Oak Park, IL Sign Regulations: Digital Billboards (2026)

Section 7-7-16 draws a sharp line between two categories of electronic signage. Electronic message signs, changing-light text displays like traditional digital reader boards, are prohibited Village-wide with no district exception. Electronic display screens, the category covering video and image screens, are permitted only in the downtown and neighborhood commercial sign overlay districts, and even there they are tightly boxed in. Each screen is capped at six square feet, must be mounted no higher than seven feet above grade, and cannot cover prominent architectural features. Screens are allowed only as wall or window signs, never as freestanding or ground signs, and only one electronic display screen is permitted per zoning lot.

Content rules are equally specific: no off-premises advertising may appear on a screen, each image or message must hold static for at least eight seconds, and animation, streaming video, and any appearance of movement are prohibited outright, as is text that blinks, flashes, or mimics a strobe. Audio speakers or any audio component are barred entirely. Illumination from a screen cannot glare into any residential premises or interfere with the safe movement of traffic, and screens used as window signs count toward the separate 25 percent window sign area cap, while those used as wall signs count toward the maximum wall sign area.

Screens must also meet the light trespass standard in § 7-7-9D2. Taken together, the rule functions as a near-total ban on true digital billboards while allowing only small, static-image screens in the Village's two commercial overlay districts.