Hours of Service Rules for Truck Drivers: The 11, 14, 30-Minute, 70-Hour and Sleeper Berth Rules Explained (2026 CDL-A Guide)

Your clock runs your day

Every CDL-A driver learns the hours of service rules in school, and most forget half of them by the end of the first month on the road. Then a shipper holds the truck for four hours, the 14-hour window runs out 60 miles from the receiver, and the rules suddenly matter a lot.

This guide explains the hours of service rules for truck drivers hauling property in interstate commerce: the 11-hour driving limit, the 14-hour window, the 30-minute break, the 60/70-hour limit, the 34-hour restart, sleeper berth splits, and the two exceptions drivers ask about most. It is written by Maas Logistics LLC, an asset-based dry van and reefer carrier in Melissa, Texas, on the north side of DFW. We run full truckload freight across 48 states, so these are the rules our own drivers plan around every day.

This is general information, not legal advice. The official rules are in 49 CFR Part 395, your carrier's policies may be stricter, and your ELD and your safety department have the final word on your logs. Intrastate drivers who never cross a state line may fall under their state's rules instead, which can differ.

Hours of service in one paragraph

Before you can drive, you need 10 consecutive hours off duty. After that, you can drive up to 11 hours, but only inside a 14-hour window that starts when you come on duty. Once you have 8 hours of driving without a break, you need a 30-minute break from driving before you drive again. On top of the daily limits, you cannot drive after 60 hours on duty in 7 days or 70 hours on duty in 8 days, depending on your carrier's schedule, and a 34-hour off-duty period can restart that weekly count. Those numbers come from 49 CFR 395.3.

The four duty statuses

Your ELD records every minute of your day in one of four statuses. Getting them right is the foundation of everything else.

• Off duty. You are relieved of all work and responsibility. Meals, sleep at a hotel or at home, and real personal time.
• Sleeper berth. Time resting in a sleeper berth that meets the federal definition.
• Driving. All time at the controls of the truck in operation.
• On duty, not driving. Everything else that is work: pre-trip and post-trip inspections, fueling, loading and unloading, waiting at a shipper or receiver to be loaded when you have not been relieved from duty, paperwork, and dealing with a breakdown. Under 49 CFR 395.2, on-duty time includes all time inspecting, servicing or conditioning the truck and time waiting to be dispatched at a shipper or other facility unless you have been relieved from duty.

A common rookie mistake is logging dock time as off duty to save hours. If you are still responsible for the truck and the load and waiting to be called to a door, that is usually on-duty time. Log it honestly.

The 11-hour driving limit

You may drive a total of 11 hours after 10 consecutive hours off duty (49 CFR 395.3(a)(3)(i)). Those 11 hours do not have to be in a row, but they all have to fall inside the 14-hour window. Once you hit 11 hours of driving, you are done driving until you get another 10 hours off (or a qualifying sleeper berth split, below).

The 14-hour window

This is the rule that catches most drivers. Once you come on duty after 10 hours off, a 14-hour clock starts (49 CFR 395.3(a)(2)). You cannot drive after the 14th hour, even if you have driving time left. Taking a lunch break, a nap in the cab, or a long wait at a dock off duty does not stop the 14-hour clock. Only a qualifying sleeper berth period, described below, is left out of the 14-hour calculation.

That is why long waits at shippers and receivers hurt drivers so much. Four hours at a dock is four hours gone from your 14, whether or not you turned a wheel. Shippers who want to help drivers can read our guide on how to reduce detention.

The 30-minute break

You cannot drive if more than 8 hours of driving have passed without at least a 30-minute consecutive interruption in driving (49 CFR 395.3(a)(3)(ii)). The key word is driving. Since 2020, the break can be off duty, in the sleeper berth, on duty not driving, or a combination of those. So 30 minutes spent fueling, doing paperwork, or waiting at a dock can count as your break, as long as you are not driving.

Drivers who qualify for the short-haul exceptions in 49 CFR 395.1(e) do not need the 30-minute break.

The 60/70-hour limit and the 34-hour restart

The weekly limit counts all on-duty time, driving and not driving (49 CFR 395.3(b)):

• 60 hours in 7 consecutive days if your carrier does not operate trucks every day of the week.
• 70 hours in 8 consecutive days if your carrier operates every day of the week.

Most OTR carriers run seven days a week, so most OTR drivers live on the 70-hour/8-day clock. It is a rolling total. Each day, the hours from the oldest day drop off and you pick them back up.

The 34-hour restart (49 CFR 395.3(c)) lets you reset that weekly count to zero by taking 34 or more consecutive hours off duty. Whether and when you take a restart is a planning choice. A restart in the right place can set up a full week of driving. A restart in the wrong place, like at a truck stop two states from your next pickup, can cost you a day.

Sleeper berth splits: 7/3 and 8/2

If your truck has a sleeper berth, you can split your required 10 hours off into two periods instead of taking them all at once (49 CFR 395.1(g)(1)). The rules for a split:

• You take no more than two rest periods.
• One of them is at least 7 consecutive hours in the sleeper berth.
• The other is at least 2 consecutive hours, either in the sleeper berth or off duty, or a combination.
• The two periods add up to at least 10 hours.

