When headlights must be on — District of Columbia Permit Test
When headlights must be on on the District of Columbia permit test — 4 rules, each with the reason behind it and a question on it while it is fresh.
The rules
Always turn on your headlights when the windshield wipers are on.
Rain makes your car hard to see as well as making the road hard to see, and headlights let others spot you.
Always turn on headlights when the windshield wipers are on.
You must turn on your headlights from one-half hour after sunset until one-half hour before sunrise.
Dusk and dawn are when your car blends into the gray light and other drivers do not see it coming.
You must turn on your headlights one-half hour after sunset and one-half hour before sunrise
You must turn on your headlights at other times when you cannot see persons or vehicles on the highway clearly at a distance of 500 feet or less.
In fog, heavy rain or smoke you cannot see far, and neither can the drivers who need to see you.
You must turn on your headlights at other times when you cannot see persons or vehicles on the highway clearly at a distance of 500 feet or less
You must turn on your headlights when driving in a tunnel.
Coming out of daylight into a tunnel your eyes are slow to adjust, and the car ahead can disappear in the dark.
You must turn on your headlights when driving in a tunnel
On the test
In the District, when must your headlights be on during the day?
When your wipers are on. Rain makes your car hard to see as well as making the road hard to see, and headlights let others spot you. DC Driver Manual, p.73: “Always turn on headlights when the windshield wipers are on.”
How this works
Most practice tests hand you a bank of questions and leave the manual somewhere else. This one puts them together.
You read one law and the reason behind it, then answer a question on that law while it is still fresh. Get it right and you move on; get it wrong and you have found the gap while it is cheap to fix, not on the morning of the exam.
Learning one rule at a time, and proving it immediately, is what turns a manual you skimmed into something you actually know — and it makes studying feel like getting somewhere rather than like waiting to find out.
What it costs
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All District of Columbia permit topics
Where these come from
Every rule here is checked against DC Driver Manual, published by the District of Columbia Department of Motor Vehicles, and against the state code itself. Last checked 2026-10-05.
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/DC.pdf (DC Driver Manual (English), Rev. 7/29/2021, District of Columbia Department of Motor Vehicles, fetched 2026-10-05 from the Wayback Machine's original-bytes capture of dmv.dc.gov; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/DC.pages.txt (the plain pdftotext fixture every citation here was cut from and verified against; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- https://dmv.dc.gov/publication/dc-dmv-automobile-driver-manual (read 2026-10-05; links only the 2023 Issuu flipbooks)
- https://issuu.com/dcdmv/docs/dc_dmv_driver_manual_english_revised_final (the current 2023 edition, read 2026-10-05 from its public page images to diff against the pinned edition; not pinnable)
- https://dmv.dc.gov/service/knowledge-tests (read 2026-10-05; states no count or mark for the knowledge test)
- https://dcregs.dc.gov/Common/DCMR/RuleList.aspx?ChapterNum=18-1 (18 DCMR chapter 1, sections 100-114, read 2026-10-05; section 104 sets what the examination covers and states no figure)
- https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/50-1401.01 (D.C. Code 50-1401.01, read 2026-10-05; requires a knowledge examination and states no figure)