The OSHA 300 log and 300A summary, explained (2026)

Few compliance duties are as widely misunderstood as OSHA recordkeeping. Employers routinely record cases that are not recordable, miss cases that are, or forget the February posting entirely. Yet the rules — set out in 29 CFR Part 1904 — are learnable, and getting them right protects you at audit and gives you the injury data every good safety program runs on. This guide walks through who has to keep records, what counts, and how the three forms fit together.

Who has to keep records

As a general rule, if you had more than 10 employees at any time during the previous calendar year, you must keep OSHA injury and illness records — unless your industry is classified as partially exempt because it is historically low-hazard. Those partially exempt industries are listed in Appendix A to Subpart B of Part 1904 (many retail, finance, insurance and professional-service sectors). Being partially exempt does not remove every duty: you must still report severe incidents to OSHA, and you must keep records if OSHA or the Bureau of Labor Statistics specifically asks you to. If you are covered, you keep records for each establishment expected to operate for a year or more.

The three forms

Form 300 is the log itself — a running list of each recordable case during the year, with the employee, job title, date, where it happened, a description, how the case is classified, and the count of days away or on restricted duty.

Form 301 is the incident report — the detailed record for each individual case, capturing how the injury or illness happened. A workers' compensation report or an equivalent internal form can satisfy the 301 requirement if it captures the same information.

Form 300A is the annual summary — the year-end totals from your 300 log. This is the one with a hard public deadline, covered below.

What makes a case recordable

A case goes on the log if it is work-related, is a new case, and meets one or more of the general recording criteria. Work-related means an event or exposure in the work environment caused or contributed to the condition, or significantly aggravated a pre-existing condition — with a specific list of exceptions (for example, eating in the cafeteria, common colds and flu, or injuries while voluntarily participating in a wellness program). Once a case is work-related and new, it is recordable if it results in any of the following: death; days away from work; restricted work or transfer to another job; medical treatment beyond first aid; loss of consciousness; or a significant injury or illness diagnosed by a physician or other licensed health care professional.

The phrase that trips people up is "medical treatment beyond first aid." OSHA defines first aid as a specific, finite list — things like using non-prescription medication at non-prescription strength, cleaning and bandaging minor wounds, using hot or cold therapy, or drinking fluids for heat stress. If the treatment goes beyond that list — prescription medication, sutures, physical therapy and so on — the case is generally recordable, even if the injury seems minor.

Classifying the case

For each recordable case you record the most serious outcome: death (column G), days away from work (column H), job transfer or restriction (column I), or other recordable cases (column J). You then count the number of calendar days the employee was away (column K) or on restricted/transferred duty (column L), capping the count at 180 days total. Finally you check the injury or illness type — injury, skin disorder, respiratory condition, poisoning, hearing loss, or all other illnesses. Those classifications are what roll up into your annual summary.

The February posting — the deadline people miss

At the end of each year you total your 300 log onto Form 300A, and a company executive must certify that the summary is correct. You then post the 300A from February 1 through April 30 in each establishment, somewhere employees will see it — even if you had zero recordable cases, in which case you post a summary showing zeros. This is the deadline small employers most often miss, and it is an easy citation for an inspector to write.

Electronic submission to OSHA (the ITA)

Separately from posting, some establishments must submit their data to OSHA electronically through the Injury Tracking Application (ITA), generally by March 2 each year. Whether you must submit depends on your establishment size and industry: broadly, establishments with 100 or more employees in certain high-hazard industries must submit 300 and 301 data, establishments with 250 or more employees in industries covered by the recordkeeping rule must submit 300A data, and establishments with 20 to 249 employees in a designated list of industries must submit 300A data. The thresholds and industry lists change, so confirm the current requirement on osha.gov before each cycle.

Retention and privacy

You keep the 300 log, the 300A summary and the 301 records for five years following the year they cover, and you update the 300 log if you learn of a recordable case or a change to one after the fact. Certain "privacy concern" cases — for example those involving sexual assault, HIV, mental illness, or injuries to intimate body parts — must have the employee's name withheld on the log, replaced with "privacy case," with the identity kept in a separate confidential list.

Why the log is worth more than compliance

Handled well, the 300 log is not just a form — it is the clearest picture you have of where people actually get hurt in your business. Patterns in it should feed straight back into your hazard assessments and JHAs. That is why keeping it in a live system, rather than a once-a-year spreadsheet scramble, pays off twice: you stay compliant, and you get safer.