California Vehicle Code 22100: Turn Rules, Fines, and Points

California Vehicle Code 22100 governs how you position your car when turning. On a right turn, both your approach and the turn itself must stay as close as practicable to the right-hand curb or edge of the road. On a left turn, your approach must be as close as practicable to the left edge of the far-left lane going your direction, and you cannot start the turn until you’ve entered the intersection. A violation is an infraction that runs about $233 after fees and adds one point to your DMV record.¹

How to Make a Legal Right Turn

Hug the curb on the way in and through the turn. The word “practicable” in the statute gives you some leeway when a parked car, pothole, or road layout pushes you out a few feet, but the baseline is to stay as far right as you reasonably can so you don’t swing into an adjacent lane.¹

Two situations change this:

If the road has lanes specifically marked for right turns, you can turn from any of those designated lanes instead of crowding the curb.
If you’re turning right off a one-way street, you still approach near the right edge, but you may complete the turn into any lawfully available lane on the road you’re entering.¹

How to Make a Legal Left Turn

Approach from the far-left lane open to traffic heading your direction, as close to the left edge of that lane as you can get. Don’t begin the turn until you’ve actually entered the intersection. Once inside, complete the turn into any lane lawfully available for traffic moving in your new direction.¹

One narrow exception applies on three-lane roads. If you’re on a highway with three marked lanes going your direction and it ends at a two-way road, a driver in the middle lane may turn left into any available lane on the new road. On any other road, the middle lane does not give you left-turn rights.¹

What CVC 22100 Does Not Cover

The statute is about positioning. Several things drivers commonly lump in with “turning rules” live in other sections of the code and can be cited separately:

When and how long to signal are handled by CVC 22107 and 22108, which require a signal whenever another vehicle could be affected and a continuous signal for the last 100 feet before the turn.²³
Right turns on red (and left on red from one-way to one-way) are governed by CVC 21453, which requires a complete stop and yielding to pedestrians and close traffic before you go.⁴
Yielding to pedestrians in marked or unmarked crosswalks at intersections falls under CVC 21950. A technically correct turn under 22100 can still draw a citation if you fail to yield.⁵
Posted “No Right Turn” or “No Left Turn” signs are enforced through CVC 22101, a separate offense from 22100.⁶
U-turns at signal-controlled intersections are covered by CVC 22100.5, which requires the far-left lane and a signal that permits the movement.⁷

Fine, Points, and License Consequences

A CVC 22100 violation is an infraction, so there’s no criminal charge and no jail exposure.⁸ The base fine is $35, but once state penalty assessments, surcharges, and court fees are added under the 2025 Uniform Bail and Penalty Schedule, the total runs about $233. Prior moving-violation convictions within the past 36 months add $10 to the base fine per prior.⁹

A conviction also adds one point to your DMV record.¹⁰ Points stay on your record for three years and typically push up insurance premiums. If they accumulate fast enough, the DMV classifies you as a negligent operator and suspends your license for six months. The thresholds are four points in 12 months, six in 24 months, or eight in 36 months.¹¹

Keeping the Point Off Your Record With Traffic School

If you qualify, completing a state-approved traffic school course after a CVC 22100 ticket keeps the point off your public DMV record, which means insurers can’t see it. You’re generally eligible if you hold a valid noncommercial license and haven’t used traffic school for another ticket in the past 18 months.¹²

You still pay the full fine, plus the traffic school fee. Online courses usually run $20 to $50 depending on the provider. Commercial license holders fall under different rules and should check with the court directly.

If the Turn Caused a Crash

A turning ticket becomes much more serious when someone was hurt. Under California Evidence Code 669, violating a safety statute creates a rebuttable presumption of negligence. An injured person doesn’t have to prove you drove carelessly in some general sense; they point to the 22100 violation and the law presumes you failed to exercise due care.¹³

You can rebut the presumption by showing you did what a reasonable person would have done, or that an emergency or unusual road condition made compliance impractical. In most turn-related crashes, the violation is hard to explain away, and insurers facing a clean statutory breach tend to settle rather than fight.¹³

California’s comparative fault system works the other way too. If the person you hit was partly at fault, their recovery drops by their share of the blame. A 22100 violation doesn’t automatically put the full loss on you, but it hands the other side a strong starting position on liability.

1
California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 22100 – Turning Upon a Highway
2
California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 22107 – Turning and Lane Change Signals
3
California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 22108 – Signal Duration
4
California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 21453 – Circular Red or Red Arrow
5
California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 21950 – Right-of-Way at Crosswalks
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California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 22101 – Turning Movements at Intersections
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California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 22100.5 – U-Turns at Controlled Intersections
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California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 40000.1 – Infractions
9
Judicial Council of California. Uniform Bail and Penalty Schedules 2025
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California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 12810 – Violation Point Count
11
California DMV. Negligent Operator Actions
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California Courts Self Help. Traffic School
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California Legislative Information. California Evidence Code 669 – Presumption of Negligence from Statute Violation