What Are the Home Daycare License Requirements in Virginia?

Virginia's statute defines 'home-based child care' as a child day program offered in the provider's residence or the home of any child in care, serving one through 12 children under 13, not counting the provider's own children or children who live in the home, when at least one child is paid for.

That is the setting the regulations still call a 'family day home.' The licensing line is five: once a home serves five through 12 children, exclusive of the provider's own and resident children, it must be licensed.

Below that line, the statute still caps unlicensed, unregistered homes at no more than four children under age two, counting the provider's own and resident children, unless the home is licensed or voluntarily registered.

Virginia also offers voluntary registration for home-based child care that is not required to be licensed.

The statute recognizes two statuses for a home: licensed home-based child care, which is required at five through 12 children, and registered home-based child care, a voluntary registration for homes that are not required to be licensed.

The setting itself is capped at 12 children under 13, excluding the provider's own and resident children.

Day-to-day capacity is managed with a point system rather than a single staff-to-child ratio: each caregiver may not exceed 16 points, counted as 4 points for an infant up to 15 months, 3 points for ages 16 to 23 months, 2 points for ages 2 through 4, 1 point for ages 5 through 9 and 0 points for age 10 and older.

The caregiver's own children and resident children under eight count toward that maximum.

A licensed family day home provider must be at least 18 years old and hold a high school diploma or a college-admission equivalent, have three months of programmatic experience, and hold current CPR and first aid certification.

The 8VAC20-800 regulations use the title 'family day home provider' for this role.

On top of first aid and CPR, caregivers must complete at least 16 clock hours of training every year in areas relevant to their job responsibilities.

Virginia requires a background check for all child day program employees and volunteers before employment and every five years thereafter.

The check includes fingerprinting through the state CCRE and the FBI, a search of the central registry of child abuse and neglect, and criminal history, sex offender and abuse-and-neglect registry checks in any state the individual has lived in during the preceding five years.

Any assistant you hire as an employee is covered by that same requirement.

The federal CCDF background-check rule counts any individual residing in a family child care home who is age 18 and older among those who need the check.

Our research captured the state statute and the federal rule but did not separately confirm how VDOE applies them to every member of a licensed home's household, so confirm the household requirements with the department before you rely on a specific arrangement.

Virginia's family day home standards sit in 8VAC20-800, and VDOE administers licensing for child day programs, but our research pass captured the threshold, qualification, training and capacity sections of those rules without the home inspection requirements themselves.

What an inspection covers, when it happens in the application and what inspectors look for were not established in our research.

Ask VDOE's licensing staff what the inspection for a family day home involves, and confirm the current requirements directly with the department before you apply.

Virginia statute directs the Board of Education to set application fee schedules with gradations by capacity, and the fees fund provider training; our research did not confirm the current dollar amounts, so ask VDOE for the fee schedule that applies to a family day home application.

On timeline, the statute sets the outside: a license for home-based child care, and renewals of it, may be issued for periods of up to three successive years.

VDOE administers child day program licensing, so the department is the source for the current application steps, forms and documents.

Family day home assistants must be at least 16 years old, and an assistant under 18 must always be directly supervised by the provider.

An assistant you hire as an employee is a child day program employee, so the same background check applies before employment and every five years thereafter, with the fingerprinting and registry searches described above.

If you use a substitute provider rather than an employee, the regulations cap substitute use at no more than a total of 240 hours per calendar year.

A 2026 amendment to the Code of Virginia renamed the setting: the statute now says 'home-based child care' where it previously said 'family day home,' and the administrative regulations in 8VAC20-800 still use the older term, including the provisions on family day home providers, assistants and substitute providers.

The other change worth knowing dates to 2021: licensing of child day programs moved to the Virginia Department of Education from VDSS, so VDOE is the agency that administers family day home licensing today.