Key Takeaways
- TRIR stands for Total Recordable Incident Rate.
- TRIR is calculated as (number of recordable incidents × 200,000) ÷ total hours worked.
- TRIR varies from one industry to the next. The recordable case rate for private industry was 2.3 per 100 full-time workers in 2024, but you should benchmark against your own NAICS code, not a cross-industry average.
- On multi-employer sites, subcontractor data is the single biggest source of TRIR error.
- TRIR is a lagging indicator. Pair it with leading indicators like training completion and pre-task plan quality to see the full picture of a company’s safety.
Why TRIR Matters, and Why It’s Hard to Get Right
Safety metrics only matter if they change behaviors and lower risk on-site. The Total Recordable Incident Rate is one of the most common metrics used in accomplishing those goals. A low, well-understood TRIR helps you dodge the downtime and disruption that follow a workplace injury, and it’s the number owners, insurers, and regulators tend to look at first.
Before you can lower it, though, you have to measure it right.
That’s harder than it sounds on a multi-employer site. When half the workforce answers to other companies, getting clean TRIR data turns into a constant chase across spreadsheets, emails, and OSHA 300 logs. Knowing what a good TRIR looks like, how to calculate it across subs, and how to actually bring it down is what turns a confusing metric into a tool you can use.
What TRIR Measures (and What It Doesn’t)
TRIR is one of the most widely used safety metrics because it boils safety down to a single equation that companies and regulators can compare across industries. It’s a lagging indicator: it measures incidents that already happened, so it tells you where you’ve been, not where you are right now. It also misses two things worth remembering: near misses and the severity of any single incident.
How to Calculate TRIR
TRIR = (number of recordable incidents × 200,000) ÷ total hours worked
Why OSHA Uses 200,000 Hours
The 200,000 constant is the number of hours 100 employees work over a year, assuming 40 hours a week across 50 weeks (that is, 100 workers putting in 2,000 hours each). Building that figure into the formula standardizes the rate across companies of wildly different sizes, so a 30-person outfit and a 3,000-person one can be measured on the same scale.
A Worked Example
One paving contractor logged 3 recordable incidents in a year across a crew of 150 that worked 300,000 hours (excluding vacation and sick time). Run the numbers:
(3 × 200,000) ÷ 300,000 = a TRIR of 2.0
To judge that 2.0, you’d compare it against the average for your NAICS code, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes by industry. As a broad reference point, the private-industry average was 2.3 per 100 workers in 2024, so a 2.0 is a solid result.
What Counts as a Recordable Incident
OSHA counts an incident as recordable when it results in any of the following:
- Death
- Days away from work
- Restricted work or transfer to another job
- Medical treatment beyond first aid
- Loss of consciousness
- A significant injury or illness diagnosed by a licensed health care professional
Severity is often what tips an incident from first-aid-only into recordable. A few examples make the line clearer:
- Recordable: A worker falls from the top of a ladder and loses consciousness.
- Not recordable: A worker slips off a low rung, picks up a minor bruise, and keeps working.
- Recordable: A worker takes a deep laceration from a tool and goes to the ER for stitches.
- Not recordable: A worker gets a small cut and returns to normal duties after a bandage.
What Is a Good TRIR Score?
There’s no single TRIR that counts as “good” across the board. Comparing two companies in unrelated industries paints a misleading picture of either one.
Trades are classified under the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), and each is benchmarked separately so companies are measured against their real peers. To find a fair target for your company, pull the industry injury and illness rates from BLS for your NAICS code. As a rule of thumb, a good score is at or below the average for your industry.
TRIR vs. DART, EMR, and the OSHA Recordable Rate
A few related metrics travel alongside TRIR, and together they give a fuller read on a company’s safety.
- Days Away, Restricted, or Transferred (DART): measures the more serious cases, the ones that cost days away, restricted duty, or a job transfer. DART = (number of DART cases × 200,000) ÷ total hours worked.
- Experience Modification Rate (EMR): an insurance pricing multiplier that compares your workers’ compensation claims to what’s expected for a company your size in your industry. It’s built partly on your incident history.
- OSHA recordable rate: just another name for TRIR. Some companies use the terms interchangeably.
TRIR vs. DART
Think of DART as a subset of TRIR. TRIR counts every recordable; DART counts only the serious ones. An injury that costs several days off work lands in both. An injury that needs stitches but no time off counts toward TRIR but not DART.
EMR vs. TRIR
Insurers calculate EMR from your claims history to set your workers’ comp rates. TRIR feeds into that story: a higher incident rate generally means higher claims costs, which can push your premiums up. For a closer look at how your safety data shapes that number, see our guide to defending your EMR rate.
TRIR vs. the OSHA Recordable Rate
Same metric, different name. Whether someone says “TRIR” or “OSHA recordable rate,” they’re talking about the same figure.
The Subcontractor Problem: Calculating TRIR Across a Fragmented Workforce
General contractors often end up with incomplete TRIR numbers because tracking another company’s incident data is hard. Pulling it together from each sub’s spreadsheets, emails, and OSHA 300 logs is a manual grind, and even once it’s collected, keeping it in one consistent format is its own headache.
That’s the problem a Contractor Scorecard is built to solve. It gives GCs a live view of each sub’s recordable incidents and leading indicators in one place, so subcontractor TRIR sits alongside every other trade instead of scattered across inboxes. It also drives more consistent pre-task plan (PTP) and hazard-reporting quality across subs, which improves the accuracy of the underlying data over time.
How to Actually Lower Your TRIR
Because TRIR only counts incidents that already happened, it moves after your safety improves, not before. To change the number, work on the leading indicators that shape it: PTP quality, hazard reporting rates, and corrective action closure. Those track what’s happening on site right now, before it becomes a recordable.
That’s where Flex PTP fits in. It uses photo capture and AI quality-scoring of pre-task plans to surface hazards before they turn into recordable incidents, and tracking near misses and observations alongside it builds a fuller picture of site safety. From there, you can flag the crews with weak hazard identification and step in early, without micromanaging every trade.
For more on measuring plan quality, see our guide to PTP quality scores.
Turning TRIR Into a Tool, Not Just a Number
TRIR is one of your better tools for spotting and heading off the incidents that drive injuries, lost productivity, higher insurance costs, and added regulatory attention. But it’s only as reliable as the data behind it. If pulling TRIR from a dozen subcontractors feels like chasing paperwork every quarter, a Contractor Scorecard keeps that data current so the number you report is one you can actually trust.
Request a demo to see how Safety Mojo works across a multi-sub site.
FAQ
How is TRIR calculated?
Multiply your number of recordable incidents by 200,000, then divide by the total hours worked (excluding sick and vacation time): (number of recordable incidents × 200,000) ÷ total hours worked. Recordable incidents are defined by OSHA’s recordkeeping rule, 29 CFR 1904.7.
What is a good TRIR score?
There’s no universal scale. Most companies treat a good score as anything at or below the average for their industry, which you can find in the BLS industry injury and illness rates for your NAICS code. A score above your industry average is a sign to dig in.
Why is TRIR based on 200,000?
200,000 is the number of hours 100 employees work in a year at 2,000 hours each. OSHA uses it to standardize the rate across companies of different sizes.
Is TRIR the same as the OSHA recordable rate?
Yes. The two terms refer to the same figure. You’ll also see it called the recordable incident rate (RIR) or the total recordable injury rate, all describing the same thing.
