California Department of Industrial Relations, Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) - Electrician Certification Unit (ECU) administers electrician licensing in California. Every figure below is verified against the board’s own official pages and dated. Who must personally hold a credential — the contractor, the business, or the individual worker — is set out under Requirements.
What it’s called
California CERTIFIES individual electricians rather than issuing a “license.” The state’s Electrician Certification Program (Department of Industrial Relations) certifies people who perform electrical work for C-10 electrical contractors. “Electrician license,” “journeyman electrician license” and “California electrician card” are common informal names for that certification. The C-10 electrical CONTRACTOR license is a separate credential — it is what a business needs to contract electrical work.
License types & fees
| Type | Experience | Exam | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| General Electrician | 8,000 hours of work for an electrical contractor installing, constructing or maintaining electrical systems covered by the National Electrical Code (from two or more work categories, with per-category caps). Applicants without enough hours may register as an Electrician Trainee and enroll in a state-approved school. | General Electrician certification exam: 100 multiple-choice questions, 4 hours 30 minutes, open book (materials provided), based on the NEC and references in the content outline; 70% required to pass. | $175 |
| Residential Electrician | 4,800 hours of work for an electrical contractor installing, constructing or maintaining electrical systems covered by the National Electrical Code (from two or more work categories, with per-category caps). | Residential Electrician exam: 80 multiple-choice questions, 3 hours 30 minutes, open book; 70% required to pass. | $175 |
| Fire/Life Safety Technician | 4,000 hours of work for an electrical contractor installing, constructing or maintaining electrical systems covered by the National Electrical Code (from two or more work categories, with per-category caps). | Fire/Life Safety exam: 50 multiple-choice questions, 2 hours 15 minutes, open book; 70% required to pass. | $175 |
| Voice, Data, Video Technician | 4,000 hours of work for an electrical contractor installing, constructing or maintaining electrical systems covered by the National Electrical Code (from two or more work categories, with per-category caps). | Voice, Data, Video Technician exam: 50 multiple-choice questions, 2 hours 15 minutes, open book; 70% required to pass. | $175 |
| Non-residential Lighting Technician | 2,000 hours of work for an electrical contractor installing, constructing or maintaining electrical systems covered by the National Electrical Code (from two or more work categories, with per-category caps). | Non-residential Lighting Technician exam: 50 multiple-choice questions, 2 hours 15 minutes, open book; 70% required to pass. | $175 |
Who does NOT need this license — exemptions
California’s electrician certification (the DIR/DLSE credential this page covers, in all five classifications — General Electrician, Residential Electrician, Fire/Life Safety Technician, Voice Data Video Technician, and Non-residential Lighting Technician) is bounded first by a structural rule, then by enumerated carve-outs. The structural rule: ‘Certification is required only for those persons who perform work as electricians for contractors licensed as class C-10 electrical contractors’ (Labor Code § 108.2(b)(1)). Anyone not performing electrical work as an employee of a C-10 contractor — homeowners working on their own property, in-house maintenance staff of businesses, public-agency employees — is outside the certification requirement altogether. On top of that boundary, the statute enumerates: workers for class C-7 low voltage systems or class C-45 electric sign contractors, as long as the work is within the C-7 or C-45 license scope, even if the same contractor also holds a C-10 (Labor Code § 108.2(b)(2)); workers on high-voltage electrical transmission or distribution systems owned by utilities (local publicly owned electric utilities, electrical corporations, and related PUC-defined entities) when employed by the utility or by a licensed contractor principally engaged in installing or maintaining transmission or distribution systems (§ 108.2(b)(3)); registered apprentices performing electrical work in a state- or federally approved apprenticeship program (§ 108.2(d)); uncertified workers employed as trainees under Labor Code § 108.4 — enrolled in an approved school and working under a certified electrician’s direct supervision (§ 108.2(e)); nonresidential lighting trainees in an approved on-the-job instructional program under onsite supervision of a certified nonresidential lighting technician (§ 108.2(f)); and the qualifying person for a C-10 license, who need not also be certified to perform or supervise electrical work for that contractor (§ 108.2(g)). The statute’s definition of ’electricians’ also excludes whole categories of work from certification: electrical connections under 100 volt-amperes; work covered by Business and Professions Code § 7042.5 (public utilities doing construction, maintenance, and development work incidental to their own business, and regulated cable television corporation activities); electrical work ordinarily and customarily performed by stationary engineers; and electrical work on temporary or portable equipment performed by technicians in the theatrical, motion picture production, television, hotel, exhibition, or trade show industries (Labor Code § 108(c)). Note the certification is a distinct credential from the CSLB C-10 contractor license; these exemptions address who must hold the DIR certification, not who may contract for electrical work.
