20th Annual Road Safety Performance Index (PIN Report)
In 2026 the ETSC Road Safety Performance Index (PIN) marks its twentieth anniversary. Over two decades it has become one of Europe’s most influential road safety tools, comparing performance across 31 participating countries. This 20th annual report assesses progress towards the EU’s goal of halving both road deaths and serious injuries between 2020 and 2030, and reviews the recent EU policy developments that will help determine whether that goal is met.
Progress on road deaths remains far too slow
In 2025, around 19,500 people lost their lives on roads in the EU, while more than 100,000 are estimated to have been seriously injured. Road deaths in the EU have fallen by just 2% in the last year, and by 15% since 2019. To reach the 2030 target, a cumulative reduction of at least 31% from 2019 was needed by now, actual progress was just 15%.
Poland leads progress between 2019 and 2025 with a 43% reduction in road deaths, followed by Denmark with 32%. Norway and Sweden remain the safest countries for road users, each with 19 deaths per million inhabitants, closely followed by Denmark with 23, against an EU average of 43.
The 2026 ETSC Road Safety Performance Index Award, which recognises sustained long-term improvement, was presented to Denmark.
Even slow progress carries enormous value. Between 2016 and 2025, more than 31,000 deaths were prevented in EU PIN countries compared with what would have happened had deaths continued at their 2015 level – human losses avoided are worth an estimated €77 billion. Had the annual reduction needed to meet the target been achieved, a further 42,900 lives could have been saved.
Serious injuries: little progress and persistent data gaps
Progress on serious injuries has been even weaker. Using national definitions, serious road traffic injuries in the EU fell by only 13% over the period 2015–2025, and the annual rate of reduction continues to lag behind that for deaths. The European Commission’s latest estimate, based on the common MAIS3+ definition, puts the number of seriously injured on EU roads at 100,000 in 2023, down from 110,000 in 2019. Comparison between countries remains impracticable because national definitions, data collection methods and levels of underreporting differ widely, and underreporting is consistently worse for pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists. Improving and harmonising serious injury data – and setting reduction targets for it – remains a central priority.
A deregulatory trend in the EU threatens progress
The PIN programme was set up to hold national governments and the EU to account on their efforts to improve road safety, and to track progress against their agreed targets.
At EU level, the Commission’s February 2026 mid-point review of the EU Road Safety Policy Framework offers an honest assessment that progress is too slow. Meanwhile, a series of legislative decisions now under negotiation risk undermining the 2030 targets: expanding cross-border routes of longer and heavier lorries, watering down proposed vehicle testing rules and freezing the safety standards of a new class of small electric vehicles for a decade.
ETSC is also warning against accepting weaker US vehicle safety standards in trade talks and urging caution over “hands-off” assisted-driving systems that automate more of the task while leaving the driver legally responsible. Securing proper road safety funding in the next EU budget (2028–2034) will be essential to future progress.
Encouraging momentum from national government action
Thanks, in part, to the work of the PIN programme and its experts, most PIN countries are now setting a clear framework for action: 26 of the 31 have a national road safety strategy in place, the majority aligned to the EU’s goal of halving deaths and serious injuries by 2030 as compared to 2020. The United Kingdom published a new strategy for Great Britain in 2026 – its first in over a decade – committing to a 65% reduction in people killed or seriously injured by 2035.
Several governments also strengthened the law and stepped-up enforcement: Belgium brought in an immediate 14-day driving ban for drink-driving or handheld mobile phone use, and Lithuania halved its drink-driving deaths between 2020 and 2024 through tougher penalties and the wider use of contactless breathalyser devices. With no KPI targets yet set at EU level, several countries have gone ahead and set their own.
The collective goal of halving road deaths and serious injuries by 2030, while ambitious, remains both necessary and achievable. Two decades of PIN data show that progress is possible where governments act with determination – and that it stalls when attention slips.
Meeting the targets will require national governments and the EU to redouble their efforts and their budgets and resist any rollback of established safety protections. As it has for twenty years, the PIN programme will continue to track that progress and hold decision-makers to account.