How to Become a Notary in California

Becoming a notary public in California is not difficult, but it is unforgiving about sequence and deadlines. Two in particular carry consequences the state will not undo: the education requirement, which a current commission shortens but nothing waives, and the 30-day window to file an oath of office and bond, which the handbook says is not extended for mail delays, county clerk processing delays, or any other reason.

This guide walks the process in the order you will actually do it. Every requirement below is drawn from the California Notary Public Handbook, January 2026 edition, published by the Secretary of State, and from the code sections that handbook reproduces or cites.

Do you qualify?

To become a notary public in California you must meet all of the following requirements (Government Code sections 8201 and 8201.1 — the background check is in 8201.1, not 8201):

• Be a legal resident of the State of California
• Be at least 18 years of age
• Satisfactorily complete a course of study approved by the Secretary of State
• Pass a written examination prescribed by the Secretary of State
• Pass a background check

That is the list for a standard appointment. Section 8201(a)(1) carries one narrow exception on its face — "except as otherwise provided in Section 8203.1" — and section 8203.1, which covers appointments to military and naval reservations, sets a different list: United States citizenship, at least 18 years of age, and the course-of-study and examination requirements of section 8201(a)(3) and (4).

A past conviction is not automatically disqualifying. Section 8214.1 says the Secretary of State may refuse to appoint on the grounds it lists, and the handbook declines to say in advance whether any given conviction disqualifies — it answers that question by pointing applicants to the Notary Public Disciplinary Guidelines and to the background check itself. Failing to disclose a conviction, though, is its own ground for denial. More on that below.

The seven steps, in order

1. Confirm you meet the five requirements

Nothing after this point is refundable time. Start here.

2. Complete the approved course of study — six hours, or three if you are renewing

California's education requirement has two tiers, and the shorter one is reached only by an applicant who satisfies all three of its conditions: you hold a current California notary public commission, you have already completed an approved six-hour course at least once, and you are applying before the commission you hold expires. Miss any one of the three and the requirement is six hours.

• First-time applicants take six hours. Every person appointed as a California notary public must take and satisfactorily complete a six-hour course of study approved by the Secretary of State before appointment, and the handbook is explicit that all persons being appointed, no matter how many commission terms they have held in the past, are required to take the initial six-hour course (Government Code section 8201(a)(3) and (b)).
• A notary who holds a current commission and has already completed an approved six-hour course takes a three-hour refresher before reappointment (Government Code section 8201(b)(2)). That shorter route is conditional, and the conditions are strict enough to be worth their own section — see Your term, and what renewal looks like below.

Nobody is exempt from the requirement itself. Holding a commission already shortens it; it never removes it.

The Secretary of State reviews and approves these courses. An approved course includes all the material a person is expected to know in order to pass the written examination, and the Secretary of State compiles and publishes a list of every vendor offering an approved course of study (Government Code section 8201.2). That list lives at notaryeducation.sos.ca.gov.

When you finish, the vendor issues you a Proof of Completion certificate. The handbook's instruction on what to do with it is short and literal: staple your Proof of Completion to your application and take both items with you to the exam.

This guide is free information. It is not the course. Reading it does not count toward those hours — six or three — and cannot. The statutory education requirement is satisfied only by completing a course of study the Secretary of State has approved and receiving that vendor's Proof of Completion certificate.

3. Take the state examination

You must pass a written examination prescribed by the Secretary of State. Under Government Code section 8201(a)(4), every question on it is based on California law as set out in the booklet of notary laws the Secretary of State distributes. Section 8201.2(a) separately requires that an approved course include all the material a person is expected to know to pass that examination — so the two provisions between them tie the course to California statute rather than to general notary practice.

Bring to the exam site:

• Your completed application
• A 2-inch by 2-inch color passport photograph of yourself
• Your Proof of Completion certificate, stapled to the application
• The application fee

The application and photograph are submitted at the examination site and forwarded to the Secretary of State's office, where staff review them for qualifying information (Government Code section 8201.5).

Your exam results are valid for one year from the date of the examination (California Code of Regulations, Title 2, section 20803). If you are renewing, the handbook recommends taking the exam at least six months before your current commission expires, so you do not end up with a gap between terms.

4. Get fingerprinted through Live Scan

State law requires all notary applicants to be fingerprinted as part of a thorough background check before a commission is granted (Government Code section 8201.1). Your fingerprint images go to the California Department of Justice, which forwards them to the Federal Bureau of Investigation and requests a federal summary of criminal information.

