The Kentucky Revised Statutes are the permanent, codified laws of the Commonwealth, and you can read the full text for free at the Legislative Research Commission’s website.1Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Kentucky Revised Statutes The code is organized by subject, every law has a citation number, and once you know how the numbering works, you can jump to any section in a few clicks.
How a KRS Citation Is Built
A citation starts with the abbreviation “KRS,” then a number, a decimal point, and another number. In KRS 61.870, the “61” is the Chapter and “.870” is the Section within that Chapter. If you see KRS 189.390, you know to look in Chapter 189, Section .390. That’s the entire basic format.
Longer citations point to smaller pieces inside a section. “KRS 61.870(2)” means subsection (2) of that section, which defines “public record.”2Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. KRS 61.870 “KRS 61.870(1)(d)” takes you to paragraph (d) inside subsection (1). The further right you read in a citation, the more precisely it points.
Watch the digits. Chapter 61 covers general provisions about state government. Chapter 610 covers juvenile proceedings. A single misplaced zero drops you into an unrelated area of law, so if a citation feels wrong in context, check it against the online code before relying on it.
How the Code Is Organized
The KRS uses three levels. A Title is the broadest grouping and covers an entire legal topic; Title IX, for example, covers counties, cities, and other local government units. Each Title contains multiple Chapters on narrower subjects. Chapters contain Sections, which are the individual laws you actually read.3Kentucky General Assembly. Kentucky Revised Statutes
The numbering reflects that structure. Chapter 61 contains sections numbered 61.010, 61.020, and so on, so the number before the decimal always tells you which Chapter a law belongs to.
Inside a section, the text breaks down further. Numbered subsections — (1), (2), (3) — split into lettered paragraphs (a), (b), (c), and sometimes into numbered subparagraphs below that. KRS 61.870, the definitions section of Kentucky’s Open Records Act, shows this pattern: subsection (1) defines “public agency,” and paragraphs (a) through (k) list each type of government body that qualifies.2Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. KRS 61.870
Finding a Statute Online
The Legislative Research Commission hosts the complete code at apps.legislature.ky.gov. If you already know the citation, you can go straight to the section. If you don’t, you can browse the table of contents by Title and Chapter, or use the search tool.1Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Kentucky Revised Statutes
The search page gives you several options: all of the words, any of the words, an exact phrase, or boolean operators for more complex queries. You can also limit results to a statute number range, include or exclude repealed statutes, and hide Reviser’s Notes if they’re cluttering your view.4Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Kentucky Legislative Research Commission Search Options
Start specific. A search for “landlord security deposit” produces far more useful results than just “deposit.” If a search returns too many hits, use the statute range filter to narrow results to a particular area of law. When a section you’re reading cites another section, click the cross-reference instead of searching for it manually — the interface links related provisions directly.
What the History Note at the End Means
Most KRS sections end with a line that looks like: “History: 1996 c 278, §1, eff. 7-15-96.” The year is when the law was enacted or amended. “c 278” is Chapter 278 of the Kentucky Acts from that session, which is where the session law lives before codification. “§1” is the section of the original bill. “eff. 7-15-96” is the date the law took effect.
These notes let you trace a section back to the bill that created or changed it. Take the year and Acts chapter number, pull the matching volume of the Kentucky Acts, and you’ll find the original House or Senate bill number at the chapter heading. From there you can search the General Assembly’s archives for the bill’s full history.
A section with several entries has been amended more than once, listed chronologically. A long history line signals a provision the legislature has revisited repeatedly.
Statutes Are Not Administrative Regulations
The KRS and the Kentucky Administrative Regulations (KAR) are separate bodies of law. Statutes are passed by the General Assembly. Administrative regulations are written by executive branch agencies to fill in the practical details — forms, fees, procedures, deadlines — that statutes leave open.5Kentucky Department of Education. Kentucky Administrative Regulations
KAR citations look different. The format is a title number, “KAR,” a chapter number, a colon, and a regulation number, as in 405 KAR 5:020.6Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Kentucky Administrative Regulations – Quick Reference If a citation uses “KAR” instead of “KRS,” you’re looking at an agency rule, not a statute.
Both carry the force of law, but statutes outrank regulations. A regulation cannot exceed the authority granted by the statute that authorized it, and if the two conflict, the statute wins. When an agency says a regulation requires something, you can usually check the regulation’s “RELATES TO” or “STATUTORY AUTHORITY” heading to find the enabling statute and read it yourself.
Which Version of the KRS Counts
The Legislative Research Commission is the official custodian of the Kentucky Revised Statutes.7Kentucky General Assembly. Legislative Research Commission Kentucky law distinguishes between the LRC’s “official version” and “certified versions” that meet standards the Commission sets. In court or an administrative proceeding, the official or certified version controls.8Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Kentucky Revised Statutes – Chapter 7
You’ll also see the KRS on commercial databases like Westlaw and LexisNexis. The statutory text itself should match, but the annotations around it — editorial notes, case cross-references, secondary source pointers — vary by publisher because different editors write them. Annotations help with deeper research, but they are not part of the law. If an annotation seems to contradict the plain text, the statute wins.
For nearly anything a non-lawyer needs, the free LRC version is both sufficient and authoritative. The paid databases mostly add value through annotations and multi-state searching, which matters for attorneys building a case but not for someone looking up a specific Kentucky law.