DUI Under 21 in Florida: The 0.02% Rule

Florida's under-21 limit is 0.02%, and the suspension is administrative and immediate: the officer takes the license at the roadside.

The rule

Under Florida statute 322.2616, it's unlawful for anyone under 21 to drive or be in actual physical control of a vehicle with a blood or breath alcohol level of 0.02 or higher. An officer with probable cause can detain the driver and request a test.

What happens at the roadside

If the test shows 0.02 or higher, or if the driver refuses, the officer suspends the license on behalf of the state, takes it, and issues a 10-day temporary permit (if the driver is otherwise eligible) with a notice of suspension:

Situation	Suspension
0.02 or higher, first violation	6 months
0.02 or higher, previously suspended under this law	1 year
Refusing the test, first time	1 year
Refusing again after a previous refusal suspension	18 months

At 0.05 or higher, the suspension stays in effect until the driver completes a substance abuse course from a licensed DUI program, at the driver's expense. For drivers under 19, the program notifies parents or guardians of the evaluation results.

Not a crime, but on the record

A violation of this section is neither a traffic infraction nor a criminal offense, and being detained under it isn't an arrest. It's an administrative action, but it is recorded on the driver's motor vehicle record, and it doesn't prevent prosecution for a regular DUI if the driver was at 0.08 or impaired.

Challenging the suspension

You have 10 days from the notice to request a review: an informal review (paper only, decided within 30 days) or a formal review (an in-person hearing where the arresting officer can be subpoenaed). Two rules favor the driver — if FLHSMV doesn't schedule a requested hearing within 30 days, the suspension is automatically invalidated, and if a subpoenaed officer doesn't show up to a formal hearing, the suspension is invalidated too. Beyond that, the only appeal path is a petition to the circuit court, which reviews the record rather than holding a new trial and doesn't pause the suspension while it's pending. Nothing said at the administrative review can be used against you in a separate criminal case, and a criminal outcome doesn't change the administrative one — the two are handled separately. You also can't be suspended under both this law and Florida's general adult implied-consent law for the same single stop.

Can a minor get a hardship license?

Yes, through the same business/employment-purposes hardship license adults use (§ 322.271) — but not right away. The application only opens 30 days after the initial 10-day temporary permit expires, so realistically around 40 days from the stop. A second refusal-based suspension (18 months) may not qualify at all: Florida bars a hardship license for anyone suspended twice for test refusal, and a minor's application runs through that same rule.

When this becomes a full DUI charge

Florida's criminal DUI threshold (§ 316.193) is a flat 0.08% for every driver regardless of age — there's no separate, lower per-se criminal threshold just because you're under 21. But the law also lets prosecutors charge DUI based on impaired "normal faculties" alone, independent of the number, so a driver under 0.08% (even under 0.05%) can still face a criminal DUI charge on evidence like erratic driving or a failed field sobriety test, separately from the civil zero-tolerance suspension.

Reinstatement

The base reinstatement fee is $45. An additional $130 applies when the underlying suspension was for a DUI or a test refusal — which likely puts a straightforward 0.02%+ suspension at $45 and a refusal-based one at $175, though FLHSMV's fee schedule doesn't name this specific statute directly.

What it does to your insurance rates

We didn't find comparable published insurance rate data for an under-21 alcohol violation in Florida. Two things are true everywhere: teen drivers already pay the highest premiums of any age group, and an alcohol-related violation on a young driver's record makes that worse. See what teens normally pay in our Florida teen driver guide, and what an adult DUI does to rates in our Florida DUI guide.

Related: Car insurance after a DUI in Florida · FR-44 in Florida