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Rear-Facing Car Seats

Stage 1: Rear-Facing Car Seats up to Age 4

Children should use rear-facing car seats in the back seat as long as possible, even up to age 4. Be sure to stay within rear-facing height and weight limits for the seat. If your child outgrows their car seat before age 4, change to a seat with higher rear-facing weight and height limits. Leg crowding is expected and okay.

Rear-Facing Car Seat Safety Tips

  • Babies and little kids should ride in infant or convertible seats.
  • Babies and little kids should remain rear-facing seats in the back seat until a minimum of age 2, and as long as possible (even up to age 4) to the maximum rear-facing height and weight limits for the seat.
  • Read labels to determine the correct seat for age, weight and height. Maximum rear-facing weight range vary greatly. Check instructions and labels carefully.

Seat should be semi-reclined

at approximately 45 degrees when rear-facing; use angle indicator on safety seat.

READ the instruction manual

AND the safety belt/seat section in your vehicle manual for proper installation guidance.

Children should always

 ride in the back seat. In some states (including Virginia), it is illegal to place a rear-facing seat in the front seat of a vehicle.

Install infant and convertible seats

tightly in the vehicle—less than an inch of movement at the belt path.

If using a safety belt to install

LOCK the vehicle safety belt to keep it tight—refer to labels on belt, vehicle owners manual, and car seat instruction manual

Safety Restraint Misuses

At least half of safety seats

are unintentionally misused. Partial misuse of a safety seat reduces its effectiveness against severe injuries.

Parents’ top 3 mistakes when installing traditional safety seats include:

  • Failure to secure the seat tightly
  • Failure to secure the harness straps tightly
  • Incorrect positioning of the chest clip

To help guard against misuse, parents should always

  • READ seat instructions, labels, and vehicle owner’s manual
  • Install the seat tightly (less than 1 inch of movement) & lock the safety belt
  • Position the harness straps tightly

Printable Parent Resources

 

Child Passenger Safety Stages 1-page Flyer |  English  |  Spanish

Printable Child Passenger Safety Guide |  PDF

For installation help and more information, consider these helpful sites:

 

To find a seat check event:

https://www.nhtsa.gov/equipment/car-seats-and-booster-seats

Child Passenger Safety Seat Guide
Stage 2: Forward-Facing Car Seats

Project Lead

  • Kelli England, Ph.D.
  • Professor of Pediatrics &
  • Clinical Psychologist

Contact Information

Macon & Joan Brock Virginia Health Sciences

at Old Dominion University

Community Health and Research

E.V. Williams Hall Pediatrics

855 W. Brambleton Avenue

Norfolk, Virginia 23510

 

Phone: 1-757-446-5799

E-mail: carsafetynow@evms.edu

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Materials are free for educational, nonprofit use; citation is appreciated.

 

The Car Safety Now program was supported by a series of grants from the Virginia DMV Highway Safety Office (Principal Investigator: Kelli England, Ph.D.). The contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the U.S. Department of Transportation, Virginia DMV, or Virginia Highway Safety Office.