Nat Turner's Rebellion was notable for a multitude of reasons. The rebellion had small chances of succeeding due to the small number of people leading it and the lack of unity among them. However, it ended up being one of the most successful slave revolts in American History. The rebellion shook America and redefined what it meant to be a slave in the 19th century south. After the rebellion, life for African Americans in the United States changed for the worse and the social and political oppression characteristic of the time period worsened to the point where it was nearly impossible for African Americans to meet within their community. This agitated not only the people who were subject to these fundamentally racist laws, but also abolitionists who took the phrase "all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights" to be their crowning belief.

      As for the slaves whose lives were negatively impacted by the harsh black codes and legislation in states like Virginia, courage to stand up against slaveowners became a popular thought and more slaves felt empowered enough to declare their personhood. ​​Turner became a martyr in the eyes of fellow slaves as he had died doing something he believed was right, so his death inspired many more to rise up and do the same thing. It is said that he was the inspiration behind Harriet Tubman and Malcolm X, among others and some black folklore refers to the Civil War as the "Second War" and Nat Turner's rebellion as the "First War."

      On a more political level, the revolt had a profound impact on Southern attitudes towards the "peculiar institution" of slavery. It changed the perception that slaves were too weak and disorganized to lead a systematic revolt against their mistreatment. It scared the southern slaveholders into thinking that the slaves had strength in numbers and another revolt like Turner's could topple the socioeconomic plantation system that ran the south. As a result, the revolt led to a harsh tightening of controls over the slave population. These controls strengthened pro-slavery sentiment in the south and anti-slavery sentiment in the north, forming the tension that gripped Antebellum America.

      In addition to dividing the nation on the topic of slavery, Nat Turner's rebellion hardened sectional animosities, making secession and the American Civil War an inevitable future for the United States. Threatened by the Turner uprising, Southern congressmen sought to enact the Fugitive Slave Act of 1796, which endangered slaves everywhere by"[requiring] that slaves be returned to their owners, even if they were in a free state...[and by making] the federal government responsible for finding, returning, and trying escaped slaves". Following the pattern of poor legislation, in 1836 the House of Representatives enacted a gag rule preventing the debate of anti-slavery petitions. It was later repealed and confrontation created the sparks that caused southern secession to be a formidable obstacle to the unity in the United States.