Two details the handbook answers directly:

• This applies every time. The handbook answers it directly: all notary public applicants, whether or not they have held a previous commission, must submit fingerprints to the Department of Justice — including notaries reapplying with no break in service.
• You do not need to solve this step before the exam. Information concerning the fingerprinting requirements is mailed to applicants who pass the examination.

The Request for Live Scan Service form is available on the Secretary of State's website, or on request from its office.

5. Disclose every arrest and conviction

Notary applicants are required to disclose on their applications all arrests for which trials are pending and all convictions — including convictions that have been dismissed under Penal Code section 1203.4 or 1203.4a. The handbook states plainly that there is no time limit on this: a conviction from twenty-five years ago is still disclosable, and a DUI is still disclosable.

The Secretary of State may deny an application for:

• Failure to disclose any conviction
• Conviction of a felony
• Conviction of a disqualifying lesser offense

Note the order. Failure to disclose is listed first, and it is an independent ground for denial regardless of what the underlying conviction was. A denied applicant generally has the right to appeal through the administrative hearing process (Government Code section 8214.3) — but read that section before relying on it, because it names two situations in which there is no right to a hearing after a denial: where the Secretary of State denied or revoked your application or commission within the previous year after a hearing, and where the Secretary of State has entered an order under section 8214.4 finding that you committed acts that are grounds for suspension or revocation. The full list of denial grounds is in Government Code section 8214.1, and the Secretary of State's Notary Public Disciplinary Guidelines list the most common disqualifying convictions.

If you are unsure what to disclose, the handbook directs you to contact the Secretary of State's office before signing the application, and gives the California Department of Justice number for questions about your own record: (916) 227-3849.

6. File your oath of office and $15,000 bond — within 30 calendar days

This is the deadline the state does not extend for any reason.

Once your commission has been issued, you have 30 calendar days from the beginning of the term prescribed in the commission to take, subscribe and file an oath of office, and to file a $15,000 surety bond, with the county clerk's office (Government Code sections 8212 and 8213).

Five things about that window:

1. The commission does not take effect until the oath and bond are filed. Holding the certificate is not the same as being a notary.
2. File in the right county — the county where you maintain your principal place of business, as shown on the application on file with the Secretary of State.
3. You cannot swear your own oath at home. Government Code section 8213(a) requires that a person appointed to be a notary public take and subscribe the oath of office either in the office of that county clerk or before another notary public in that county. If you take and subscribe it before the county clerk, section 8213(a) also requires you to present the clerk with satisfactory evidence of identity — an identification document meeting the requirements of subparagraph (A) or (B) of paragraph (3), or subparagraph (A) or (E) of paragraph (4), of subdivision (b) of Civil Code section 1185. Those are specific subparagraphs, not the whole of 1185(b)(3) and (b)(4).
4. The mail option is attached to one of those two cases. Section 8213(a) grants it conditionally: if the oath of office is taken and subscribed before a notary public, the oath and bond may be filed with the county clerk by certified mail or any other means of physical delivery that provides a receipt. The statute does not say anything either way about mailing in the other case, so do not read this as a prohibition — read it as the one route the statute expressly provides for. You must still allow enough time for it to arrive and be filed.
5. There are no exceptions. The handbook says so in as many words: exceptions are not made to the 30-day filing requirement due to mail service delays, county clerk mail processing delays, or for any other reason.

If you miss the window, the commission is not valid and you may not act as a notary until you obtain a new appointment and properly qualify within a new 30-calendar-day limit. In practice that means starting over: a new application with a current Proof of Completion attached, a new photograph, a new fee — and, per the handbook, having your fingerprints retaken at a Live Scan site.

The steps around this filing, from the commission to your first notarial act, are set out in order in Your First 30 Days as a California Notary.

7. Understand what the bond is — and what it is not

Every person appointed a California notary public must execute an official bond in the sum of $15,000, in the form of a bond executed by an admitted surety insurer. A deposit in lieu of bond is not permitted (Government Code section 8212).

The bond is not insurance for you. The handbook is blunt about this: the bond is designed only to provide a limited source of funds for paying claims against the notary public. You remain personally liable to the full extent of any damages sustained, and you may be required to reimburse the bonding company for sums it pays out because of your misconduct or negligence (Government Code sections 8212 to 8214).

What it costs

The handbook is a legal reference, not a price list. It names several fees and states an amount for almost none of them. Here is every cost item the handbook or the statutes it reproduces actually name:

So the handbook names six cost items, states a dollar figure for two of them, and only one of those — the twenty-dollar check — is money you hand over; the other is the bond amount, not its price. Everything else — the exam and commission fees, Live Scan, the county recording fee, your seal, your journal, and the approved course itself — has no amount anywhere in the corpus this article is drawn from. Confirm current figures with the Secretary of State's Notary Public Section before you budget — Business Programs Division, Notary Public Section, P.O. Box 942877, Sacramento, California 94277-0001, (916) 653-3595 — and do not rely on a number you read in an article, including this one.

