Potholes have become a big talking point over the last few years, as road surfaces continue to fail quicker than councils can repair them.
Left for a long time, potholes can become much worse as weather conditions erode at the already open tarmac. For some, the resulting strikes can cause significant pothole damage to vehicles.
According to Blackcircles, only one in four pothole claims are successful. This means that 75% of drivers that see their vehicles damaged have to pay for repairs out of their own pockets. According to the supplier’s Pothole Report, around 20% of drivers spend at least £200 on pothole-related damages.
Increasing cost of pothole damage
The company spoke to people who had been impacted by pothole damage to find out first hand the cost of the pothole crisis. In addition, motoring experts have also commented on the importance of repairing any damage, before it gets worse, and makes the vehicle unroadworthy.
According to the Blackcircles report, 87% of drivers said that potholes were a problem in their area. However, 19% said they are rarely, or never fixed.
When it came to pothole damage, 11% of respondents said they spent up to £100 on damage, while 23% spent between £100 and £200 on repairs. A further 12% said pothole damage had caused up to £300 worth of work.
Blackcircles spoke to some drivers who had experienced pothole damage. Tom, 22, from Lincolnshire, spent around £300 repairing damage caused by a pothole on local country roads.
Tom was near a Lincolnshire village at night, “driving slowly because it was foggy”, when he hit the pothole and “heard a massive bang”. The pothole had “blown a hole in the tyre wall and cracked the alloy wheel,” resulting in almost £300 worth of damage – “£200 to replace the alloy wheel, and £90 for a new tyre”.
After the incident, Tom “contacted the council about [the pothole] and they had been aware of it for about a month. They did nothing about it until [he] contacted them about the incident and they filled it in the next day”. However, the council said Tom “couldn’t get paid out as the pothole wasn’t deemed dangerous and [he] would have to cover all the costs on his own.
For the aftermarket, pothole damage offers opportunity to help drivers with their vehicle repairs. Work includes wheel alignment, suspension and steering maintenance and tyre replacements, alongside other, more serious issues caused by the hardest of strikes. Educating drivers on the importance of these areas, so they know what to look for if they hit a pothole hard, can be key.
Spending varies
In addition the survey of drivers, Blackcircles also sent Freedom of Information requests to local authorities across the UK to reveal the areas reporting, and repairing, the most potholes.
This found that between 2021 and 2025, Aberdeen recorded the highest pothole rate in the UK, with 10,396 reports per 100km. However, Portsmouth recorded the lowest rate of reported potholes in the dataset, with just 223 reports per 100km of road.
When it comes to repairing potholes, Stoke-on-Trent spent the most, with £7.98 million per 100km. This was followed by Luton, with a spend of £5.83 million per 100km. This was in stark contrast to Brighton and Hove, which only spent £1.37 million per 100km, and Newport, with a spend of £1.08 million.
Ray Kavanagh, Blackcircles.com CEO, commented, “The scale of pothole reports in parts of the UK highlights how persistent the problem remains, and our findings show that drivers are feeling the impact, both financially and in terms of road safety.
Even relatively small potholes can cause issues if struck at speed. The most common pothole damage problems we see are tyre sidewall bulges, punctures, cracked alloy wheels and suspension misalignment. In some cases, the damage is not immediately visible but develops later as vibration, uneven tyre wear or steering pull.”
James Harding, a motoring specialist at Blackcircles with over 16 years of industry experience, added: “Reporting potholes can help them get repaired faster, saving other motorists from potential damage and hefty repair bills. Most local councils have a dedicated page on their website for reporting road faults, but because these pages are not uniform across the country, some are easier to find than others.”
