Car insurance calculator Canada.

Our car insurance estimator tool will ask you questions in the following three categories:

1. Vehicle information
2. Driver information
3. Discount information

The key to finding savings with our vehicle insurance calculator is to ensure the answers to these questions are accurate. It helps to be prepared before you apply for a quote. Below, we’ll walk you through how to answer the questions in each section so that you find the most savings and the lowest car insurance rate.

The first part of the calculation process asks for basic information about your vehicle.

Insurance companies can gauge how much it will cost to repair a car based on its make and model. Insurance companies can also predict the likelihood your car will be written off as a total loss.

Any time you apply for a car insurance policy, you will be asked about the car you want to insure. Here’s what you’ll be asked:

• Vehicle year
• Vehicle make
• Vehicle model
• Whether the vehicle is leased
• Vehicle purchase date
• If you car has winter tires
• Where the car is parked overnight
• The primary use of this vehicle
• How number of kilometers are driven to work or school one way (each day)
• The total kilometers driven each year
• Whether you would like your insurance to include comprehensive and/or collision coverage

Tips on how to answer these questions

1) Make sure you know the make and model name of your car. That includes the trim and body style of the car.

• Make and model names can be found near the back bumper or in your owner’s manual.
• Trim is usually designated by letters or numbers after the model name. Some common ones are: DX, LS, or a series, like 300 or 500. This information is also usually displayed on the back of the car. It can also be found in the drivers’ manual.
• Body style refers to the type of car you have: coupe, sedan, hatchback, wagon, SUV or CUV.

2) Many people don’t know how many kilometres they drive each day. A quick way to figure out your daily mileage is to calculate your daily commute using Google maps, which will show you the distance between your home and your workplace. You only need to state the distance you drive one-way. Based on your answer, our calculator will automatically tell you what your annual mileage is.

3) Two things you should know about our calculator:

• If you’re buying a car that’s the current model year, we include comprehensive and collision coverages automatically.
• For any car older than the current year, our calculator assumes that you only want to buy the mandatory minimum coverage required in your province. However, you may actually need more coverage than the minimum. For example, you may want to increase your accident benefit to minimize the amount you need to pay out-of-pocket if you are ever injured in an accident.

By comparison, excluding comprehensive or collision car insurance while using our calculator will lower your monthly premium. However, these coverages may be a good idea especially if you’re driving a valuable car that you cannot afford to repair or replace out of pocket.

Bonus savings tip: Car insurance companies award discounts to drivers who install snow tires during the winter. You can save up to 5% per year.

The second part of our car insurance calculator asks you to enter some details about yourself — the driver of the car that’s going to be insured. This is important because insurance companies rely on demographic data to calculate risk probabilities. That’s a fancy way of saying that insurance companies need to figure out who is the most likely to get into an accident and file a claim — which the insurance company will need to pay.

You’ll be asked to enter:

• Your name
• Your date of birth
• Your gender
• Your marital status
• Your employment status
• Your licence level and the date which you were first licenced
• Whether you’ve ever had your licence suspended within the past three years
• Whether you’ve ever been at-fault for a car accident
• Whether you’ve ever had any traffic tickets within the past three years

If a second person is going to be driving the car as well, our form lets you add a secondary driver. Just click the ‘Add Driver’ tab near the top of the page. We will need these details about their driving history as well.

Tips on how to answer these questions:

• Being at-fault includes scenarios where you were found to be partially at-fault. So, if your insurance company determined that you were, for example, 50% to blame for a car accident, you need to check ‘yes.’ There isn’t an expiration date on these, either. If you’ve ever been found at-fault, you need to answer ‘yes.’ The insurance company will verify that you’ve answered these questions truthfully.
• Traffic tickets refer to tickets for speeding, running red lights, careless driving, and more. Parking tickets don’t count as a traffic ticket. Insurance companies or brokers will call on historical reports to confirm this information.

Finally, we’ll ask you some questions to see if you qualify for additional discounts. Discounts can help lower your car insurance premium quotes and really help you save. Be prepared to answer the following:

• Whether you plan on insuring multiple policies (e.g. home, tenant, or condo insurance) with the same company (up to a 10-15% discount)
• Whether you’re a member of Costco or CAA (up to a 20% discount).

Bonus savings tips: There are many more discounts available to drivers than we can include in our form. Examples include: seniors’ discounts, grade point average (GPA) discounts, alumni discounts, trade discounts, and more. Talk to your agent or broker about these or any other discounts you may qualify for.

