How to Start a Daycare in Virginia: Licensing Steps, Costs and Staffing

Daycares in Virginia are licensed by the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE), whose Division of Early Childhood Care and Education took over child day programs from the Virginia Department of Social Services in 2021.

Licensed child day centers answer to the Standards for Licensed Child Day Centers in 8VAC20-780; home-based programs answer to the family day home regulations in 8VAC20-800, which still carry the old name even though the 2026 statute renamed the category home-based child care.

The statute sits in Code of Virginia Title 22.1, Chapter 14.1.

Because the agency changed hands in 2021, older guides that point you to VDSS are out of date.

The sources we read name no separate group-home tier: 13 or more children at any location — even a house — makes the program a child day center.

A child day center is a child day program for two or more children under 13 in a facility that is not the provider's or any child's residence, or for 13 or more children anywhere.

Home-based child care, the statute's term since a 2026 amendment for what the regulations still call a family day home, is care in the provider's or a child's home for one through 12 children under 13, not counting the provider's own or resident children, when at least one child is paid for.

Serving five through 12 children requires the license.

Below that threshold a home may register voluntarily, and unlicensed, unregistered care may serve no more than four children under age two, counting the provider's own and resident children.

Our research captured Virginia's fee rule and license terms but not a step-by-step account of VDOE's application or its pre-licensing inspection visit, so get the current sequence from VDOE's Division of Early Childhood Care and Education before you schedule a build-out.

What the sources do establish: the Board of Education sets application fee schedules with minimum and maximum amounts and gradations by capacity; a child day center license runs two years from issuance, while a home-based license may be issued for up to three years; and background checks are a before-hire step for every employee and volunteer, repeated every five years, covering fingerprints, a central registry search and registry checks in any state of residence in the past five years.

The statute lets an applicant start work before every component returns only with a qualifying fingerprint result, under continuous supervision by someone cleared within the past five years.

At a child day center, one adult must be on the premises during operating hours in charge of administration — the administrator or an appointed or designated adult.

Center directors must be at least 21 and meet one of four education-and-experience paths, which run from a child-related graduate degree plus six months of programmatic experience to two years of experience, one supervisory, plus an early childhood certificate, a CDA-type credential or a Montessori certification.

Directors without management experience add a business-related college course, 10 hours of management training or a child care management course, and a qualified director or back-up director must regularly be on site at least 50% of operating hours.

The classroom lead title is program leader, at least 18 with a high school diploma or equivalent plus listed options; the assistant title is aide, at least 16 with no education minimum, and one program leader supervises no more than two aides.

Staff complete the VDOE-sponsored orientation course within 90 calendar days, center orientation before working alone and within seven days, first aid and CPR within 30 days, and a minimum of 16 hours of training annually.

Licensed home-based providers must be at least 18 with a high school diploma or college-admission equivalent, three months of programmatic experience and current CPR and first aid, plus 16 clock hours of training a year.

Virginia sets center staffing in 8VAC20-780-350, and the youngest rooms carry the tightest rules: birth to 16 months is 1:4 with a maximum group of 12, 16 to 24 months is 1:5 (group of 15), two-year-olds are 1:8 (24), and three-year-olds up to school age are 1:10 (30).

School-age-eligible children are staffed at 1:18 up to age 9 and 1:20 for ages 9 to 12, with no group-size limits for that band.

In an ongoing mixed-age group, the ratio and group size of the youngest child apply to the entire group, and staff count in ratio only while directly supervising children.

Licensed home capacity works differently: under the 8VAC20-800 family day home rules, a caregiver may not exceed 16 points, counted as 4 points per infant up to 15 months, 3 for ages 16 to 23 months, 2 for ages 2 to 4, 1 for ages 5 to 9 and 0 from age 10 — and the caregiver's own or resident children under eight count in the maximum.

Virginia statute directs the Board of Education to set application fee schedules with minimum and maximum amounts and, where appropriate, gradations by capacity, and the fees fund provider training.

The dollar amounts themselves were not confirmed in our research — VDOE's fee pages were not accessible when we read them — so get the current schedule from VDOE before you budget.

On timing, the sources we read establish license terms rather than a processing timeline: center licenses run two years from issuance and home-based licenses may be issued for up to three years.

For national context only, a September 2021 U.S. Treasury report described most for-profit child care facilities as operating on razor-thin profit margins usually below 1 percent, and, citing a Center for American Progress cost analysis, said wages are at least 50-60 percent of child care expenses on U.S. averages — a reminder that staffing is a large share of a child care budget.

Virginia does not appear on the T.E.A.C.H.

Early Childhood National Center's programs-by-state list as of our October 2026 check, so do not plan around T.E.A.C.H. scholarships here.

The main ECE scholarship our research found is Project Pathfinders, administered by the Virginia Early Childhood Foundation: it funds people already working with children birth to 5 to attend a Virginia community college toward an early childhood certificate or degree, covers bachelor's study for those who have finished the transferable two-year ECE degree, and includes a high-school dual-enrollment track — a staffing lever for meeting the credential and training rules above.

RecognizeB5, the educator incentive tied to VQB5, made lead and assistant educators eligible for a maximum of $1,500 in 2024-2025, but VDOE's July 2024 bulletin reports no RecognizeB5 funds in the 2025-2026 state budget, so do not build it into a startup budget.

Note that participation in VQB5, Virginia's unified measurement and improvement system, is required for publicly funded birth-to-five providers and optional for others.

Our research did not confirm a Virginia startup grant for new daycare operators; ask VDOE what funding is currently available.

State licensing may not be the only approval a site needs.

Local zoning, building and fire requirements for your locality were not established in our research — the sources this page is built on are the state statute and the VDOE rulebooks, not city or county codes.

Before you commit to a site, check with your city or county planning and zoning office and your local fire official, and ask VDOE which local clearances your license application needs.

Two changes matter if you are working from older material.

Licensing of child day programs moved from the Virginia Department of Social Services to the Virginia Department of Education in 2021, so VDOE is the agency that answers licensing questions today.

And a 2026 amendment to the statute renamed the family day home category home-based child care; the regulations in 8VAC20-800 still use the old term, so you will see both names across the statute and the rules.