Who has to keep OSHA 300, 301 and 300A forms, and for how long?

General information, not legal advice. The rule details below come from OSHA's official text on osha.gov, read on 2026-10-08.

When someone gets hurt at work, OSHA's recordkeeping rule (29 CFR Part 1904) says what goes on paper, how fast, and how long it stays there. Here is the short version.

Who has to keep the records

Employers with more than 10 employees keep OSHA injury and illness records, unless they are in certain low-hazard industries that the rule exempts. The exempt industries are listed in an appendix to the rule. Check that list for your own industry before deciding you do not need to keep the forms.

The three forms

• Form 300, the log. The running list of recordable cases.
• Form 301, the incident report. The details of each case.
• Form 300A, the yearly summary. The year's totals.

OSHA also accepts equivalent forms.

The 7-day rule

Once you learn that a recordable case happened, you have 7 calendar days to record it (1904.29(b)(3)).

The clock runs from when you learn of the case. That makes the path from the floor to the person who keeps the log as important as the form itself. An injury that sits in someone's notebook for a week can miss the deadline even if everyone meant well.

Which cases count as "recordable" is set out elsewhere in the rule. This guide does not cover that question.

What to report to OSHA within 8 and 24 hours

Recording a case and reporting it are two different duties. Some events must be reported to OSHA directly, on a much shorter clock:

• A death: within 8 hours.
• An in-patient hospitalization, an amputation, or the loss of an eye: within 24 hours.

This guide covers the deadlines only. Check osha.gov for who must report and how to make the report.

Posting and sending the yearly summary

• Post it. The 300A goes up by February 1 and stays up until April 30. A company executive signs it (1904.32).
• Send it online, if you are covered. Employees are counted per establishment (each site), not across the whole company. The deadline is March 2 each year (1904.41):
  • The 300A: sites with 20 to 249 employees in listed industries, or sites with 250 or more employees in an industry that must keep part 1904 records.
  • The 300 and 301 as well: sites with 100 or more employees in listed high-hazard industries.

Both industry lists are appendices to the rule. Check whether your industry is on them. Part-time, seasonal and temporary workers count toward the total (1904.41(b)(2)).

How long to keep them: 5 years

Keep the records for 5 years after the end of the calendar year they cover (1904.33). Records for injuries in 2026 are kept through the end of 2031.

That is longer than most people plan for. In five years staff change, offices move, and shared spreadsheets get edited by people who have since left. Someone may still need to show what was written down, and when.

When the facts change later

While you keep it, the 300 log must be updated when you find a case you missed or when a case is reclassified (the old entry is lined out and the new information entered). The 300A and the 301 do not need to be updated.

Checklist

• Rule: Count your employees, and check whether your industry is on OSHA's exempt list before deciding you do not need to keep the forms.
• Habit: Name who keeps the 300 log, the 301 reports and the 300A.
• Habit: Make sure injuries reach that person the same day, not at the end of the week.
• Rule: Record each recordable case within 7 calendar days of learning of it.
• Rule: Report a death within 8 hours.
• Rule: Report an in-patient hospitalization, an amputation or the loss of an eye within 24 hours.
• Rule: Update the 300 log for newly found cases and reclassifications.
• Rule: Have a company executive sign the 300A, and post it from February 1 to April 30.
• Rule: Check whether you must send your data to OSHA online by March 2.
• Rule: Keep the 300 log, 301 reports and 300A summaries for 5 years after the end of the year they cover. Exposure and medical records have longer periods: at least 30 years for exposure records, and the length of employment plus 30 years for medical records, with limited exceptions (29 CFR 1910.1020).

How Cibotti helps

Cibotti does not fill in or file OSHA forms. It is the work record underneath them: what happened, who wrote it down, and when. It helps you keep that record and prove it was not changed.

• Sealed when it is saved. Staff log an injury by typing or speaking. Each entry gets a time and a fingerprint when it is saved and is chained to the entry before it. Every 10 minutes the newest fingerprint is sent for a Bitcoin timestamp, which Bitcoin confirms some hours later. Once an entry is covered, any change to it shows when the chain is checked. You can show exactly when the case was first written down in Cibotti.
• Corrections add, never erase. Entries cannot be edited. A correction is a new entry, and the original stays in view: the same idea as lining out an old line on the 300 log.
• The rule, next to the form. When someone picks Injury, the Oversight box shows what OSHA's rule says: the 7-day rule, the 8- and 24-hour reports, and the 5 years. It says what the rule asks. It never says you have met it.
• Files and exports. A photo or document attaches to the entry and is fingerprinted with it (for several photos, use a project task), and the ledger exports to CSV or JSON when you need it elsewhere.

Sources

The rule details in this guide come from the official text, read on 2026-10-08. Each link opens the current official text in a new tab; check it there before you rely on a detail.

• OSHA's recordkeeping page on osha.gov (opens in a new tab): who keeps records, the forms, 8- and 24-hour reporting.
• 29 CFR 1904.29 on osha.gov (opens in a new tab): the 7-day rule, 1904.29(b)(3).
• 29 CFR 1904.32 on osha.gov (opens in a new tab): posting, and the executive's signature.
• 29 CFR 1904.33 on osha.gov (opens in a new tab): 5 years, and updating the 300 log.
• 29 CFR 1904.41 on osha.gov (opens in a new tab): March 2, and who sends what.
• 29 CFR 1910.1020 on osha.gov (opens in a new tab): exposure and medical record periods.

See how sealed entries and the Oversight box look in practice: open the live demo at https://cibotti.app ("Open the live demo"), no sign-up needed.

John, Cibotti