Fees
Application for examination and certification (one exam): $175 = $100 exam fee + $75 administration fee, non-refundable, payable to ‘DIR-Electrician Certification Fund’. Retest exam fee: $100 per exam. Renewal: $100 per certificate. Renewal after certification has expired/lapsed (requires re-taking the exam): $200. Replacement certification card: $30. SSA employment history report (SSA-7050): SSA charges approximately $115.
Exam
Computer-based, multiple-choice, open-book exam administered by classification (100 questions/4 hours 30 minutes for General; 80 questions/3 hours 30 minutes Residential; 50 questions/2 hours 15 minutes for Fire-Life-Safety, Voice-Data-Video, and Non-residential Lighting). Minimum passing score 70%. Failing candidates must wait 60 days to retake and pay a $100 exam fee per retest. Exam is offered in English and Spanish. Exams taken on or after June 1, 2026 are administered by CPS HR Consulting: after DLSE approval, CPS HR Consulting ([email protected] , 855-298-4917) sends scheduling instructions within 1-2 business days and the exam is scheduled through Pearson VUE (866-302-9666 or online). The exam must be taken within one year of the eligibility notice.
Renewal & continuing education
Certification expires three years from the effective date. Renew before expiration; renewal applications accepted up to one year before expiration. 32 hours of continuing education relevant to the certification category, plus 2,000 hours of work in the industry within the past three years, required to renew before the card expires. If renewing after the card has expired, the CE requirement is waived but the exam must be re-taken.
How to apply
Applications are handled by California Department of Industrial Relations, Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) - Electrician Certification Unit (ECU). Start at the official application page .
How California compares to neighboring states
Each of these states issues its credential to the individual electrician, so the entry-level “general” or “journey-level” tier can be set side by side. Figures are each state’s own, in that state’s own units.
| State | General / journey-level experience route | Exam | Board fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| California | 8,000 hours of work for an electrical contractor on NEC-covered systems (from two or more work categories, with per-category caps) | 100 multiple-choice questions, 4 hours 30 minutes, open book; 70% to pass | $175 application for examination and certification (one exam) |
| Oregon | Completion of an approved Oregon apprenticeship; or 576 hours of classroom training plus 8,000 hours of out-of-state on-the-job experience (minimum 1,000 hours in each of residential, commercial and industrial); or 16,000 hours of out-of-state on-the-job experience (minimum 2,000 hours in each category; the 300 percent rule applies to both out-of-state routes) | 52 questions, 3 hours, open book | $100 license fee (General Journeyman) |
| Washington | 8,000 hours of work experience (no more than 4,000 in 4,000-hour specialties) plus 96 hours of classroom instruction — and in-state candidates must have gained those hours in a registered 8,000-hour apprenticeship approved under chapter 49.04 RCW (the allowance that let in-state trainees qualify on work hours alone ended July 1, 2026); out-of-state routes include an equivalent apprenticeship, a journey certificate obtained by exam in a state requiring at least 8,000 supervised hours, 16,000 out-of-state hours, or 8,000 armed-forces construction-battalion hours | Journey level (01) examination administered by PSI; each section must be passed with 70% or greater | $114.60 application (includes original certificate and application processing) |
| Utah | A 4-year (576 classroom hours) apprenticeship education program plus 8,000 hours of licensed experience, or 16,000 hours of licensed experience — note that Utah’s own DOPL exam-information page states 6,000 hours for the education path, so the board’s pages disagree on that figure | Utah Journeyman Electrician written exam and Utah Electrician Practical exam (6 modules), administered by Prov | $110 application fee (Electrician, all classifications) |
What the table shows: 8,000 hours is the common exam-entry benchmark in California, Washington and Utah’s education route; Oregon and Washington each run their journey tier through an approved in-state apprenticeship (Oregon’s listed with no separate hours figure, Washington’s a registered 8,000-hour program), and Utah is the only one that adds a practical exam to the written one. California’s published board figure is the highest of the four, though it is a combined application-and-examination charge while Oregon’s $100 is a license fee and Washington’s and Utah’s are application fees — the states do not price the same thing. Nevada, also on California’s border, is not in the table because it licenses the contractor (the C-2 Electrical Contracting license issued by the Nevada State Contractors Board), not the individual electrician, so its numbers are not the same credential.
