DMV Brings More Services Online

SACRAMENTO — The Department of Motor Vehicles or DMV is expanding its digital transformation efforts and bringing more services online. The DMV is also now offering an online customer experience that is faster, and can be personalized, housing all of an individual’s driver’s license and vehicle related information in one location. 

Starting June 3, the DMV will reduce potential wait times for customers by requiring the following transactions be completed through alternative, “out-of-office” options — including online and at DMV self-serve kiosks commonly found at both DMV locations and retail locations like grocery stores:

• Simple vehicle registration renewals that are not past the due date.
• Driver’s license renewals that do not require an in-person visit.
• Requests for copies of vehicle registration records, which show a vehicle’s ownership history.
• Requests for copies of driver’s license records, which show a driver’s history.
• Replacing a lost or stolen driver’s license/identification card.

In recent years, the DMV has digitized many of their services and made more than 90% of transactions available online. These transactions are available online or by mail, and in some cases at kiosks, over the phone or through DMV business partners. As more customers go online and use other service channels, DMV offices can better accommodate Californians who need a REAL ID or otherwise must visit an office.

In total, this could potentially reduce DMV office visits by 200,000 customers a month – 2.4 million trips in a year.

Bigger picture

The DMV has more than doubled the number of online services, from 20 in 2019 to 50 today. There are 287 DMV Kiosks available statewide and thousands of business partners throughout the state. Many transactions that previously required an office visit can also be started online and completed with the assistance of a virtual agent. Californians completed more than 27 million online transactions in 2023, compared to 18.7 million in 2019.

The DMV also cut transaction times by two-thirds, removed obstacles so staff can process transactions more quickly and developed a paperless renewal notifications program.

Additionally, the new MyDMV account allows for easy renewal of driver’s licenses and status checks, and also offers choices on how to receive important DMV information, including updating an address, changing the name on your driver’s license and ordering a replacement driver’s license.

MyDMV also offers a “Garage” feature that allows customers to park and manage all vehicle and boat information, renew registration, and check processing status in one convenient place.

It is unclear how or if these changes will affect DMV employees’ jobs.