A corkage fee in California is what a restaurant charges to open and serve a bottle of wine you brought from home, and it typically runs $25 to $50 per bottle. High-end restaurants often charge more, sometimes $100 or above. No state law caps the amount, and no restaurant is required to offer corkage in the first place.
Call the Restaurant Before You Bring a Bottle
Corkage is a courtesy, not a right. A restaurant can decline to open outside bottles entirely, and some do. Policies also change, and the fee you saw online last year may not be the fee tonight. A quick call before you leave the house avoids an awkward moment at the table.
When you call, confirm three things: whether they allow corkage at all, the current fee, and any limits on how many bottles you can bring. Ask about duplicates too, because many restaurants refuse to open a wine that already appears on their list.
What the Fee Costs and What It Buys
Most California restaurants now charge between $25 and $50 per bottle. The old $15 standard has largely disappeared. At the highest-end restaurants, fees above $75 are common, and a handful of well-known establishments charge $100 to $200 per bottle. Those steep fees are often meant to discourage BYO rather than cover the service.
The fee pays for the wine service you’d get with any bottle: proper stemware, professional pouring, decanting if the wine needs it, chilling for whites and sparkling wines, and cleanup. It also offsets the markup the restaurant would have earned on a bottle from its own list.
Ask about a waiver. Many restaurants will waive corkage on your bottle if you also buy one from their list. That single question can change the math on whether BYO is worth it.
Tip on the full value of the wine service, not on the corkage fee alone. Your server is doing the same work with your bottle that they would with one from the cellar.
Wine and Champagne Only, In Practice
Assume corkage covers wine and champagne only. Even restaurants with a full liquor license almost never extend BYO to spirits or beer. Wine arrives in a sealed, single-serving-sized bottle that staff can verify and pour in controlled amounts; spirits and beer create problems restaurants have no reason to take on.
If the restaurant holds a beer-and-wine-only license, bringing in anything stronger is not just discouraged, it’s prohibited. California Business and Professions Code Section 25607 makes it unlawful for a licensee to have alcohol on the premises that the license doesn’t authorize.1California Legislative Information. California Business and Professions Code 25607 A bottle of whiskey at a Type 41 restaurant puts the restaurant’s license at risk, so staff will refuse it.
What Restaurants Can Restrict
Restaurants set the terms, and the common ones look like this:
- Duplicate wines. If the bottle you brought is on their list, many restaurants will refuse to open it.
- Bottle limits. Most cap BYO at one or two standard 750ml bottles per table.
- Sealed bottles only. The bottle must be unopened when you arrive. Staff will check the label and the seal before uncorking it, and they can refuse anything that looks tampered with.
- Server discretion. Staff can decline to pour for any guest they believe is already intoxicated, whether the wine came from the cellar or from your car.
Taking Unfinished Wine Home
California lets you take an unfinished bottle home from a restaurant, whether you bought it there or brought it yourself. Staff will reseal the bottle with the cork before you leave. The rule is sometimes called the recorking privilege, and it applies at any licensed eating place.
Once the bottle is in your car, open container law takes over, and it is strict. Under California Vehicle Code Section 23225, any opened or partially consumed bottle of alcohol in a motor vehicle must be stored in the trunk. If your car has no trunk, the bottle has to go somewhere not normally occupied by the driver or passengers. A glove compartment or center console does not count.2California Legislative Information. California Vehicle Code 23225
Handing the resealed bottle to someone in the back seat is not a workaround. California also prohibits any passenger from possessing an open container of alcohol in a moving vehicle on a highway. Put it in the trunk.
The Restaurant Can Still Cut You Off
Bringing your own wine does not change the server’s responsibilities. California Business and Professions Code Section 25602 makes it a misdemeanor to furnish alcohol to someone who is obviously intoxicated, and that applies to pouring from your bottle just as it does to pouring from the restaurant’s stock.3California Legislative Information. California Business and Professions Code 25602 A server who thinks you’ve had enough will stop pouring, and the restaurant has every reason to back that call to protect its license.