Car insurance groups explained

Car insurance groups help insurers calculate how much your car insurance should cost – but they are only a guideline established when the car is first designed. Underwriters (the experts that work out the risk and cost of claims) may identify trends with a particular car, and its insurance could be higher or lower than the group suggests. If a car in a higher grouping appeals to you, it’s still worth getting an insurance quote.

There are 50 car insurance groups and the higher the group, the more expensive the car is to insure.

The Association of British Insurers (ABI) gets 70 per cent of the information it uses to determine insurance groups from Thatcham Research, an automotive research centre.

Find out more about how car insurance is calculated here.

Thatcham uses a 15km/h impact test before its engineers determine the costs and time involved in returning the car to its pre-accident condition.

Thatcham will also look at the car’s new model price in the event of a total loss claim, its performance from 0-60mph and top speed, along with standard security levels.

The last test is a parts pricing one where the cost of replacements of a standard list of 23 parts (the most commonly damaged in accidents) is calculated.

All this is collated before the Group Rating Panel assigns the new car an insurance group based on its findings.

Cars are also assigned letters which indicate the security and anti-theft performance. You will almost always see an E for this, meaning in exceeds requirements and has been placed in a lower group as a result, but you may find some specialist cars with an A or U. A means the security is acceptable, and U means it is unacceptable and the car has been placed in a higher group.

You can find out your car insurance group by looking at Parkers.co.uk specifications, checking the brochure or asking your dealer.

The cheapest car insurance groups are one to five, though many cars in groups up to 15E may be surprisingly affordable for young drivers if they are safe and not sporty. For older drivers, the insurance group may be less of a concern than where you live and if you keep the car parked on the road.

Not all insurers use the insurance groups that are decided on by the Group Rating Panel but they will use their own version of the rating system. Some insurers may use as many as 100 groups internally, and they don’t always correlate with the published rating.

Vans also have insurance groups, though insuring a van for private use has other risk factors such as the type of cargo you are carrying.

Find out more about van insurance groups here.

An insurance group rating makes it easier for your insurer to determine how much your vehicle will cost to insure.

The test by Thatcham tell the Group Rating Panel how much it will cost to replace or repair your car in the event of an accident as well as looking at performance factors that could increase the chances of theft or of an accident.

But an insurance group looks only at your car, not the person driving it, so while your car could be in a low and affordable insurance group, your insurance could still be expensive.

Insurance groups look just at your vehicle, not where they park, where they’re driven or who is driving them.

That means that while they impact the cost of your insurance premium, they are not the only factor at play.

You can read our guide on how car insurance is calculated if you want to know the ins and outs.

While we can’t help you with the insurance group of your car, that is what it is, we can help you find an insurance quote that’s right for you and your wallet – compare insurance quotes with over 50 providers either online or over the phone.