Teen & New Drivers
Virginia's provisional license: the passenger limit, the midnight curfew, and why an officer may not stop a car to enforce either one.
2 guides
The first license issued to anyone under 18 in Virginia is a provisional license, and it carries restrictions that are easy to find and almost universally described wrongly. Under Va. Code § 46.2-334.01 F, no law-enforcement officer may stop a vehicle for a violation of that section at all, and evidence found as a result of such a stop — including evidence handed over with the driver's consent — is inadmissible. The passenger limit and the curfew are real, but they are secondary offenses: an officer reaches them only after a lawful stop for something else.
What carries more weight in practice is what the DMV does afterwards. A first conviction while under 18 sends the driver to a DMV-directed driver improvement clinic that earns no safe driving points; a second brings a 90-day suspension; a third revokes the license for a year or until the driver turns 18, whichever is longer. These pages set out the restrictions, the escalation and the route from a learner's permit to a full license.
All guides
- Virginia's Restrictions on New Drivers: The Provisional License
Virginia's new driver restrictions: one passenger under 21, no driving midnight to 4 a.m., and no officer may stop a car to enforce either rule.
- Virginia Driver's License Requirements for a New Driver Under 18
Virginia's new driver's license requirements: age 16 years and three months, driver education, 45 hours of supervised driving, and a court ceremony.