Details and official sources for each state are on its linked page.
What it costs, all-in
California publishes each charge separately, and they are not one combined payment:
- Application for examination and certification (one exam): $175 — $100 exam fee plus $75 administration fee, non-refundable, payable to “DIR-Electrician Certification Fund”.
- Retest: $100 per exam. A failing candidate must wait 60 days to retake.
- Renewal: $100 per certificate, on a three-year cycle.
- Renewal after the certification has expired or lapsed: $200 — and that route requires re-taking the exam.
- Replacement certification card: $30.
- Social Security Administration employment-history report (Form SSA-7050): approximately $115, charged by SSA, not by the state. The application for examination and certification must include this report as proof of employment.
Two figures deliberately absent: per-exam charges for multi-exam bundles (only the single-exam $175 fee is confirmed from an official California page), and anything to do with the separate C-10 Electrical Contractor license — that credential comes from a different agency, the Contractors State License Board, whose fees are not stated here rather than guessed.
Common questions
Which California classification takes the fewest hours? Non-residential Lighting Technician, at 2,000 hours. The published hour requirements by classification are General 8,000; Residential 4,800; Fire/Life Safety 4,000; Voice/Data/Video 4,000; Non-residential Lighting 2,000. Each classification has its own exam, and the $175 application covers one exam.
What happens if the certification lapses? The renewal price and the requirements both change. Renewing before expiration costs $100 and requires 32 hours of continuing education relevant to the certification category plus 2,000 hours of work in the industry within the past three years. Renewing after the card has expired costs $200, the continuing-education requirement is waived, and the exam must be re-taken. Renewal applications are accepted up to one year before expiration.
Do the neighboring states’ apprenticeship routes work in California? Not as a substitute for the California exam. California’s record states that an out-of-state electrician license makes an applicant eligible to sit for the exam, but the California exam and certification are still required, and electricians moving to California must be certified before working — there is no grace period. By contrast, Oregon lists completion of an approved Oregon apprenticeship program as a qualifying route to its General Journeyman license, and Washington lists an out-of-state journey level certificate obtained by examination in a state requiring at least 8,000 hours of supervised experience among the ways to qualify on out-of-state experience.
Is the C-10 electrical contractor license the same credential as this one? No. The certification described on this page is the individual-electrician credential issued by the Department of Industrial Relations. The C-10 Electrical Contractor license — what a business needs to contract electrical work — is issued by a separate state agency, the Contractors State License Board. Its requirements and fees are not published on this page because they were not read from that board’s own pages.
Licensing rules change. We monitor official sources across the site and publish every change we act on — see recent changes and our corrections log .
Verify a license in California
California Department of Industrial Relations - Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, Electrician Certification Unit publishes a public license search , searchable by first four letters of last name plus last four digits of driver’s license/ID, certification card number, application tracking number or trainee number. It covers California state electrician certification and registered electrician-trainee status (General Electrician, Residential, Fire/Life Safety, Voice-Data-Video) - the individual credential, distinct from the CSLB contractor license.
Records come from California Department of Industrial Relations - Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, Electrician Certification Unit’s own system. LicensingAtlas does not hold license records and cannot confirm any individual’s status — the date on this page refers to the requirements described above, not to anyone’s credential.