General Liability vs. Workers’ Compensation: What’s the Difference?
Most businesses need general liability insurance. If you have employees, you probably need workers' comp too.
Many, or all, of the products featured on this page are from our advertising partners who compensate us when you take certain actions on our website or click to take an action on their website. However, this does not influence our evaluations. Our opinions are our own. Here is a list of our partners and here's how we make money.
Updated · 2 min read
Written by
Lead Writer & Content Strategist 
Edited by
Senior Editor & Content Strategist 
Co-written by
Lead Writer & Content Strategist 
General liability insurance protects your business against claims that you injured someone else, like a customer or passerby. Workers' compensation pays out when an employee gets injured on the job.
Many small businesses need both general liability and workers’ compensation insurance.
Save up to 30% on business insurance
NerdWallet Small Business helps you get real-time quotes from 30+ insurers, and instant access to your Certificate of Insurance (COI) through our partner, Coverdash.
What is general liability insurance?
General liability insurance deals with accidents and property damage involving nonemployees and customers.
What it covers
- Third-party bodily injury: Imagine that someone not affiliated with your business, like a customer or vendor, gets hurt or experiences emotional distress due to your services, operations or employees. General liability insurance can pay for legal fees or settlement costs if they sue your business.
- Third-party medical expenses: In one of the cases above, say the injured person seeks medical attention. General liability insurance can help cover their bills.
- Third-party property damage: Say a customer or client's property is damaged by an employee on your business premises or at a job site. General liability insurance pays to repair or replace it.
- Personal and advertising injury: This covers your company in case of libel, slander or copyright infringement allegations.
What it doesn't cover
- Employee injury: General liability insurance covers a business when there’s a third-party injury, but not when an employee hurts themselves while working. That’s where workers’ comp comes in.
- Liquor liability: If your business sells alcohol and a customer becomes intoxicated and hurts themselves or others, liquor liability insurance will protect the business’s finances. You'll need liquor liability insurance for that.
- Professional liability: General liability insurance doesn't cover claims that your business made a mistake that caused financial damage to a client. If you offer professional services, you’ll need professional liability insurance to protect you against claims of errors, malpractice and negligence.
- Product liability: Sometimes, general liability policies include some product liability insurance. This helps protect your business if your product leads to third-party injury or property damage. But if you design, manufacture, sell or distribute products, you should consider buying a separate and more robust product liability insurance policy.
What is workers' comp insurance?
Businesses need workers’ comp in case an employee experiences a work-related illness or injury. It’s often required by law. Click here to learn about your state's workers' comp requirements.
What it covers
- Work-related employee injury: This includes injuries that happen on-premises and off-premises, as long as the employee is acting within the scope of their employment. Depending on the state, workers' comp may also cover psychological injury, like PTSD and work-related stress.
- Work-related employee illness: This is when an employee gets sick because they were exposed to something toxic or harmful at work. It also includes occupational diseases.
- Employee injury due to vehicle accidents during work: An employee must be driving for work purposes only. This includes driving from one worksite to another, but not driving to or from home.
- Employee injury due to workplace violence.
- Employee injury at the workplace due to natural disasters.
What it excludes
- Car accidents driving to and from work.
- An employee intentionally injuring himself.
- Employee injury that happens because the employee is intoxicated.
- Employee injury that happens when the worker isn't following documented company procedures.
Save up to 30% on business insurance
NerdWallet Small Business helps you get real-time quotes from 30+ insurers, and instant access to your Certificate of Insurance (COI) through our partner, Coverdash.
What’s the difference between workers’ comp and general liability?
General liability deals with accidents involving non-employees and customers, whereas workers’ comp helps manage risk among employees on the job. Workers' comp is often required by law. Landlords or business partners might require you to have general liability insurance, but the law usually doesn't.
Here are some examples of what each type of insurance covers:
| Scenario | Type of insurance |
|---|---|
| An employee who works remotely from their computer develops carpal tunnel syndrome. The issue surfaced during the course of their employment. | Workers’ comp |
| A competitor claims that your business stole its name. | General liability |
| An employee was moving equipment around on a shelf when a heavy piece fell and broke their foot. | Workers’ comp |
| A customer participates in a brewery tour and injures their hand on the establishment’s canning line. | General liability |
| A construction worker drives to pick up tools for a new work-related project while they are on the clock. They get rear-ended and suffer whiplash. | Workers’ comp |
| An employee fixing a plumbing issue in a customer’s home messes with the wrong pipe. It causes the customer’s entire kitchen to flood. | General liability |
How to get general liability and workers' comp insurance
Most major insurance companies sell both these kinds of coverage.
You can buy general liability insurance by itself or as part of a business owner's policy. We recommend a BOP if you have inventory or equipment or a storefront, since it also includes commercial property insurance and business interruption insurance. Those coverages can protect your business in case of a fire, burglary or disaster.
Workers' comp is sold on its own. But you may be able to buy both policies at the same time.
» MORE: How to get business insurance
Best companies for general liability and workers' comp coverage
If you want personal help, find an insurance agent. Independent agents can sell policies from several different insurers. Captive agents can only sell policies from one insurance company, like State Farm. Either way, an agent can help you understand what coverage you need and help you get quotes.
If you need coverage right away, try the following companies to get coverage online.
Chubb
Chubb is our top-rated small-business insurance company thanks to its financial strength and relatively low numbers of complaints to regulators. The company sells workers' comp and BOPs online, but not general liability insurance by itself. For that reason, choose Chubb if you need a BOP and your business has less than $2 million in annual revenue. Read our review.
The Hartford
You can get a quote online from The Hartford, a century-old insurance company, for general liability insurance and workers' comp. An agent or insurance specialist will call you to finish the purchase process. That gives you the chance to ask questions about any specific risks your business faces and what other coverage you need. Read our review.
Ergo Next
Ergo Next, a subsidiary of Munich Re, sells common types of business insurance online. You can get a quote and buy a policy in just a few minutes. Once covered, you can access your certificate of insurance online and add additional insureds if you need to. Read our review.
Article sources
NerdWallet writers are subject matter authorities who use primary,
trustworthy sources to inform their work, including peer-reviewed
studies, government websites, academic research and interviews with
industry experts. All content is fact-checked for accuracy, timeliness
and relevance. You can learn more about NerdWallet's high
standards for journalism by reading our
editorial guidelines.
Methodology
Business insurance ratings methodology
NerdWallet’s business insurance ratings reward companies that offer small-business owners reliability and ease of use. Ratings are based on weighted averages of scores in several categories, including financial strength, customer complaint data, shopping experience and customer service. Learn more about how we rate small-business insurance companies.
These ratings are a guide, but insurance policy details and prices can vary widely from business to business and provider to provider. We encourage you to shop around and compare several insurance quotes.
NerdWallet does not receive compensation for any reviews. Read our editorial guidelines.
Insurer complaints methodology
NerdWallet examined complaints received by state insurance regulators and reported to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners in 2022-2024.
To assess how insurers compare to one another, the NAIC calculates a complaint index each year for each subsidiary, measuring its share of total complaints relative to its size, or share of total premiums in the industry. To evaluate a company’s complaint history, NerdWallet calculated a similar index for each insurer, weighted by market shares of each subsidiary, over the three-year period.
Our star ratings consider ratios for both general liability insurance and commercial property insurance. When an insurer sells policies that are underwritten by several different insurance companies, we consider the NAIC complaint ratios of all the underwriters.
On this page
