How much is bail for a DUI?

In California the number depends on the county; in Florida one statewide schedule sets it, though a circuit may raise it. California’s law makes every county’s judges write their own bail schedule, and the four 2026 schedules compared first below put a first misdemeanor DUI at $5,000 in three of them and $10,000 in the fourth — while one of the three releases that driver on a promise to appear with no bail at all. Florida went the other way in 2026, with one statewide schedule for release before first appearance.

Why the answer is a county, not a state

Section 1269b(c) of the Penal Code says it is the duty of the superior court judges in each county to prepare, adopt and annually revise a uniform countywide schedule of bail for all bailable felony offenses and for all misdemeanor and infraction offenses except Vehicle Code infractions. For felonies, subsection (e) tells them to consider the seriousness of the offense charged. Nothing in the section sets a number, so the number is whatever each county’s judges adopt.

The result is that the same charge, under the same Vehicle Code section, carries different scheduled bail across a county line. The table below is four of California’s fifty-eight schedules, each read from the court’s own 2026 document.

Four 2026 schedules, side by side

Fresno’s schedule prints its two felony DUI lines with prior offenses as “DUI with prior felony DUI” at $50,000 and “DUI with 3 or more priors” at $100,000; the table uses the second. Santa Cruz labels its higher misdemeanor lines “HIGH BAC” without defining the reading.

More Bay Area schedules

Three more counties, read on October 7, 2026, add to the spread, and a fourth follows the table. Contra Costa’s 2026 schedule designates a first misdemeanor DUI Book and Release — $0 bail on a promise to appear, unless an exception such as felony probation or parole applies — and moves to dollar amounts once there is a prior within seven years. San Mateo’s 2026 misdemeanor schedule, effective July 27, 2026, follows the $5,000, $10,000, $20,000 steps. Alameda’s newest posted local schedule is dated 2024 and lists one figure for misdemeanor DUI, $10,000, without a split by prior. Solano County’s schedule, read on October 9, 2026 and effective January 14, 2026, lists misdemeanor DUI at $5,000, $7,500 and $15,000 for a first, second and third offense — but starts from the rule that a misdemeanor defendant is entitled to own-recognizance release unless that would compromise public safety or appearance (Solano County).

Kern County: amounts listed, $0 required

Kern’s 2026 schedule, effective December 29, 2025, sorts every offense into a release category before it gives an amount. For people arrested for misdemeanors in its Cite and Release category, it says, bail is $0 and no financial conditions are required. Misdemeanor DUI under Vehicle Code 23152 — with no prior, one prior or two — is in that category, and so is misdemeanor DUI causing injury. The amounts in the table are the schedule’s presumptive figures for those charges, but they are not what a misdemeanor DUI arrestee is asked to post.

Felony DUI is different. DUI causing injury filed as a felony, DUI with three priors under section 23550 and DUI with a prior felony DUI under section 23550.5 are all in Magistrate Review, at $200,000, $100,000 and $50,000. The Bakersfield page covers the four categories in full. Kern lists one felony figure for DUI causing injury, with no split by prior.

San Bernardino: the highest numbers, and room to move

San Bernardino’s schedule, effective January 1, 2026, opens its misdemeanor section by saying bail is not required on misdemeanors unless the schedule lists them — and it lists DUI: $10,000, $20,000 with one prior, $50,000 with two or more, and $50,000 to $100,000 for DUI causing injury. In its felony section DUI with three or more priors and DUI with injuries are each $250,000, the highest figures among the four counties.

Its misdemeanor section gives judges discretion to adjust the scheduled amounts, taking into account the defendant’s prior record — pending warrants, failures to appear, probation violations — and the nature of the offense, and says judges may also set zero bail when appropriate. Its felony DUI figures are single lines, with no split by prior for DUI with injuries.

Santa Barbara: who waits for arraignment

Santa Barbara County’s schedule, approved by its judges and effective June 2026, lists a first misdemeanor DUI at $5,000, $15,000 with one prior in ten years and $25,000 with two, and both a felony DUI under Vehicle Code 23550 or 23550.5 and DUI causing bodily injury under 23153 at $100,000. Its opening pages add something the amounts alone do not show: before arraignment a judicial officer, using a risk assessment, may release on own recognizance, release on $0 bail with conditions, set money bail, or defer release to arraignment. The schedule then lists offenses excluded from that early release, and one entry is DUI-specific: a third DUI within ten years, a DUI with injury, or a DUI with a BAC of .20 or above. More on the Santa Barbara page.

Shasta and Tulare: the low end and the top end

Two more schedules widen the range in both directions. Shasta County’s, effective January 20, 2026, lists a misdemeanor DUI at $2,500 — half the $5,000 in Kern, Fresno and Santa Cruz — $5,000 with one prior in ten years, and $7,500 with two or more, marked “DO NOT O.R.”, no release on own recognizance. Its felony DUI rows are $50,000, and $100,000 for DUI causing death. More on the Redding page.

Tulare County’s, effective November 6, 2025, lists a misdemeanor DUI at $10,000 and injury DUI at $25,000, and its felony rows climb from $125,000 — plus $10,000 for each additional injury or death — to $200,000, and then to No Bail for DUI causing great bodily injury with four or more priors. It opens with four numbered principles of pretrial release, stating that everyone eligible for bail should be considered for own-recognizance release unless a court finds flight risk or danger. More on the Visalia page.

Two rules the schedules share

One amount per set of facts, usually. Santa Cruz’s misdemeanor schedule says that when a defendant is booked for more than one violation from the same factual situation, bail is based on the violation with the highest amount and is not accumulated. San Bernardino’s misdemeanor section uses the highest amount on any single offense per case, and adds bail on separate cases. Kern applies the single highest bail plus all applicable enhancements, but adds separate amounts together when the charges occurred on different occasions or involve different victims.

A judge can depart from the number. Santa Cruz’s schedule says bail set after first appearance may be greater or less than the scheduled amount, and requires a request to increase a scheduled amount to be presented to a judge for prior authorization, with the requesting agency’s form. San Bernardino’s misdemeanor section leaves adjustments to each judge. The scheduled figure is where release starts, not necessarily where it ends.

Florida: one schedule for the whole state

Florida’s Legislature, in section 903.011(5)(a), told the Florida Supreme Court to adopt an annual uniform statewide bond schedule for release before a person’s first appearance hearing, as the Nineteenth Circuit’s Administrative Order 2026-02 recites. The Court issued it as AOSC25-69, effective January 1 through December 31, 2026. It applies when police, county jail or pretrial release employees use their discretion to release someone on bond before first appearance, and it does not bind the judge at first appearance. For driving or boating under the influence it lists:

Three rules in the same order change how far those numbers reach. A chief judge may add conditions or raise the amounts in a local schedule (and may ask the Court to approve lower ones). Each crime of arrest requires a separate bond, under section 903.02(4). And no scheduled bond applies to a person held for first appearance under section 903.011(6) — among others, someone on pretrial release, probation or community control at the time of an arrest for a felony, or arrested three or more times in the previous six months. See the Port St. Lucie page for one circuit’s local order, which holds more people than the statute does.

What this page does not tell you

Other California counties. Forty-seven schedules are not read here. Each is published by its court, and the numbers above should not be carried across a county line.

Other states. This page reads California, where every county must publish a schedule, and Florida, which has one statewide schedule. It does not state DUI bail for any other state.

What a bail bond costs. The schedules set bail, not the fee a bail agent charges to post it, and no figure for that appears here.

Common questions