Ontario Auto Insurance for Families: How the 2026 Changes Affect You

Since July 1, 2026, several accident benefits that used to be built into every Ontario auto policy are choices you make — or decline — at renewal, and the optional ones now cover only four groups: the named insured, their spouse, their dependants, and the drivers listed on the policy. For the parent reading the renewal package at the kitchen table, that turns the decision into two questions: which benefits the policy still carries, and whether everyone in the household is inside that group.

TopRates.ca is educational. Quotes are not offered or arranged on this site today. Nothing here is advice for your specific situation — it's the plain-English background to bring to a licensed insurance professional.

Under Ontario Regulation 383/24, which amends the Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule (SABS), only three accident benefits remain mandatory in every Ontario auto policy: medical, rehabilitation, and attendant care. Everything else became optional for policies entered into or renewed on or after July 1, 2026.

The newly optional list includes the benefits many families quietly rely on: income replacement, the non-earner benefit, caregiver benefits, housekeeping and home maintenance, and death and funeral benefits, along with several smaller ones. A few benefits — dependant care, indexation, and supplementary medical coverage — were already optional before the reform and remain available.

The mandatory medical limits themselves did not change: $3,500 for most minor injuries, $65,000 for non-catastrophic injuries, and $1,000,000 for catastrophic impairment, as set out in the SABS.

This is the part of the reform most likely to surprise families. Optional benefits apply only to four groups: the named insured, their spouse, their dependants, and the drivers listed on the policy.

For a household, that has two practical consequences. First, children generally remain covered as dependants. Second, a driving teen is only inside your optional coverage if they are actually listed on the policy — being a family member is not enough on its own.

Everyone outside those groups — a visiting relative who borrows the car, a neighbour's child in the carpool, a pedestrian or cyclist your vehicle strikes — still receives the mandatory medical, rehabilitation and attendant care benefits, but not the optional ones. Recovering lost income or similar losses would generally mean a legal claim against the at-fault driver.

Every household weighs this differently, but four of the newly optional benefits map directly onto family life. The dollar amounts below come from the SABS and were unchanged by the reform — what changed is that they are no longer automatic.

• Income replacement. If an earning parent can't work after a collision, this benefit replaces 70% of gross income up to $400 per week, with optional increases to $600, $800 or $1,000. Households where one income carries the mortgage feel its absence fastest.
• Non-earner benefit. Designed for people without a paycheque to replace — a stay-at-home parent or a student — it pays $185 per week after a four-week waiting period, for up to 104 weeks, where an injury causes a complete inability to carry on a normal life.
• Caregiver benefit. If the person who cares for your children or an elderly parent is injured, this pays $250 per week for the first person in need of care and $50 per week for each additional person. Under the standard policy it applies only to catastrophic impairment; optional coverage extends it to all injuries.
• Housekeeping and home maintenance. Up to $100 per week for household tasks an injured person can no longer do — again standard only for catastrophic impairment, with optional coverage extending it to all injuries.

Death and funeral benefits also moved to optional: $25,000 to a surviving spouse and $10,000 per dependant, plus up to $6,000 for a funeral, with optional higher amounts available. Dependant care — help paying for childcare while an injured parent recovers — was already optional before the reform and remains so.

The default depends on whether you're renewing or starting fresh. Existing policies renew with their current benefits carried over as optional coverage in the same amounts — they only disappear if you decline or reduce them in writing. Nothing is silently taken away.

A brand-new policy works the other way: it starts at the mandatory minimum unless optional benefits are actively added. Families setting up a first Ontario policy — including newcomers to Canada — start from the smaller baseline, not from the pre-2026 standard.

Before the reform, families typically claimed medical and rehabilitation costs through a workplace or private health plan first, with auto insurance paying afterward. For accidents on or after July 1, 2026, that order flips: the auto insurer pays first for medical and rehabilitation costs, with one exception — medication, where your health plan still pays first.

The practical effect is on how a claim is filed, not on whether coverage exists. It's worth knowing which insurer gets billed first before the receipts start arriving — and your workplace plan booklet is worth re-reading with this change in mind.

• Which optional benefits does our current policy carry into renewal, and what does each cost to keep?
• If either parent couldn't work for six months, what income would this household actually have?
• Who provides the care in this house — and who would pay for that care if they were the one injured?
• Is every regular driver, including a teen with a G2, listed on the policy?
• What does our workplace benefits plan already cover — and where does it stop?

A licensed insurance professional can walk through these against your actual policy. Both FSRA (Ontario's insurance regulator) and the Insurance Bureau of Canada have published consumer self-assessment checklists for exactly this decision.

For the full July 1, 2026 reform in one place, see the Ontario auto reform guide.