The Texas personal injury statute of limitations gives you two years from the date of your injury to file a lawsuit in most cases. That deadline is set by Section 16.003 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code, and courts enforce it strictly.1State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 16.003 – Two-Year Limitations Period Miss it by a day and your case is gone, no matter how serious the injuries. Several exceptions shorten or extend that window depending on who caused the harm, when you discovered it, and whether a government entity is involved.
The Two-Year Rule
For a car crash, a slip-and-fall, or most other accidents, the clock starts on the date the injury occurs. Hurt on March 15, 2026, and you must file your petition with the court by March 15, 2028.
Filing means getting the original petition on record with the appropriate Texas court. Handing paperwork to your lawyer or mailing a demand to an insurance company does not count. And filing alone isn’t enough. Texas courts also expect you to serve the defendant with reasonable diligence after filing. If you file on the last possible day and then wait months to serve the other side, a court can dismiss the case as though you never filed at all.
Wrongful Death and Survival Claims
When an injury causes death, the two-year deadline still applies, but the starting date shifts. A wrongful death claim brought by the surviving spouse, children, or parents runs from the date of death, not the date of the accident that caused it.1State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 16.003 – Two-Year Limitations Period That distinction matters when someone lingers in the hospital for weeks or months before dying.
A survival action is a separate claim filed by the deceased person’s estate to recover damages the injured person suffered between the accident and death, such as medical bills and pain during that period. The two-year clock for a survival action runs from the date of the original injury, not the date of death. Two different claims, two different accrual dates, and missing either one forfeits that claim permanently.
Medical Malpractice Deadlines Are Different
Healthcare liability claims follow their own rules under Chapter 74, and the differences trip up a lot of people. The period is still two years, but it runs from the date of the negligent act or the date the course of treatment ended, whichever is later.2State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 74.251 – Statute of Limitations on Health Care Liability Claims Children under 12 get extra time and have until their 14th birthday to file or have a claim filed for them. Chapter 74 explicitly overrides the general disability rules, so the usual minority extension doesn’t apply.
Before you can file, you must send a written notice of claim by certified mail to every physician or healthcare provider you intend to sue at least 60 days ahead of filing. That notice must include a signed authorization for release of your protected health information. A valid notice tolls the statute of limitations for 75 days, giving a brief cushion beyond the two-year mark.3State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 74.051 – Notice
There’s a catch. If a court later finds your authorization form was deficient, the tolling may not apply, and the lawsuit could be treated as untimely. The safer approach is to file within the original two-year window and treat the 75-day extension as a backup.
An absolute 10-year statute of repose caps healthcare liability claims. No matter when you discover the harm, you cannot file more than 10 years after the negligent act.2State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 74.251 – Statute of Limitations on Health Care Liability Claims The discovery rule cannot override that ceiling.
Claims Against a Government Entity
Suing a government body in Texas requires extra steps before you file. The Texas Tort Claims Act requires written notice of your claim to the governmental unit within six months of the incident.4State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 101.101 – Notice The notice must describe the injury, state when and where the incident happened, and identify what occurred. Miss that six-month window and the government keeps its sovereign immunity. The case is dead before it starts.
One safety valve exists. If the governmental unit already has actual knowledge that someone was injured, died, or had property damaged, the formal notice requirement doesn’t apply.4State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 101.101 – Notice Relying on that exception is risky, because you’ll have to prove what the government knew and when.
Individual cities can impose their own notice deadlines through their charters, and some are tighter than the state default. Houston’s charter requires written notice within 90 days of the injury.5City of Houston Legal Department. Filing a Claim Dallas requires written notice within six months for personal injury claims against the city, matching the state default but imposing its own formatting requirements.6City of Dallas. Notice of Claim If your claim involves a city, county, or other local government, check that entity’s charter for its specific deadline. Missing a notice window preserves the government’s immunity, and no amount of good-faith effort after the fact will revive the claim.
When the Deadline Moves
The Discovery Rule
Sometimes you don’t know you’ve been injured until long after the harm. Texas courts recognize a narrow exception called the discovery rule. Instead of starting the clock on the date of the incident, the two-year period begins when you discover the injury or when a reasonable person exercising ordinary diligence would have discovered it.
Courts apply this exception only when the injury is “inherently undiscoverable” at the time it happens. A broken bone from a car wreck is immediately obvious, so the discovery rule wouldn’t apply. A surgical instrument left inside your body or a slowly progressing toxic exposure might qualify. You have to show both that the injury was the type a reasonable person wouldn’t have noticed right away and that another party’s wrongful conduct caused it.
Latent occupational diseases are a classic example. Conditions like mesothelioma from asbestos exposure can take 20 to 50 years to develop symptoms. Under the discovery rule, the two-year clock starts when you’re diagnosed or when you reasonably should have connected your symptoms to the exposure.
The rule has limits. Once you have enough information to suspect something is wrong, the clock starts whether or not you’ve confirmed every detail. Ignoring symptoms or avoiding a doctor doesn’t pause the deadline. And the 10-year repose on medical malpractice sits above the discovery rule as a hard ceiling.
Minors and Persons of Unsound Mind
If you are under a legal disability when your cause of action accrues, the time of that disability is excluded from the limitations period. Texas defines legal disability as being younger than 18 (regardless of marital status) or being of unsound mind.7State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 16.001 – Effect of Disability For a child, the two-year clock doesn’t start running until their 18th birthday, giving them generally until age 20 to file.
Two limits apply. You cannot stack one disability onto another. A minor who is also of unsound mind doesn’t get to pause the clock for both conditions consecutively.7State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 16.001 – Effect of Disability And a disability that develops after the limitations period has already started running does not pause it. Injured at 19 and later incapacitated at 20, the clock keeps running from the date of injury.
Defendant’s Absence From Texas
If the person who injured you leaves Texas after your cause of action accrues, the time they spend out of state does not count toward the limitations period.8State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 16.063 – Temporary Absence From State A driver who causes an accident in Texas and then moves out of state for a year doesn’t consume that year of your deadline. The clock resumes when they return.
Hard Outer Deadlines: Statutes of Repose
A statute of repose works differently from a statute of limitations. Where a limitations period can be extended by tolling or the discovery rule, a statute of repose sets an absolute outer boundary that cannot be pushed back for any reason. Think of it as an expiration date on the claim itself.
Claims against licensed architects, engineers, interior designers, and landscape architects for injuries caused by defective construction must be filed within 10 years of the project’s substantial completion.9State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code 16.008 If you discover a defect and present a written claim within that 10-year window, you get an additional two years from the date of the claim to file suit. For claims brought by a governmental entity, the repose period is shorter at eight years. Residential construction has its own separate, shorter six-year statute of repose that applies to defect claims involving detached single-family homes and townhomes when the builder provides certain minimum written warranties.
Product liability claims face a 15-year statute of repose under Section 16.012, measured from the date the product was sold. Even if a manufacturing defect doesn’t cause injury until year 14, you still only have until year 15 to file. After that, the claim is extinguished regardless of when you discovered the problem.