There were 51.5 million licensed drivers aged 65 and older in the United States in 2022, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a 40 percent increase from 2013. Older drivers grew far faster than the licensed population as a whole: total licensed drivers rose 11 percent over the same stretch, and older drivers rose from 17 percent of all licensed drivers to 22 percent. The numbers describe a country where driving has become a normal part of later life.
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The figures come from NHTSA’s Traffic Safety Facts report on the older population, covering 2022 data. The comparison point is 2013, which the agency’s own wording calls 10 years earlier.
The 51.5 million drivers in NHTSA’s 2022 data
The publication, Traffic Safety Facts: Older Population, 2022 Data (DOT HS 813 616), defines older people as those 65 and older across population, drivers, occupants and nonoccupants. Its licensed-driver counts come from the Federal Highway Administration, whose licensed driver tables break drivers out by sex and age. The report does not itself define what counts as a licensed driver.
Read against population, the growth in licensed older drivers is partly demographic. NHTSA reports that 57.8 million people were 65 and older in 2022, or 17 percent of the total population, and that the group grew 29 percent from 2013 to 2022 while the total population grew 5 percent. Licensed older drivers grew faster still, at 40 percent, which means the pool of older people holding licenses expanded more quickly than the number of older people overall. Growth of 33 percent for older males and 27 percent for older females shows the male group expanding faster in population terms.
Set side by side, the two headline figures in the report show how common licensing is in this age group. NHTSA counts 51.5 million licensed drivers 65 and older against 57.8 million people in that age range, which works out to about nine licensed drivers for every ten older people. The comparison joins counts from two different agencies, the Federal Highway Administration for drivers and the Census Bureau for population, so it is a rough ratio rather than an official licensing rate.
Why older drivers are now a larger share of the road
The share arithmetic is where the shift is easiest to see. In 2013, drivers 65 and older were 17 percent of everyone licensed to drive. By 2022 they were 22 percent, so roughly one licensed driver in five was in the older group. A rise of five percentage points in the share of a population that numbers in the hundreds of millions reflects a large absolute change, and it moves traffic-safety questions that were once niche into the mainstream of road planning, vehicle design and licensing policy.
NHTSA’s older drivers page carries the more recent population figure: about 61.2 million Americans were 65 or older in 2024, a 28 percent increase since 2015. The page also states the agency’s position on age and ability in plain terms, that decisions about whether a person should keep driving should never be made on age alone, while acknowledging that changes in vision, physical fitness and reflexes can still raise safety concerns.
Daytime driving, restraint use and the safety picture around the number
The same report adds context on how older drivers use the road. Most traffic fatalities in crashes involving older drivers in 2022 happened during the daytime, at 72 percent, compared with 46 percent for all traffic fatalities. The gap shows that the timing of fatal crashes involving older drivers differs from the pattern across all traffic fatalities, though the report does not say how much of the difference reflects when older people choose to drive.
Among passenger-vehicle occupants 65 and older who were killed in crashes where restraint use was known, 69 percent were restrained. The figure is about the occupants who died, not about older drivers in general, and it says nothing by itself about how often older drivers buckle up on trips that end safely.
For anyone using the 51.5 million figure, the data year is the detail to keep straight. The count is for 2022, published in NHTSA’s 2022 data edition, and the agency’s newer page already cites a larger older population for 2024. Newer licensed-driver counts will follow in later Traffic Safety Facts editions, and each should be read against its own data year rather than blended with the 2022 figure.
The practical side is handled by licensing rules and by resources aimed at families. NHTSA keeps a summary of key provisions of state laws on older driver licensing, since renewal intervals, vision tests and in-person requirements vary by state, and it points families to the guide Driving Safely While Aging Gracefully, produced with the USAA Educational Foundation and AARP. A population of 51.5 million licensed older drivers is large enough that the details of those state rules reach millions of households.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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