• If you plan on sticking with your current insurance company for your home or tenants’ coverage, don’t check this box. By checking this box, your quotes will be reduced by about 10-15%, but it isn’t final. Your insurance company will have to ask you questions about your home and determine the likelihood of you needing to file a home insurance claim. By and large, home and tenants insurance is less expensive than car insurance.
• If you’re not yet a member of CAA or Costco but are thinking about joining now that you know about the discount, check the box anyway. To qualify for this discount, just let your broker or agent know that you have not yet applied for CAA or Costco membership but will join before the policy is activated.

There are a number of factors that determine the monthly cost of car insurance. When deciding on the appropriate price, insurance companies look at the likelihood that you’ll make a claim and the potential loss amount.

That’s why we ask for details about your driving habits and your insurance history, the make and model of your car, as well as how old you are. Your answers will determine how much you pay.

Never lie to an insurance company for the sake of scoring a lower rate. It will backfire and may even result in you losing your insurance altogether (as well as having to pay a claim out of pocket).

Here are the most important factors that influence your premium and why we need to ask for this information.

• Your mileage: The amount you drive every day has a large impact on your auto insurance costs. Someone who drives 30 to 45 minutes each way to work will pay more for car insurance than someone who uses public transit to commute and only uses their car to run errands on weekends. Our car insurance premium calculator will automatically generate the number of kilometers you travel annually.
   
• Your postal code: Insurance companies determine your rates based on the postal code you live in. Insurance companies only use the first three characters of a postal code — also known as the forward sorting area (FSA) — to group customers. If an insurance company sees that it has a high volume of customers who make claims within an FSA, they will charge all their customers within that area a little more for car insurance. That’s why you might find yourself paying higher rates than people living in the next FSA over.
   
• Your driving record: Your driving history is another factor that will heavily impact your car insurance premium. Someone with an accident or multiple tickets on their record will pay more for insurance than someone with a clean record because they’ll be deemed higher risk.
   
• Your age: Unfortunately, the younger you are, the more you’ll pay for car insurance. This is because you’re considered a high-risk driver until you’ve built up a driving history to demonstrate the opposite. There isn’t much you can do about this, but at least you’re not alone. Young people across Canada pay higher auto insurance rates than the more experienced drivers they share the road with. However, it’s possible for twenty-something and teenage drivers to use our car insurance calculator/quoter to find sizeable savings. The more you’re expected to pay, the more dramatic the savings when you compare rates.
   
• Your gender: Insurance actuaries (the statistics and math whizzes that help insurance companies create policies) have found that there is a strong correlation between being a man and being at a higher risk of being involved in a car accident. Unfortunately, as a result, men pay higher insurance premiums than women. However, the gulf isn’t too wide, especially if you’re more than 25 years old.
   
• Your policy: If you purchase more coverage than the minimum requirement, you’ll pay more for car insurance. Many people don't buy enough medical, rehab and liability insurance. Being underinsured could cost you hundreds of thousands — even millions — of dollars, so the additional protection can save you money in the long-run. Our car insurance calculator doesn’t quote all the additional medical coverages available, so it’s important to bring this topic up with an insurance advisor.
   

If you’re looking to insure a newer car, it might be a good idea to purchase collision and/or comprehensive insurance. Both types of coverage will help pay for repairs, or even a replacement car, since most people cannot afford to pay for a new car out-of-pocket. If our calculator detects that you are looking to insure a current model year car, it will automatically add collision and comprehensive coverage to your quote.

Different provinces take different approaches to car insurance. It’s best to check which car insurance coverages are mandatory in your province. However, there are some coverage requirements that are consistent across the provinces.

Third-party liability insurance is mandatory throughout Canada. It covers damages caused to another person or vehicle in an accident. Damages include medical bills, lost earnings, legal fees, and other expenses.

Accident benefits/bodily injury insurance covers the cost of your own medical expenses and loss of income when you're in a car accident. In Quebec, accident benefits are already provided by the province. Payment is included in the fees you pay for driver’s licence registration.

Comprehensive insurance

This type of auto insurance covers damages resulting from incidents other than car accidents or collisions. Comprehensive coverage includes protection from hazards like extreme weather, vandalism, falling objects, fire, theft, and flooding.

Collision insurance

Collision insurance covers damage to your car in the event of a vehicle rollover or a collision with another vehicle or object. If your car is totalled, collision insurance will pay the cost of replacing it.

Uninsured motorist coverage

Covers costs related to your injury or death after an accident caused by another driver who is either uninsured or unidentified, as in the case of a hit-and-run driver. Keep in mind that this coverage only pays for damage to your vehicle if the uninsured driver is also identified.