk Hours Carry Outsized Risk

Collision risk does not distribute evenly across the clock, according to the report. Motive found that risk peaks at 3 a.m., when collision rates are nearly three times higher than at midday. Additional spikes occur around midnight, 1 a.m. and between 6 and 7 a.m., when drowsiness risk rises sharply.

Since October 2025, when daylight saving time ended, collisions have been highest around 6 p.m. — roughly 2.4 times the midday rate — making dusk an increasingly dangerous period. January poses particular challenges, with shorter daylight, colder weather and post-holiday fatigue compounding risk for early-morning drivers, the report said.

“Evening and early-morning risk isn’t new. What’s new is how consistently it shows up across regions and industries,” said Hamish Woodrow, head of strategic analytics and data engineering at Motive. “Drowsiness has always been a leading indicator of collision risk, but it’s been one of the hardest to quantify until now.”

Distraction and Aggression Drive Collisions Across Geographies

Aggressive driving remains among the strongest predictors of commercial vehicle collisions, according to Motive. In October 2025 alone, drivers who experienced a collision were 25% more likely to hard corner or swerve lanes and 7% more likely to speed than those who avoided collisions, the report found. The data reinforces that incidents are rarely the result of a single mistake but instead follow an accumulation of risky behaviors over time.

Cellphone use ranked among the top five risky behaviors linked to collisions across all geographies studied, with violations spiking between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. — the same window when drowsiness increases and delivery volume peaks. Drivers in agriculture showed the highest rates of cellphone use among industries examined.

Smoking behind the wheel emerged as a persistent and often underestimated distraction source. Motive said. The report detected more than 1.3 million smoking events in 2025, averaging nearly 3,800 incidents per day.

State-Level Trends and Trade Patterns Shift the Risk Landscape

Commercial vehicle collision trends varied widely by state, Motive found. Florida saw a 42.6% reduction in collisions year over year, followed by North Carolina at 29.8% fewer and New Jersey down 24.8%. Some smaller states saw increases in collisions — Rhode Island rose 24.8% — though lower baseline volumes can amplify percentage changes, the report noted. In Rhode Island, no fatal collisions were reported despite the increase in total incidents.

Transportation and logistics fleets, despite driving the most miles, maintained the lowest overall collision rates — underscoring the report’s central finding that operating environment and behavior management matter more than distance traveled.