United States, car permit

Car permit tests, in your state's own format

Each state writes its own car knowledge test, so the question count and the mark that passes change at the state line. Pick a state and you get a paper built to what that agency publishes, with the source printed under every answer.

Florida

FL

50 questions, 40 to pass, exactly the FLHSMV format.

Texas

TX

TxDPS publishes no count, so our paper asks 30, and 21 right clears the 70 percent it does publish.

California

CA

36 questions, 30 to pass. That count traces to an older California DMV report rather than a live page.

More states are being added. All states covered.

What the car knowledge test covers

Most of the paper is national. The federal sign manual fixes the shapes and the colors, and stopping distance does not change at a border, so the shared core below is correct wherever you sit the test. Each state paper then adds its own statute layer on top, and that layer is the part a national practice test gets wrong.

Signs and road markings18
Signals and right of way13
Speed and space11
Sharing the road8
Control and conditions12
Emergencies8

Where the states part company

The published format is the difference that matters, and not every agency publishes one. Where a figure is missing we say so rather than repeating a number with nothing behind it.

StatePublished formatOur paper
FloridaFL50 questions, 40 to pass (80%)FLHSMV, Class E Knowledge Exam and Driving Skills Test, checked September 9, 202650 questions, pass with 4080 percent, per FLHSMV, Class E Knowledge Exam and Driving Skills Test, checked September 9, 2026.
TexasTX70% to passTxDPS does not publish how many questions the test has.Texas Driver Handbook DL-7 (rev. January 2026) and dps.texas.gov, checked September 9, 202630 questions, pass with 21Length ours, pass mark theirs at 70 percent.
CaliforniaCA80% to passCalifornia DMV publishes no current question count. The 36 widely quoted comes from an older agency report, not a live page.California DMV Research and Development Branch report RSS-06-221 (December 2006), checked September 9, 202636 questions, pass with 3083.3 percent, per California DMV instruction permits page, checked September 9, 2026.

Common questions

How many questions are on the car permit test?

It depends on the state, and two of the three here do not publish a current figure. Florida publishes 50 questions with 40 correct to pass; TxDPS publishes none at all; California DMV publishes no count on any current page, and the 36 quoted everywhere comes from an older agency report.

What score do I need to pass?

Florida, 80 percent. Texas, 70 percent. California, 83.3 percent. Each of those is the figure that state publishes. Where a state also documents an error allowance that works out stricter than its own headline percentage, the paper here is marked at the allowance instead.

Are these the real exam questions?

No, and nobody selling you a bank of them has the real ones either. These are original questions written from the rule they test, each printing the statute number or handbook section it was drafted against, so you can check the wording against the text the state publishes.

Sources: Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles; Texas Department of Public Safety, Driver License Division; California Department of Motor Vehicles; Federal MUTCD, 11th Edition. Checked September 9, 2026. Original practice questions, not the official examination questions, and not affiliated with or endorsed by any state licensing agency.