Hours-of-Service Rules Explained

A property-carrying truck driver in interstate commerce works under three federal clocks at once: an 11-hour limit on driving, a 14-hour window that caps the workday, and a weekly ceiling of 60 or 70 hours on duty. A fourth rule requires a 30-minute break after 8 hours of driving. The rules sit in 49 CFR Part 395¹. What makes them hard is how the clocks interact, so this explainer sets out each limit, then follows a hypothetical driver through a day.

Who the rules cover

The rules apply to drivers of commercial motor vehicles in interstate commerce. FMCSA describes a commercial motor vehicle, for these purposes, as one used in business that weighs or is rated at 10,001 pounds or more, is designed or used to carry 16 or more passengers without compensation or 9 or more for compensation, or carries placarded hazardous materials⁴. That reaches well beyond tractor-trailers to box trucks and service vehicles working interstate routes.

The limits side by side

The rules split by what the vehicle carries¹².

The columns differ in structure, not only in numbers. A passenger driver’s long lunch off duty does not count toward the 15 hours. A property driver’s 14-hour window runs from the moment he or she comes on duty, and off-duty time inside it does not stop the clock².

One driver’s day, hour by hour

This is a hypothetical, built to show the mechanics. The driver, carrier and times are invented, and no sleeper berth or exception is used.

The driver hauls dry van freight for a carrier that runs seven days a week, so the 70-hours-in-8-days limit applies. He has had 10 consecutive hours off and starts the day with 40 hours already used in the 8-day period.

• 5:00 a.m. Comes on duty at the terminal. Pre-trip inspection and paperwork are on-duty, not driving. The 14-hour window opens now and closes at 7:00 p.m. no matter what happens in between.
• 5:30 a.m. Starts driving, with nothing longer than a few minutes’ stop all morning.
• 1:30 p.m. He has driven 8 hours without a 30-minute interruption. He may not get back behind the wheel until he takes one¹.
• 1:30 to 2:00 p.m. Lunch, logged off duty. Off-duty time does not pause the 14-hour window. The window still closes at 7:00 p.m.
• 2:00 p.m. Back on the road with 3 hours left under the 11-hour limit and 5 hours left in the window.
• 3:00 p.m. Arrives at the receiver. Driving total: 9 hours.
• 3:00 to 4:30 p.m. Waits while the trailer is unloaded. Under 49 CFR 395.2, time attending a vehicle being unloaded is on-duty time¹. The window keeps running. (Had this wait come before the 8-hour mark, it would have satisfied the break. Since the 2020 rule, any 30 consecutive minutes of non-driving time counts, on duty or off³.)
• 4:30 p.m. Released empty and dispatched toward the next pickup. He has 2 hours of driving left and 2.5 hours left in the window.
• 6:30 p.m. Driving total reaches 11 hours. The 11-hour limit stops the truck with 30 minutes still on the window. He pulls into a truck stop and goes off duty.
• 6:30 p.m. onward. He needs 10 consecutive hours off before his next shift behind the wheel. The day added 13 on-duty hours to his 8-day total, bringing it to 53 of 70.

Change one fact and a different clock decides. Had the receiver held him until 6:30 p.m., he would have had only 30 minutes before the window closed at 7:00, and the 14-hour limit would have ended his day with 1.5 hours of driving unused. Had his carrier not run every day, the 60-hour limit would apply. Starting the day at 50 of 60 hours, he would have hit the weekly ceiling at 3:30 p.m., on the receiver’s dock, with time left on both daily clocks. He could finish the unload but could not pull away.

The weekly limit and the 34-hour restart

The weekly limit is a rolling total of on-duty hours, not driving hours. A driver whose carrier does not operate every day is barred from driving after 60 hours on duty in 7 consecutive days. If the carrier runs every day, the cap is 70 hours in 8 days¹. Each day, the oldest day drops off and the newest is added.

The restart wipes the slate. Any 7- or 8-day period may end with the start of an off-duty period of 34 or more consecutive hours, and the count begins again at zero¹.

