Dash cameras aren’t a feature we see built into cars from the factory, and they are far less common than they should be. There are a number of reasons to invest in a dashcam, and all of them can be incredibly important. They can be helpful in criminal hit-and-run cases, proving fault in a car accident, or even unintentionally catching a crime on camera, and while a great majority of what your dash camera will record is just mundane driving, it’s one of those things that pays to have once you really need it.

Video evidence of an accident

There have been multiple cases of reports where a driver has been labeled as ‘at fault’ for an accident and witnesses have testified claiming that the driver was driving recklessly. Eye-witnesses are not always reliable sources for information, but a dashcam can show exactly what happened. This can be helpful in several ways.

The first reason is that you can use a dash camera video to help yourself in case of an accident. This can be crucial in unfortunate hit-and-run cases where you get live video evidence of the crime, but it can also be helpful in showing how exactly an accident happened and potentially why. This provides more reliable facts to a case than eye-witness testimony will.

The second reason is that your dash camera video can catch someone else’s accident, even if you aren’t involved as anything other than an onlooker. A dash camera video of a stopped car can catch accidents of cars around them, and even intersections where a good portion of accidents occur. 

Dash cameras can capture it all

The less suspected reason for having a dash camera is that you can record what is going on around you. Even if there isn’t a car accident immediately ahead, there are plenty of other critical things your dash camera could catch. A pedestrian or bicyclist getting hit by a car is just one of the many unfortunate things our dash camera can assist police with.

Dash cameras are becoming both progressively better and increasingly affordable to the average consumer, meaning you don’t have to spend an exorbitant amount of money to get a good quality dashcam. Because they are becoming more affordable and they can also give you peace of mind when it comes to unfortunate incidents, it’s well worth the money to invest in a dash camera, and you never know how much it might end up saving you or someone else in the long run.

Dash cameras usually rely on the car running to work, so they aren’t going to help you figure out which neighbor is leaving passive-aggressive sticky notes on your car at night – that’s right Karen, I know it’s you – but it can still be a good tool to have while your car is on and running. 

They might fall into the category of “things you don’t realize you need until you actually need them” but you might find a dash camera to be one of the most useful purchases when the time comes that you actually have to replay those videos.