Your term, and what renewal looks like

The term of office of a California notary public is four years, commencing with the date specified in the commission (Government Code section 8204).

Renewal is where California's two-tier education rule bites, and it is worth reading twice:

• If you hold a current California commission and have completed an approved six-hour course at least once, you must satisfactorily complete an approved three-hour refresher course before reappointment (Government Code section 8201(b)(2)).
• The three-hour course counts only if you apply for reappointment before your current commission expires. To be eligible for it, you must have taken the notary exam and submitted your application at the exam site prior to your current commission's expiration date.
• If your commission has expired, the three-hour course no longer satisfies the requirement. You must complete a six-hour course again, even if you completed one for a previous commission.
• A six-hour approved course always satisfies the education requirement, whether you are a new applicant or applying for reappointment. The reverse is not true.

One more timing detail worth knowing: if you complete the course and pass the exam while your current commission still has months left to run, your reappointment commission is issued 30 days prior to the expiration date of the current one, provided you have complied with all the requirements.

If you already hold a commission and this is the section you came for, there is a longer treatment of it: How to Renew Your California Notary Commission sets out all of the conditions on the three-hour refresher, the three separate ways a reappointment falls back to six hours, and what happens to your journal and seal when a term ends. If you only need to know which of the two courses to buy, Six-Hour vs. Three-Hour California Notary Course answers that question on its own.

What the job actually involves

Passing the exam is not the same as knowing the work. Four things define the daily job.

Personal appearance and identification

When completing a certificate of acknowledgment or a jurat, a notary public is required to certify to the identity of the signer (Civil Code sections 1185(a) and 1189, Government Code section 8202). Identity is established by satisfactory evidence. The ordinary route is an identification document from the lists in Civil Code section 1185(b)(3) and (4). The credible-witness routes are not an election alongside it: section 1185(b)(1)(A)(iv) requires the single credible witness to swear that the signer "does not possess any of the identification documents named in paragraphs (3) and (4)", and section 1185(b)(2) carries "each statement in paragraph (1)" into the two-witness route. A notary who fails to obtain the satisfactory evidence subparagraph (A) requires is subject to a civil penalty "not exceeding ten thousand dollars ($10,000)."

Where the notary relies on an identification document, reasonable reliance is limited to specified forms of identification that are current or were issued within five years (Civil Code section 1185(b)(3) and (4)) — a California driver's license or DMV identification card being the usual one. Which documents qualify, what the credible-witness routes require before you may use them, and what a notary may not accept are set out in How to Identify a Signer in California.

The two forms you will complete most

The certificate of acknowledgment must be filled completely out at the time the notary's signature and seal are affixed, and it is executed under penalty of perjury. A notary who willfully states as true a material fact known to be false is subject to a civil penalty not exceeding $10,000 (Civil Code section 1189(a)(4)).

A jurat cannot be affixed to a document mailed or otherwise delivered to a notary where the signer did not personally appear, take an oath, and sign in the notary's presence — even if the notary knows the signer personally.

Which of the two a document needs is not the notary's call to make, and getting it wrong is not correctable after the fact. Both points, along with the third certificate — proof of execution by a subscribing witness — and the documents on which it is prohibited, are set out in Acknowledgment vs. Jurat.

The journal

A California notary public is required to keep one active sequential journal at a time of all acts performed as a notary, kept in a locked and secured area under the notary's direct and exclusive control (Government Code section 8206(a)). Each entry records:

• The date, time and type of each official act
• The character of every instrument sworn to, affirmed, acknowledged or proved
• The signature of each person whose signature is being notarized
• A statement that identity was based on satisfactory evidence — and, for paper identification, the type of document, the issuing government agency, the serial or identifying number, and the date of issue or expiration
• The fee charged — and an entry is required even when no fee is charged, such as "no fee" or "0"
• For a deed, quitclaim deed, deed of trust, other document affecting real property, or a power of attorney: the signer's right thumbprint

The journal is the exclusive property of the notary and must not be surrendered to an employer on termination of employment, whether or not the employer paid for it. If it is stolen, lost, misplaced, destroyed, damaged or otherwise rendered unusable, the notary must immediately notify the Secretary of State by certified or registered mail, or another delivery method providing a receipt. Willfully failing to properly maintain the journal is a misdemeanor (Government Code section 8228.1).

