Kentucky Window Tint: 35% Front, 18% Rear, Door-Jamb Label Required

KRS 189.110 splits a Kentucky vehicle into three glass zones and gives each its own pair of numbers. Subsection (3) governs the side wings and side windows on either side forward of or adjacent to the operator's seat: film may be applied only if, tested on one-eighth (1/8) inch clear glass, it shows a total solar reflectance of visible light of no more than 25 percent measured on the nonfilm side and a light transmittance of at least 35 percent. Subsection (4) governs every window behind the driver and is looser on darkness but stricter on mirror finish, at least 18 percent transmittance with reflectance no higher than 35 percent, and for multipurpose passenger vehicles the transmittance floor drops to 8 percent. Perforated sunscreening gets its own rule in subsection (4)(b), at no less than 30 percent transmittance and no more than 35 percent total reflectance, with the highest reflectance found by dividing the area into sixteen equal sections and averaging, and no single section allowed past 50 percent.

The windshield is handled by subsection (2), which is written as a closed list. Nothing may be attached to or located in or upon the windshield except a certificate or other paper required to be displayed by law, transparent sunscreening along a strip at the top that does not encroach on the AS-1 portion defined by Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 205, or sunscreening applied to the windshield that has a light transmittance of not less than 70 percent and is not red or yellow in color. That last allowance is worth noticing, because Kentucky is one of the states that permits a clear or near-clear film across the entire windshield rather than only a brow strip, provided the 70 percent figure holds and the color is neither red nor yellow.

Two definitions in KRS 189.010 do real work here. Subsection (23) defines a "window" to exclude the windshield, any roof-mounted viewing device, and any viewing device with less than one hundred fifty (150) square inches of area, so a small fixed quarter light under that size falls outside the transmittance rule entirely. Subsection (22) defines "transmittance" as a ratio measured through the product and the glazing together, which is why the statute keeps specifying the one-eighth inch clear glass test pane: the number describes film plus glass, not film alone. Subsection (7) of KRS 189.110 then allows every percentage in subsections (2) to (4) a tolerance of plus or minus three percent, so a meter reading of 32 percent on a front side window sits inside the law and 31 percent does not.

Two further rules catch the darkest builds. Subsection (5) allows a rear window that has been made nontransparent only if the vehicle is equipped with side mirrors on both sides. Subsection (12) preserves any factory glazing approved by federal statute or regulation that was a component part of the vehicle at manufacture, along with a replacement window meeting the same requirements, so the privacy glass molded into a Kentucky-registered SUV or minivan at the plant is untouched by the percentages above.

The installer side of the section was rewritten by 2024 Ky. Acts ch. 17, sec. 1, effective July 15, 2024. Subsection (8) now says outright that a person shall not install window tinting materials on a vehicle that fails the minimum light transmission standards, and that noncompliant tinted material shall be removed immediately. Subsection (6) is the labeling requirement that has been Kentucky's signature for decades: each installer or seller must give the purchaser a pressure-sensitive, self-destructive, nonremovable, vinyl-type film label certifying compliance with KRS 189.010(20) to (23) and subsections (1) to (5), must affix that label to the inside left door jamb, and the label must carry the trade name of the material and the installer's or seller's business name. Labeling is not required for factory glazing that complies with Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 205. A Kentucky trooper who opens the driver's door and finds no jamb label on an aftermarket film has an immediate reason to reach for a meter.

There is no medical exemption. KRS 189.110 contains no waiver, no physician certification and no permit route, and a full-text search of the Kentucky Revised Statutes returns the word "sunscreening" in only two places, KRS 189.010 and KRS 189.110, while the same phrase search across the Kentucky Administrative Regulations returns nothing at all. No Kentucky agency has been handed rulemaking authority over tint darkness, so unlike states that route a light-sensitivity waiver through a health department or a state police form, a Kentucky driver with lupus or a photosensitivity diagnosis has no lawful path to film below 35 percent on the front sides.

990(1)(a), not less than twenty dollars ($20) nor more than one hundred dollars ($100) for each offense. 040(2)(b). 110(8) separately directs that tinted material failing the minimum standards shall be removed immediately, so a citation normally arrives paired with an expectation that the film comes off. Enforcement is entirely roadside. 115 requires is a certified inspector's check of the vehicle together with its title application and supporting documents when a vehicle is brought into the state and titled here, extended to military surplus vehicles and street-legal special purpose vehicles, and that inspection is about identity and paperwork rather than light transmittance.

There is therefore no annual lane where a meter is applied, and no registration hold quietly forcing compliance, so a Kentucky tint charge arrives as a traffic stop by the Kentucky State Police or a city or county department.