Road traffic deaths

A road traffic death involves a person who died as a result of a road traffic accident on a public road in the Netherlands, involving at least one moving vehicle. The victim died within 30 days after the traffic accident.

A deceased person is not counted as a traffic death if:

• the accident occurred in a place that is not open to public traffic;
• the accident occurred on a section of train or tram tracks which is not part of the public highway and can only be used by trains or trams;
• the victim died 30 or more days after the accident;
• the victim died due to murder or manslaughter, or suicide;
• the victim showed no signs of life at birth, regardless of the duration of the pregnancy (stillborn child).

Of the 759 road traffic deaths in 2025, 47 persons were not registered in the Personal Records Database (BRP) in the Netherlands. These are mainly people who do not live in the Netherlands and were here for business or leisure.

For the year 2025, the calculation of annual traffic mortality in the Netherlands is based on data from three sources:

• medical cause-of-death certificates completed by an examining physician (forensic doctor) and dossiers at district public prosecutor’s offices; (responsible for handling criminal cases)
• the Rijkswaterstaat database extracted from police accident reports.

The data is available from 1996. Rijkswaterstaat, which is part of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management, holds series with figures from earlier years. These time series are based only on police accident reports.