You must also respond within 15 business days to a written request from any member of the public for a copy of a journal transaction, at a cost not exceeding thirty cents per page (Government Code sections 8206(c) and 8206.5).

Each of those rules carries conditions and exceptions this summary does not — including one that the handbook's own account of the thumbprint requirement leaves out. California Notary Journal Requirements sets out the full contents of an entry, who can compel access to the book and on what terms, and what happens to it when a commission ends.

The seal

Each notary public is required to have and to use a seal, kept in a locked and secured area under the notary's direct and exclusive control and never surrendered to an employer (Government Code section 8207). Because the law requires the seal to be photographically reproducible, the rubber stamp is almost universal. The seal must:

• Be photographically reproducible when affixed to a document
• Contain the State Seal and the words "Notary Public"
• Contain your name as shown on the commission
• Contain the name of the county where the oath and bond were filed
• Contain the expiration date of your commission
• Contain your sequential identification number (commission number), as well as the identification number assigned to the seal manufacturer or vendor
• Be circular and not over two inches in diameter, or rectangular and not more than one inch in width by two and one-half inches in length, with a serrated or milled edge border

A document may be rejected by the recorder if the seal is illegible, so keep the impression clean and off signatures and printed matter.

The law allows one narrow exception on paper. Because subdivision maps are usually drawn on material that will not take standard stamp-pad ink, acknowledgments for California subdivision map certificates may be notarized without the official seal — provided your name, the county of your principal place of business and your commission expiration date are typed or printed below or immediately adjacent to your signature on the acknowledgment (Government Code section 66436(c)).

The handbook's General Information summary states the end of the seal's life unconditionally: when the commission is no longer valid, the seal must be destroyed. Two other passages in the same handbook attach conditions to that duty, and they are not the same conditions — the text of Government Code section 8207 ties it to "termination, resignation, or revocation of the notary's commission", while the handbook's question and answer about a journal and stamp ties it to allowing an appointment to expire "without obtaining reappointment within 30 days". The difference lands hardest on a notary who is being reappointed, so it is laid out — and deliberately not resolved — in Your journal and seal when a commission ends.

Fees you may charge

Update, September 14, 2026: Assembly Bill 1597 raises the section 8211 dollar amounts in this table on January 1, 2027. It does not change the two no-fee rows, or the immigration-forms row, which comes from section 8223, a section the bill does not amend. Until January 1, 2027, the section 8211 amounts below are the law. The new ones are in California's Maximum Notary Fees Rise on January 1, 2027.

Government Code section 8211 sets maximum fees. You may charge less, or nothing at all — the charging of a fee and the amount are at the discretion of the notary or the notary's employer, provided the maximum is not exceeded.

The handbook lists five no-fee exceptions together, and the table above shows only the two that sit inside the fee schedule. The other three:

• Notaries appointed to military and naval reservations under Government Code section 8203.1 collect no fees at all for notarial service rendered within the reservation (Government Code section 8203.6).
• No fee may be collected for verifying any nomination document or circulator's affidavit (Elections Code section 8080).
• A notary public working for a public entity may collect no fee for services rendered in an affidavit, application or voucher relating to the securing of a pension (Government Code section 6106).

One more rule that is not an exception but changes where the money goes. The handbook summarizes Government Code section 6100 as requiring a notary appointed to act for and on behalf of certain public agencies under Government Code section 8202.5 to charge for all services and remit the fees received to the employing agency, and to enter each fee charged in the journal. Both of those sections state the duty conditionally rather than by job title: section 8202.5 attaches remittance to fees collected by a notary "whose documents have been filed without charge and for whom bond premiums have been paid by the employer of the notary public", and section 6100 permits notarial services without a fee except by a notary "whose fees are required by law to be remitted to the state or any other public agency". Whether it reaches you is worked through in the fees guide.

Where you can work

A California notary public may provide notarial services throughout the State of California, and is not limited to the county where the oath and bond were filed (Government Code section 8200). The county named in the venue heading of a notarial certificate — "State of California, County of ______" — is the county where the signer personally appeared before you, not the county where you qualified.

The military and naval reservation appointments are the exception again: under Government Code section 8203.2 those notaries are appointed only on the recommendation of the reservation's commanding officer and are authorized to act only within its boundaries.

Can you notarize online in California?

Not yet, in the way most people mean.

California notaries are authorized under current law to perform notarizations on documents electronically, provided every requirement for a traditional paper-based notarial act is met, including use of the seal. The handbook carves out two exceptions in the very next sentence: a seal is not required on electronic real estate documents under Government Code section 27391(f), or on final subdivision plat maps under Government Code section 66436(c).

