A graph G is outer-1-planar with near-independent crossings if it can be drawn in the plane so that all vertices are on the outer face and $$|M_G(c_1)\cap M_G(c_2)|\le 1$$ | M G ( c 1 ) ∩ M G ( c 2 ) | ≤ 1 for any two distinct crossings $$c_1$$ c 1 and $$c_2$$ c 2 in G, where $$M_G(c)$$ M G ( c ) consists of the end-vertices of the two crossed edges that generate c. In Zhang and Liu (Total coloring of pseudo-outerplanar graphs, arXiv:1108.5009 ), it is showed that the total chromatic number of every outer-1-planar graph with near-independent crossings and with maximum degree at least 5 is $$\Delta +1$$ Δ + 1 . In this paper we extend the result to maximum degree 4 by proving that the total chromatic number of every outer-1-planar graph with near-independent crossings and with maximum degree 4 is exactly 5.