Mississippi Window Tint: 28% on Every Window and a $5 Sticker Test

The operative rule is Miss. Code Ann. Section 63-7-59(2). Since July 1, 2006 no registered vehicle may be driven on a Mississippi road with any window tinted or darkened, by film or otherwise, unless the windshield carries a compliance label certifying that all the windows of the vehicle have a light transmittance of twenty-eight percent (28%) or more, or the driver holds a certificate of medical exemption. Note the drafting: Mississippi does not run separate numbers for front sides, back sides and rear glass the way most states do. One figure, 28%, applies to every window on the car, and the label certifies the whole vehicle rather than a single pane.

The windshield is treated separately and far more strictly. Section 63-7-59(1) bars driving with any tinted film, glazing material or darkening material of any kind on the windshield, except material designed to replace or provide a sun shield in the uppermost area as authorized to be installed by manufacturers under federal law. There is no percentage to argue about on the windshield and no AS-1 line written into the statute: anything below the factory sun shield band is unlawful outright.

Three carve-outs sit in Section 63-7-59(3). School buses, other buses used for public transportation, buses and vans owned or leased by a Mississippi nonprofit, funeral home services vehicles, limousines owned or leased by a private or public entity, government-owned law enforcement or fire department vehicles and volunteer fire department vehicles are outside the prohibition altogether. So is any window behind the front two side windows, including the rear window, of a pickup truck, van, motor home, recreational vehicle, sport utility vehicle or multipurpose vehicle, provided the darkening still meets the federal minimum for that window on that vehicle. And factory glass tinted before delivery as federal law permits is untouched. A sedan gets no rear-window allowance at all; the deeper rear tint concession is written for trucks, vans and SUVs only.

Enforcement in Mississippi runs through a permitted station, not a police lane. Section 63-7-59(6) has the Department of Public Safety issue the labels, which must be pressure-sensitive, self-destructive upon removal and no larger than one inch square, and must sit in the lower left corner of the windshield showing the label registration number and a certification of compliance with Mississippi law. Before the station may affix it, it has to meter the glass with a device approved and certified at least annually by the Department, and it charges a fixed fee of Five Dollars ($5.00), of which Two Dollars ($2.00) stays with the station and Three Dollars ($3.00) goes to the Department. No fee may be charged unless a test is actually performed.

The stations themselves are licensed under Miss. Code Ann. Section 63-7-60, added by 2015 Miss. Laws ch. 417. The Commissioner of Public Safety issues annual permits, charges Ten Dollars ($10.00) for a permit or renewal, may suspend or revoke a permit after reasonable notice, and must maintain and post at the Department of Public Safety lists of stations holding permits and of those suspended or revoked. That same 2015 act, House Bill 982, repealed Sections 63-13-1 through 63-13-29, the Mississippi Motor Vehicle Safety Inspection Law. Mississippi therefore has no annual safety inspection sticker, yet it still has a dedicated tint inspection regime with a metering requirement written into the instrument itself, which is an unusual combination.

The medical route is in Section 63-7-59(4). A person diagnosed with a physical condition or disease that is seriously aggravated by minimum exposure to sunlight may run darker glass, but the vehicle must display prominently on the dashboard a certificate of medical exemption on a form prepared by the Commissioner of Public Safety. The certificate is issued free of charge through the offices of the county tax collectors, on an affidavit signed by the applicant and attested by the diagnosing practitioner plus proof of ownership. From July 1, 2026, 2026 Miss. Laws ch. 340 (Senate Bill 2453) added optometrists licensed to practise optometry in Mississippi to the practitioners who may make that diagnosis and attest the affidavit; before that date only a physician licensed to practise medicine in Mississippi could.

Two penalty tiers apply. 00), or up to three (3) months in the county jail, or both. That reaches the tint shop as well as the driver. Every other violation of the section, including simply driving with unlabelled dark glass, is punishable as provided in Miss. Code Ann. Section 63-7-7, which makes it a misdemeanour to drive a vehicle equipped in any manner in violation of the equipment chapter. Subsection (12) is the practical limit on all of it: violations of Section 63-7-59 shall be enforced only by law enforcement officers of the Mississippi Department of Public Safety and by municipal law enforcement officers of municipalities having a population of two thousand (2,000) or more, on the roads under their jurisdiction.

County sheriffs and officers of the smallest towns are not on that list, and repeated bills to add sheriffs, including House Bill 1010 in 2015 and Senate Bill 2583 in 2021, died in committee.