Statute of Limitations Checker
Every legal claim has a deadline. Pick your state and case type to see the general filing window — and, if you enter the incident date, your estimated last day to file before the claim is barred forever.
How this works
A statute of limitations is the legal clock on your right to sue. It generally starts the day the harm happened — or, in some cases, the day you discovered (or reasonably should have discovered) it — and runs for a fixed number of years set by your state. File one day late and the court will almost certainly throw the case out, regardless of the merits.
This checker uses the general personal-injury deadline for your state as a baseline, then adjusts it for the type of claim you select (for example, written contracts typically get a longer window than personal injury, while defamation is often shorter). If you enter an incident date, it simply adds that number of years to give an illustrative "file by" date and tells you roughly how much time is left.
Statute of limitations FAQs
It's the legal deadline for filing a lawsuit. The clock starts on a set date — usually when the harm occurred or was discovered — and runs for a fixed number of years. Once it expires, courts will almost always dismiss the case no matter how strong it is. Each state sets its own deadlines, which vary by claim type.
In nearly all cases, your claim is permanently barred. If you file late, the other side asks the court to dismiss — and judges routinely grant it, even for valid, well-documented claims. That's why confirming your exact deadline early, and filing with time to spare, matters so much.
Sometimes. The clock can be paused ("tolled") when the injured person is a minor or legally incapacitated, or moved by the "discovery rule" when an injury couldn't reasonably have been found right away. These exceptions are narrow and fact-specific — never assume one applies without legal advice.
Yes, and usually much stricter. Suing a government agency often requires a formal written notice of claim within a very short window — sometimes 30 to 180 days — well before the normal statute of limitations runs. Miss that notice and you can lose the right to sue at all.