That gives you common pairings like 7/3 and 8/2. The big advantage is that neither qualifying rest period counts against your 14-hour window. Your driving time and 14-hour window are recalculated from the end of the first of the two rest periods, and the driving time immediately before and after each rest period, added together, cannot go over 11 hours or break the 14-hour limit.

Splits are where most log mistakes happen. If you plan to use one, map it out before you start the day, and if you are not sure, call your safety department before you roll, not after.

Two exceptions drivers ask about

Adverse driving conditions

If you run into snow, ice, sleet, fog, other bad weather, or unusual road or traffic conditions that you did not know about and could not reasonably have known about before starting your day (or before driving after a qualifying break), and those conditions keep you from safely finishing the run within your normal limits, you can drive up to 2 more hours beyond the normal limits in 49 CFR 395.3(a) to finish the run or reach a safe place (49 CFR 395.1(b)(1); definition in 49 CFR 395.2). This exception does not cover a traffic jam that was on the news before you left, or a slow day you should have planned for. Annotate your log when you use it.

The 150 air-mile short-haul exception

Drivers who stay within a 150 air-mile radius (172.6 statute miles) of their normal work reporting location, return there and are released within 14 consecutive hours, and have at least 10 consecutive hours off between each 14 hours on duty, are exempt from keeping regular logs and ELD records under 49 CFR 395.1(e)(1). The carrier must keep time records instead. This exception mostly fits local and day-cab work. OTR drivers hauling dry van and reefer across 48 states will almost always be on full logs.

A sample OTR day

Here is how the rules play out on a normal day. Times are only an example.

• 6:00 a.m. Come on duty after 10 hours off. Pre-trip inspection, 15 minutes on duty not driving. Your 14-hour window now ends at 8:00 p.m.
• 6:15 a.m. to 11:15 a.m. Drive 5 hours.
• 11:15 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. Live load at a shipper, logged on duty not driving. That 90 minutes also satisfies your 30-minute break.
• 12:45 p.m. to 6:45 p.m. Drive 6 more hours. That is 11 hours of driving. You are done driving for the day, even though your 14-hour window still has more than an hour left.
• 6:45 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Post-trip, then off duty. Your 10-hour break starts.

That day used 12 hours and 45 minutes of on-duty time against your 70-hour count. Add a longer wait at the shipper and you would run out of 14 before you ran out of 11.

Your ELD and your logs

Most interstate drivers record hours of service on an electronic logging device. Your ELD tracks your status, your location at status changes, and your driving time. It is also the first thing an officer looks at during a roadside inspection.

Two pieces of current news are worth knowing. In today's trucking news roundup, we covered a public demonstration showing how quickly some ELD records can be altered, and FMCSA's list of revoked devices. FMCSA has removed dozens of devices from its registered list, and roadside enforcement treats tampering seriously. If your ELD is ever removed from FMCSA's list, your carrier has to move you to a compliant device within the deadline FMCSA sets. Never edit your logs to hide driving time, and never let anyone else do it for you. Any edit should be annotated and match what really happened.

Shippers can also see more than they used to. Our shipper guide on ELD data and shipper visibility explains how HOS-aware ETAs work from the other side of the dock.

How HOS should shape the job you choose

The hours of service rules are the same at every carrier. What changes is how a carrier plans around them.

1. Ask how dispatch plans around your clock. A good dispatcher knows your available hours before offering a load and does not build a trip that only works if you cut corners.
2. Ask how detention and dock time are handled. Long waits eat your 14 and your 70. Ask what happens when a shipper holds the truck.
3. Ask how pay works. Most company drivers are paid by the mile, so time burned at docks is time you are not driving. Our CPM pay guide explains how cents per mile adds up. At Maas, company drivers earn 50+ CPM dry van and 60+ CPM reefer: company driver jobs.
4. Owner-operators: ask whether dispatch is forced. With non-forced dispatch, you can turn down a load that does not fit your clock. Here is forced vs non-forced dispatch explained. Maas owner-operators earn 87–90% of gross with non-forced dispatch: owner-operator lease-on.
5. Think about regional vs OTR. The rules are the same, but the way your 70 hours spread across the week can look very different. See regional vs OTR CDL-A jobs.

New to the road? Our guide for the CDL school graduate choosing a first carrier covers what to ask in your first interviews. Thinking about a change? Read how to switch trucking companies first.

Quick HOS checklist

• 10 consecutive hours off before you drive.
• 11 hours of driving, max, after that.
• No driving after the 14th hour on duty. Off-duty breaks do not stop the clock.
• 30-minute break from driving after 8 hours of driving. On duty not driving counts.
• 60 hours in 7 days or 70 hours in 8 days, all on-duty time counted.
• 34 consecutive hours off restarts the weekly count.
• Sleeper split: one period of 7+ hours in the sleeper, one of 2+ hours, totaling 10+.
• Adverse conditions: up to 2 extra hours only for conditions you could not have known about.
• Log every status honestly, and annotate anything unusual.

Drive for a carrier that hauls its own freight

Maas Logistics LLC runs dry van and reefer full truckload out of Melissa, Texas and the DFW area across 48 states with our own trucks. We never re-broker a load, and dispatch answers 24/7 at (916) 770-7323. Learn about our safety program, read the driver FAQs, or apply today as a company driver or an owner-operator. Shippers can request a truckload quote.

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