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DUI on an e-scooter costs: a $250 scooter offence, until the device is a vehicle

Our vehicle-type pages price a DUI on a bicycle, a golf cart and an ATV. The rented e-scooter on the pavement outside a bar belongs to the same family, with one sharp twist: California wrote it its own small offence with a small fine — and the boundary of that offence is a device definition, so a scooter that falls outside the definition falls back into the full DUI statute.

California's scooter-specific offence

California Vehicle Code section 21221.5 makes it unlawful to operate a motorized scooter upon a highway while under the influence of an alcoholic beverage or any drug, or under the combined influence of both. A conviction is punished by a fine of not more than two hundred fifty dollars ($250) — the figure is stated in the statute itself, reproduced in the official code text. The section sits alongside section 21221, which subjects a person operating a motorized scooter on a highway to the provisions of the Vehicle Code more generally; the specific impaired-riding offence and its capped fine are the section 21221.5 layer priced in the table.

The definition does the work. A motorized scooter in California law is a two-wheeled device with handlebars, a floorboard designed to be stood upon or a seat and footrests in place of it, and an electric motor — the definition carried in Vehicle Code section 407.5 and summarised in the code references for section 21221.5. A device inside that definition is priced by the $250 offence. A faster or more powerful machine that is in law a moped, a motor-driven cycle or a motor vehicle is not: impaired operation of it is charged under the general DUI statute, section 23152, whose first-offence fine range of $390 to $1,000 and licence consequences are priced in our California breakdown.

The same $250 pattern appears one device over. Section 21200.5, the cycling-under-the-influence offence priced on our bicycle page, also caps its fine at $250. California's design is consistent: human-scale devices get a dedicated, fine-only impaired offence, while anything the code treats as a vehicle gets the full DUI stack — jail exposure, licence suspension, programme orders and the reinstatement layer. Which side of that line a shared-mobility scooter, a privately owned e-bike conversion or a seated scooter falls on is a question about the device in front of the officer, not about what the rental app called it.

The scooter components that are published

Two components are deliberately not priced in the table. Rental-company charges — account bans, damage claims, late-return or impound recovery charged by a scooter operator — are set by private rental terms, not by any statute, and no published official schedule exists for them. Medical and property-damage liability from a scooter crash is likewise case-specific civil exposure. The statutory components are the table below.

Sources: California Vehicle Code §§ 21221.5, 21200.5, 21221, 407.5 and 23152, as reproduced in the official California Legislative Information code text and code references. Last verified: October 2026.

Why other states do not price out the same way

California is the clean case because it wrote the device offence down. In most states there is no scooter-specific impaired statute to quote: an e-scooter is either inside the state's definition of a vehicle for DUI purposes, in which case the ordinary DUI components apply at the ordinary prices, or outside it, in which case officers reach for public-intoxication, disorderly-conduct or local-ordinance charges whose amounts are set locally. A page that printed a national e-scooter DUI price would be inventing the uniformity the statutes do not have, so this page prices the one offence a legislature has actually published and describes the rest.

The practical trap runs the other direction from the one riders expect. The $250 figure is real, but it protects only the ride that stays inside the definition and the section: a rider who injures someone, who is also charged with another offence arising from the same ride, or whose device is modified beyond the scooter definition can face components this table does not cap. Restitution for a proven loss, in particular, follows the rule priced on this run's restitution page — it is set on the loss, not on the device.

For the car-DUI stack that a reclassified device falls back into, start with the state breakdown for the state of the arrest; for the neighbouring device offences, see the bicycle, golf cart and ATV pages linked above. The scooter page's job is narrower: one published fine, one definition that controls it, and an honest account of where the small offence ends.

Common questions

Can you get a DUI on a rented e-scooter in California?

You can be convicted under Vehicle Code § 21221.5 for operating a motorized scooter on a highway while under the influence of alcohol or drugs. The published punishment is a fine of not more than $250.

Why is the scooter fine so much smaller than a car DUI fine?

Because the legislature gave the device its own offence. Section 21221.5 caps the fine at $250; a car DUI under § 23152 carries a $390–$1,000 first-offence fine plus the licence and programme stack.

When does a scooter ride become a full DUI?

When the device falls outside the motorized-scooter definition in § 407.5 — for example a machine the code treats as a moped or motor vehicle — impaired operation is charged under the general DUI statute instead.

Sources: California Vehicle Code §§ 21221.5, 21200.5, 407.5, 23152. Last verified: October 2026. This page is educational information about costs only — not legal advice. Laws and fees change; confirm current figures with your court and your state's driver-licensing agency.