If more than two years have passed since you were hurt in Texas, your claim may still be alive, but only if a recognized exception applies. Texas gives most injured people two years from the date of the injury to file a personal injury lawsuit under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.003. That deadline is strict, and courts enforce it. But the law also recognizes a handful of situations where the clock starts later than the injury date, pauses for a period of time, or does not run at all for a while. Those situations are narrow and fact-specific, and whether one fits your circumstances is something only a licensed attorney reviewing your actual facts can tell you.
How the two-year deadline normally works
Section 16.003 says a person must bring suit for personal injury not later than two years after the day the cause of action accrues. In most injury cases, the cause of action accrues on the day the injury happens. A car wreck on March 1 generally means a filing deadline of March 1 two years later.
Two points trip people up. First, the deadline is about filing a lawsuit in court, not about notifying an insurance company or opening a claim. Talking with an adjuster, sending medical records, or negotiating a settlement does not stop the clock. Second, if the deadline passes and no exception applies, the defendant can raise limitations as a defense and the case can be dismissed no matter how serious the injury or how clear the fault.
That is why the exceptions matter so much. They are not loopholes. They exist because the general rule would produce unfair results in specific, predictable situations.
Exceptions to the statute of limitations for Texas injury claims
Texas recognizes several categories of exceptions. Each works differently, and more than one can be in play at the same time.
Legal disability: minors and people with incapacity
Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.001 provides that if a person is under 18 or of unsound mind when the cause of action accrues, the period of that disability is not counted as part of the limitations period. In practical terms, for a child injured at age 10, the two-year clock generally does not begin until the child turns 18, which means a filing window that can extend to roughly age 20.
There are important wrinkles. A parent's own claims, like a claim for medical expenses the parent paid, may run on a different and earlier schedule than the child's claim. And some types of cases, notably health care liability claims, have their own special rules that limit how long a minor's deadline can be extended. The practical takeaway is that a minor's injury claim is often still viable years later, but it is not safe to assume the clock has stopped without checking.
The discovery rule
Normally the clock starts when the injury occurs, even if the injured person does not realize it right away. The discovery rule is a narrow exception that delays accrual until the injured person knew, or reasonably should have known, of the wrongful act and the resulting injury.
Texas courts apply this rule sparingly. It generally requires that the injury be both inherently undiscoverable and objectively verifiable. A surgical instrument left inside a patient is the classic example. A bruise that turns out to be worse than it looked is not, because the injury itself was apparent from the start. The rule is about not knowing you were injured at all, not about learning later that the injury was more severe or more expensive than you first thought.
Fraudulent concealment
If the party who caused the harm knew about the wrongdoing and actively hid it, Texas courts may prevent that party from using the limitations defense. This is an equitable doctrine, meaning it is about fairness and the defendant's conduct, not about a statutory extension. Silence alone usually is not enough. There generally must be a duty to disclose and some affirmative act or misrepresentation that kept the injured person from discovering the claim. Once the injured person learns the truth, or reasonably should have, the clock starts running.
Absence from the state and legal unavailability
Section 16.063 provides that the absence from Texas of a person against whom a claim exists tolls the limitations period during that absence. There is also tolling under Section 16.064 in certain situations where a case was filed in the wrong court and then refiled in the right one within a set window. These are technical provisions with real limits, and they turn on procedural details rather than on how the injury happened.
Death of a party
Texas law provides a limited tolling period when a person against whom a claim exists dies, to allow time for an estate representative to be appointed. This is a short window, not an open-ended extension.
Deadlines that are shorter, not longer
Searching for exceptions to the statute of limitations in a Texas injury case, it is easy to focus only on extensions and miss the deadlines that cut the other way. Some claims are governed by rules that require action well before the two-year mark.
- Claims against governmental units. The Texas Tort Claims Act requires formal written notice of a claim within a limited period after the incident, and some cities and other entities have charter or ordinance provisions requiring notice even sooner. Missing a notice deadline can end a claim while the two-year limitations period is still running.
- Health care liability claims. These claims carry their own notice requirement and expert report obligations under Chapter 74 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code. The sequence and timing matter.
- Contractual deadlines. Some insurance policies, including certain uninsured and underinsured motorist provisions, contain their own notice and suit requirements.
In other words, the two-year rule is a ceiling in many cases, not a target.
Why acting on a late claim is still worth doing promptly
If you believe an exception might apply, delay still hurts. Tolling and discovery arguments are factual arguments, and they depend on evidence: medical records showing when a condition was diagnosed, correspondence showing what a defendant said and when, documentation of a guardianship or incapacity, proof of someone's absence from the state. That evidence gets harder to gather as time passes. Witnesses move, records get purged, and memories fade.
There is also a procedural reality. When a case is filed after the two-year mark, limitations becomes a front-and-center issue that has to be addressed early, often before the merits of the injury claim get any attention at all. The stronger and better documented the tolling argument, the better positioned the claim is.
The bottom line
Texas sets a two-year deadline for personal injury lawsuits under Section 16.003 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code, and that deadline is enforced. But the two-year clock is not always measured from the day you got hurt. It can start later under the discovery rule, pause during a period of legal disability under Section 16.001, be unavailable to a defendant who fraudulently concealed the claim, or be tolled under provisions like Sections 16.063 and 16.064. At the same time, certain claims, especially those against governmental units and health care providers, carry notice deadlines that arrive much sooner than two years.
Whether an exception applies depends entirely on the specific facts and the specific type of claim. If the two-year mark has already passed, that does not automatically mean nothing can be done, and it does not mean something can. It means the question needs a real review by someone licensed to give that answer.
This article is general information about Texas law and is not legal advice. Laws change and every case is different. Talk to a licensed attorney about your situation.