The 2026 OSHA penalty table
For citations issued after January 15, 2026, federal OSHA's maximum penalty is $16,550 per serious violation and $165,514 per willful or repeated violation [osha.gov/penalties]. A hazard left uncorrected past its abatement date accrues up to $16,550 per day. Those three numbers drive nearly every dollar figure you will ever see on a citation.
| Violation type | 2026 maximum | Assessed |
|---|---|---|
| Serious | $16,550 | Per violation |
| Other-than-serious | $16,550 | Per violation |
| Posting requirements | $16,550 | Per violation |
| Failure to abate | $16,550 | Per day beyond the abatement date |
| Willful or repeated | $165,514 | Per violation · willful minimum $11,524 |
One oddity worth knowing: these figures are identical to 2025's. Since the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act took effect in 2015, OSHA has raised its maximums every January like clockwork. In 2026 it skipped the adjustment — the first pause since annual increases began. Nothing about inspection activity paused with it, so treat the freeze as an administrative footnote, not a policy signal.
How OSHA calculates the number on your citation
The maximums are ceilings, not defaults. A compliance officer starts with a gravity-based penalty: the severity of the injury the hazard could cause, weighed against the probability that it would happen. A high-gravity serious violation starts near the $16,550 ceiling; a low-gravity one starts far below it.
From there, OSHA's Field Operations Manual applies reductions:
- Size. The smallest employers can see reductions of up to 70 percent. The discount slides down as headcount rises, and large employers get nothing.
- Good faith. Up to 25 percent for a written, actually implemented safety and health program — training records, self-inspections, enforcement of your own rules. Willful and repeat violations are not eligible.
- History. A further reduction for employers with no serious, willful, or repeat citations in the previous five years.
Stack those, and a small shop with a clean record and a real safety program can watch a proposed penalty fall by more than half before the citation is even printed. That is the quiet lesson of the whole system: the documentation you keep before the inspection sets the price you pay after it.
How one inspection becomes six figures
Penalties are assessed per violation, and inspections rarely find just one. Each untrained forklift operator, each unguarded machine, each missing entry on your injury log can be cited separately. Under OSHA's egregious (per-instance) policy, a willful violation can be multiplied across every employee exposed — that is how the headline-making seven-figure penalties happen.
Two other multipliers deserve respect. A repeated violation — the same or a substantially similar hazard cited anywhere in your company within the past five years — jumps from the $16,550 ceiling to $165,514. And failure to abate compounds daily: a hazard left 30 days past its abatement date represents roughly $496,500 of exposure at $16,550 per day.
Recordkeeping and posting violations deserve special mention because they are entirely self-inflicted. Whether a case belongs on your OSHA 300 log is a mechanical test you can run in two minutes with the free OSHA 300 recordability checker — there is no reason to pay $16,550 to learn the definition of "medical treatment beyond first aid." The complete 300 log guide covers the rest.
From inspection to final order: the timeline
- The inspection. Opening conference, walkaround, employee interviews, and document review — your 300 logs and written programs come out here — then a closing conference where the compliance officer previews likely citations.
- The citation. OSHA must issue it within six months of the violation [OSH Act §9(c)]. It arrives by certified mail with proposed penalties and abatement dates. You must post a copy at or near each violation location for three working days or until abated, whichever is longer.
- Fifteen working days. The most important deadline in the process. From receipt, you have 15 working days to contest in writing. Do nothing and the citation becomes a final order — no appeal, no reduction, no do-over.
- The informal conference. Held with the area director inside that same window. This is where most penalties get reduced: bring abatement photos, training records, and a cooperative posture. Settlements here routinely trade penalty cuts for prompt, verified abatement.
- Notice of contest. A formal contest sends the case to the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission — an independent agency, not OSHA — and pauses abatement deadlines for the contested items. Most contested cases still settle before hearing.
- Abatement verification. Fixing the hazard is not enough; you must certify the abatement and, for many violations, document it [29 CFR 1903.19].
State-plan states can differ
About half the states run their own OSHA-approved programs — some covering all workplaces, others only state and local government. State plans must be at least as effective as federal OSHA, including penalty levels, but adoption timing lags in some states and a few use higher figures or different reduction rules. If you operate in California, Washington, Michigan, or any other state-plan jurisdiction, verify against your state's current schedule before assuming the federal table applies.
Six ways to reduce a penalty, legitimately
- Show up to the informal conference. It costs nothing, it is fast, and area directors have real discretion. Employers who skip it pay list price.
- Fix it fast — and prove it. Quick, documented abatement is the strongest currency in the room. Photos, invoices, and revised procedures beat arguments every time.
- Bring your training records. Nothing argues good faith like evidence your people were trained before the inspection. This is the reduction you build years in advance — see which training applies to you.
- Challenge the classification, not just the amount. Serious vs. other-than-serious, willful vs. serious, whether a "repeat" basis actually matches — classification drives the dollar figure more than anything else.
- Verify the math. Size, good-faith, and history reductions are formula-driven. Make sure yours were applied, and applied correctly.
- Ask about payment terms. Area offices can structure payment plans, and documented financial hardship has changed outcomes. Silence never has.
What prevention costs by comparison
Run the arithmetic that matters. The training that prevents OSHA's most-cited violations — hazard communication, fall protection, lockout/tagout, forklift certification — costs tens of dollars per employee. The citations it prevents start at five figures. Twenty years of EHS work teaches one reliable lesson: nobody has ever regretted the training budget after the inspection.
Start free. Check your training obligations by topic, verify your injury log with the OSHA 300 checker, put a documented safety meeting on the calendar with a generated toolbox talk, and draft the written programs that earn good-faith reductions with the SOP builder.