The sleeper berth split

A property-carrying driver with a sleeper berth may split the required 10 hours off. Under 49 CFR 395.1(g), one period must be at least 7 consecutive hours in the sleeper berth and the other at least 2 consecutive hours, off duty or in the berth. Together they must total at least 10 hours: 7 and 3, or 8 and 2¹.

Two rules make the split useful. Neither qualifying period counts against the 14-hour window, and the 11-hour and 14-hour limits are recalculated from the end of the first of the two periods¹³. A driver facing a long wait who is relieved from duty or can rest in the berth can turn that time into the shorter period and keep it off the window. Because the clocks are recalculated rather than paused, the length and order of the periods matter. A rest of 1 hour 50 minutes does not qualify as the short period.

Exceptions that change the arithmetic

Adverse driving conditions. Snow, ice, sleet, fog, other bad weather, or unusual road or traffic conditions can extend the driving limit and the on-duty window by up to 2 hours. The condition must not have been known, and could not reasonably have been known, to the driver before the duty day began or before driving resumed after a qualifying break, or to the carrier at dispatch¹. A forecast storm does not qualify.

Short-haul. A driver who stays within a 150 air-mile radius of the normal work reporting location and is released within 14 consecutive hours is exempt from keeping a record of duty status. The carrier must instead keep 6 months of time records showing when the driver reported, hours worked and when the driver was released¹. The 2020 rule widened this exception from 100 to 150 air-miles and from 12 to 14 hours, effective September 29, 2020³. Short-haul drivers are also exempt from the 30-minute break, but the daily and weekly limits still apply.

Other exceptions cover agricultural operations during planting and harvest, oilfield work, utility service vehicles and several narrower groups. Alaska has its own limits.

How the rules are enforced

Electronic logging devices. Since December 18, 2017, most carriers subject to the rules must have drivers record duty status on a registered ELD, which logs driving time automatically once the truck moves. Drivers who keep records on no more than 8 days in any 30-day period, certain driveaway-towaway operations, and vehicles built before model year 2000 may still use paper logs¹. Our brief on what an ELD records covers what the device captures and what it leaves out.

Roadside inspections. On request, a driver must transfer the ELD records to the inspector, with records current for the day of inspection and the prior 7 days¹.

Out-of-service orders. Under 49 CFR 395.13, a driver found over the hours limits, or without a current record of duty status, can be ordered out of service on the spot¹. The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance’s North American Standard Out-of-Service Criteria, updated each April 1, set the pass-fail conditions inspectors apply⁶. In CVSA’s 2026 International Roadcheck, hours-of-service violations accounted for 929 driver out-of-service orders in North America, 23.4 percent of the total and second only to drivers without a medical card. False records of duty status added another 266⁷.

Carrier audits. Federal and state investigators compare logs against the bills of lading, dispatch records, expense receipts, fleet messages and payroll records that carriers must keep as supporting documents¹.

What hours records show after a crash

After a serious crash, the hours-of-service file is often the first thing investigators and lawyers ask for. Carriers need keep records of duty status and supporting documents for only 6 months¹, so early preservation requests matter. The record can show:

• How many hours into the 14-hour window the crash occurred.
• Driving time since the last 10-hour break and the last 30-minute interruption.
• Where the driver stood against the weekly limit.
• Whether off-duty periods met the sleeper-berth rules.
• Edits, their annotations, and who requested them.

It cannot show whether the driver slept during time logged off duty, and it does not record speed or braking. Matching the log against supporting documents is how investigators test its accuracy. Our guide to evidence after a truck crash covers that wider set of records, and our analysis of truck driver fatigue covers why hours compliance and alertness are not the same thing.

State rules for intrastate trucking

Part 395 governs interstate commerce. Drivers who operate only within one state fall under that state’s rules, and states that receive federal motor carrier safety grants must keep those rules compatible with the federal regulations. Federal rules allow intrastate hours-of-service variances only within set bounds: a driving limit of up to 12 hours with no driving after 16 hours on duty, weekly limits of up to 70 hours in 7 days or 80 hours in 8 days, and a short-haul radius of 150 air-miles⁵. Whether a state uses that room, and how, depends on its own statutes and regulations. A purely intrastate operation needs to check that state’s code, not Part 395 alone.