But California law requires the signer to appear personally before the notary, and the handbook states what that means without hedging: the party must be physically present, and a video image or other form of non-physical representation is not a personal appearance under California law.

Remote online notarization is arriving in stages. The Online Notarization Act (Chapter 291, Statutes of 2023 — SB 696, Portantino) was signed on September 30, 2023 and became effective January 1, 2024. Government Code sections 8232 through 8232.4, and Civil Code sections 1182 and 1183, were operative January 1, 2024; Government Code section 8231.18, on security requirements for remote notarizations, became operative January 1, 2025. The rest — the appointment requirements, the grounds for disciplinary action, and the notary's duties for remote online notarization — become operative when the California Secretary of State completes the Notary Automation Project 2.0. What those appointment requirements will be, and the clauses in the Act that hold online notarization back, are set out in What California Will Require of Online Notaries.

Do not treat January 1, 2030 as a date the state is locked into. The handbook's introduction describes those components as operative on completion of the project "or by January 1, 2030, whichever is earlier", but Government Code section 8231(b), reproduced later in the same handbook, makes the deadline conditional: the Secretary of State "shall complete the technology project no later than January 1, 2030, unless the Secretary of State informs the Legislature and the Governor in writing on or before January 1, 2029, that the technology project necessary to implement statues related to online notarization is incomplete." Civil Code section 1181.1(b)(2) carries a parallel clause, worded differently. It makes that section operative on January 1, 2030 "unless the Secretary of State informs the Legislature and the Governor in writing on or before January 1, 2029, that the technology project necessary to implement statutes related to online notarization will not be completed by January 1, 2030, including a detailed status of the technology project." Section 8231(b) turns on the project being "incomplete"; section 1181.1(b)(2) turns on a written report that it "will not be completed by January 1, 2030", with a status attached. They are not the same clause. Where a summary and a reproduced statute differ, the statute is the text to rely on. Section 8231(b) is quoted in full in what California notaries can charge, which reaches the same question from the fee side.

One thing you must not do

California notaries are prohibited from performing any duties that may be construed as the practice of law. Among the acts that constitute the practice of law are the preparation, drafting, or selection or determination of the kind of any legal document, or giving advice in relation to any legal documents or matters. If you are asked to do any of it, decline and refer the person to an attorney.

This is not a technicality. It is a line a well-meaning notary can cross just by being helpful — and the bond behind you is not insurance for you, so the liability that follows is your own.

It is also not the only line the statutes draw, and each of the others has a consequence attached to it — a civil penalty band, a suspension floor, a misdemeanor. They are collected in What a California Notary Cannot Do.

Six mistakes, and what each one costs you

1. Missing the 30-day oath and bond deadline. No exceptions, for any reason — including mail delays and county clerk processing delays.
2. Letting a commission expire before applying for reappointment. The three-hour refresher stops counting the moment your commission lapses, and you owe six hours again.
3. Not disclosing a conviction — including one that was dismissed under Penal Code section 1203.4, and including one from decades ago. Failure to disclose is its own ground for denial.
4. Letting exam results go stale. They are valid one year from the date of the exam.
5. Notarizing without personal appearance. A jurat cannot be affixed to a document that simply arrives in the mail, even from someone you know well.
6. Handing the journal or seal to an employer. Both are yours. Willfully failing to keep the seal under your direct and exclusive control is a misdemeanor.

Official sources

Do not take an article's word for a deadline. The primary sources:

• California Notary Public Handbook, plus a checklist of the required steps to become a notary public — www.sos.ca.gov/notary
• Approved education vendors — notaryeducation.sos.ca.gov
• Notary Public Disciplinary Guidelines — the Secretary of State's guidelines, which also include a list of the most common disqualifying convictions. Available on the Secretary of State's website or mailed on request.
• Secretary of State, Notary Public Section — Business Programs Division, P.O. Box 942877, Sacramento, California 94277-0001; (916) 653-3595

Where notrai fits

notrai is a California Secretary of State–approved notary public education vendor. The Secretary of State approved two notrai courses of study on August 26, 2026 — the six-hour course for first-time applicants and the three-hour refresher for renewing notaries who meet all three of its conditions — each under its own certificate of approval. That approval covers those courses of study. It is not an endorsement of this website, and nothing on this page is legal advice.

Both courses are online and self-paced, measure and enforce time on task against the statutory minimum, and issue the Proof of Completion certificate you staple to your application and take with you to the exam.

See the courses →