How to identify hail damage on a roof

Functional damage reduces a roof's ability to shed water or shortens its service life: punctures, tears and fractures of the shingle mat. Cosmetic damage changes the appearance without affecting function, such as shallow dents in metal. Insurers and engineers focus on functional damage, and some policies exclude cosmetic damage to metal roofing.

• Bruises (mat fractures). Press the spot: a fractured shingle feels soft, like a bruise on an apple, and the fracture may be visible from the back.
• Displaced granules with exposed asphalt. Freshly exposed asphalt is black; older exposed spots oxidize to gray, which helps date the damage.
• Random distribution. Hail hits are scattered without pattern, and the windward slopes take the most hits.
• Punctures and torn edges in larger hail.

Granule loss on its own is contested. Haag Engineering found shingles kept shedding water even with most granules removed, while shingle manufacturers and 2025 IBHS research say hail granule loss shortens shingle life. Document it either way.

Soft metals keep a permanent record of the hail that hit them. Dents in aluminum gutters, downspouts, roof vents, flashing and window wraps show that hail fell and how large it was. Dents in air-conditioner condenser fins are typically about 80% of the hailstone's diameter, so a 0.8-inch dent suggests 1-inch hail. Spatter marks (clean spots where hail knocked oxidation or grime off a surface) show the size and direction of recent hail.

A test square is a 10 by 10 foot area (one roofing "square", 100 sq ft) marked on each roof slope where the inspector counts functional hail hits. The number of hits that leads to replacement is set by each insurance carrier, not by any regulation. Eight hits per square is commonly cited, but practice varies, and a single test square has wide statistical uncertainty on a large roof.

1. Start on the ground: photograph soft-metal dents, damaged siding, screens and window wraps, with a coin or ruler for scale.
2. Note the storm date. A hail map shows which storm days reached the property and the estimated size; see Hail Pro hail maps.
3. On the roof, chalk-circle hits inside a test square on each slope and photograph each square from a distance and up close.
4. Photograph representative bruises, punctures and exposed asphalt, plus anything that is not hail, so the report is credible.
5. Organize photos by elevation and slope in a report. Hail Pro Enterprise turns field photos into PDF photo reports.

Roofs are dangerous. Only trained, insured professionals with fall protection should walk a roof, and nobody should climb a wet, icy or steep roof.