Assault and battery: a distinctly shorter one-year window
Under ORC § 2305.111(B), an action for assault or battery must generally be brought within one year after the cause of action accrues — half the two-year general rule that covers ordinary negligence-based injuries. Ohio courts have applied this one-year period even when a plaintiff tries to frame the same underlying conduct as ordinary negligence, holding that the essential character of an intentional, offensive touching governs regardless of how the claim is pleaded.
A real exception for childhood sexual abuse
Ohio law carves out a genuinely different, much longer period for claims involving childhood sexual abuse. Under ORC § 2305.111(C), such a claim generally may be brought within twelve years after the cause of action accrues — and accrual itself is tied to the victim reaching the age of majority, not to the date of the abuse.
A genuinely current, pending change to watch
As of April 2026, Ohio lawmakers introduced Senate Bill 421, a bipartisan proposal that would extend the civil statute of limitations for claims involving certain sex offenses from one year to five years. Sponsors have argued that a one-year window is often too short for survivors to process an assault and decide whether to pursue a civil claim. As of this writing, this bill has been introduced but has not yet been enacted into law — the one-year period under ORC § 2305.111(B) remains current law for now, and anyone affected should confirm the bill's status with an attorney given how actively it's being discussed.
Medical malpractice: another one-year rule, with real tolling options
Medical malpractice claims generally carry their own one-year deadline under ORC § 2305.113, rather than the two-year general rule. This period can be tolled while the patient-physician relationship for the condition at issue is ongoing, or extended under a discovery-based analysis when the injury wasn't immediately apparent — genuinely important nuances given how short the base period is.
A real outer limit for products and construction
Separately from these accrual-based deadlines, Ohio law generally sets a 10-year statute of repose — an absolute outer limit — running from a product's delivery to its first purchaser, or from the completion of construction for a building defect claim, regardless of when the injury is actually discovered.