Is production insurance the same thing as E&O insurance?

No. Production insurance covers physical risk during filming: damaged equipment, injuries on set, property damage, and similar exposures. E&O insurance covers legal claims tied to the finished content itself, such as copyright, defamation, or music clearance disputes, and is typically required by distributors, broadcasters, and streaming platforms before a project is released, not before it is filmed.

A guide, not a quote form

Which insurance does your production actually need?

Q: What's the difference between production insurance and event insurance?

Production insurance is built around the risks of filming — equipment, crew, cast, and locations. Event insurance is built around live gatherings and attendees, such as weddings, festivals, concerts, and trade shows. A live-audience taping can require both, depending on the format.

Production insurance alone breaks into 8 distinct programs — before you even get to stunts, events, pyrotechnics, or E&O. This page breaks down every one in plain language and sends you straight to the specialist who writes that specific policy.

Quick answer

Not sure which one applies? Here's the shortest version.

If you’re filming anything, you need one of the 8 production insurance programs below. Add stunt or pyrotechnic coverage for physical action or effects. If it’s a live gathering rather than a shoot, you want event insurance instead. And before anything gets sold, streamed, or broadcast, you’ll separately need E&O insurance.

Production Insurance — 8 programs

All eight are written by MovieInsure, the parent site in this network. Pick the one that matches your project’s shape.

Short-Term Production

For a single independent film, commercial, documentary, or student shoot.

DICE / Annual

One continuous policy covering your company’s full production slate.

Production Portfolio

Broader protection for extended-schedule, higher-budget productions.

Foreign Productions

For shoots that cross international borders, in either direction.

Movie Boat

Supplementary coverage for productions involving watercraft.

Studio Insurance

Annual coverage for recording, editing, and post-production facilities.

Equipment Floater

Stand-alone policy for cameras, lighting, and production gear.

Multimedia E&O

Content-liability coverage required before a project is distributed.

Physical action & effects

Stunt Insurance

Physical action that standard production policies typically exclude or limit — written by Stuntinsure, quoted alongside your production policy.

Pyrotechnic Insurance

Displays, film special effects, and explosive-adjacent work — written by Pyrotechnicinsurance, for events, film, and importers alike.

Not a film shoot? Live events

Event Insurance

Built around live gatherings and attendees rather than a film crew — over 200 eligible event types, written by Eventinsure.

Before you distribute

Film E&O Insurance

Legal risk in the finished content itself, required by nearly every distributor, platform, or festival before delivery — written by Film-EO or bundled through MovieInsure.

Common questions

What people ask before they call

What kind of insurance does a film or video production actually need?

Most productions need some combination of production insurance, stunt/pyrotechnic coverage, and E&O insurance — which one(s) depend on the shoot’s size, physical content, and distribution plans.

Start with one of the 8 production insurance programs above for the shoot itself, add stunt or pyrotechnic coverage for physical action or effects, and plan for E&O before distribution.

What's the difference between production insurance and event insurance?

Production insurance covers the risks of filming; event insurance covers live gatherings and attendees.

If you’re shooting a film, series, or commercial, you want a production insurance program. If you’re hosting a wedding, festival, concert, or trade show, event insurance is the correct starting point instead.

Is production insurance the same as E&O insurance?

No — production insurance covers physical risk while filming; E&O covers legal risk in the finished content, evaluated separately.

A production can be fully covered on set and still be rejected by a distributor for lacking E&O — the two policies don’t substitute for each other. Full explanation on the E&O page.