Aggregate Limit

An aggregate limit is the total maximum amount a policy will pay across all claims filed during the policy period, typically one year. Once the aggregate is exhausted, the carrier owes nothing more for additional claims that year, no matter how many separate incidents occur or how large they are individually.

Aggregate limits appear most often on liability and professional policies. A common commercial general liability structure carries a $1,000,000 per-occurrence limit and a $2,000,000 annual aggregate. That means no single claim can exceed $1 million, and no matter how many claims occur during the year, the carrier's total exposure stops at $2 million. If three claims of $800,000, $700,000, and $300,000 file in the same year, the carrier pays $2 million in total and the third claimant receives only $500,000 -- the remaining aggregate -- rather than the full $300,000 owed.

For businesses in high-frequency claim environments -- a restaurant with multiple slip-and-fall claims, a contractor on a large project generating several related disputes -- the aggregate limit is just as important as the per-occurrence limit. Excess or umbrella liability provides additional capacity once the underlying aggregate is exhausted, which is why most businesses should carry an umbrella on top of their general liability policy rather than treating the aggregate as their actual ceiling.