The fourth Global Status Report Study estimated that more than 80 000 people were killed from road-traffic injuries in the WHO European Region in 2016, representing 6% of road-traffic deaths worldwide. Decreasing by 13% between 2010 and 2016, the WHO European and Western Pacific regions are the only WHO regions to show reductions in road-traffic mortality since the global community adopted the visionary but ambitious United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target to “halve the number of road traffic death and injuries by 2020”. Reductions in mortality have been achieved despite 14% growth in the number of registered vehicles. While the European Region has the lowest road-traffic mortality rate of any WHO region (8.8 deaths per 100 000 population compared to 18.2 per 100 000 globally), wide variation continues to persist, with a seven-fold difference between countries with the highest and lowest road-traffic mortality rates. Should the fall in the number of deaths continue at its current pace, SDG target 3.6 will not be met. This report assesses the laws and practices on key risk factors, such as regulating speed appropriate to road type, drink–driving, and use of seat belts, motorcycle helmets and child restraints to reduce the risk of road-traffic injury.