Seat Belts, Child Seats, Crashes, Insurance, Cell Phones and Losing Your License: Who Must Buckle Up and the Exemptions, Wearing the Belt, Rear-Facing Until Two, Boosters to Nine, Children Under 13 in Back, Unattended Children and Pets, Airbags and the 10-Inch Rule, Littering, Duties After a Crash and the 72-Hour Rule, No-Fault Insurance and Its Penalties, Registering Within 60 Days, the Texting Ban and Its $275 Surcharge, Suspension, Revocation, Limited Licenses and Cancellation
Written for aiforu2 as the source for a practice-test bank and the on-device tutor for the Minnesota Class D knowledge test. The facts follow the official manual; the wording is ours.
Source: Minnesota Driver's Manual (DPS DVS, June 2026 edition), Chapter 3 "Passenger safety" through "Cell phones" (pages 37–40) and Chapter 7 "Your driving privileges" (pages 88–90).
Seat belts
The driver is responsible for every passenger's safety, insisting on belts and buckling children into age-appropriate restraints. All vehicles must have belts and everyone, front and back, must wear one properly adjusted and fastened; police may stop a vehicle solely for a belt violation. Unbelted, your chance of death or injury in a crash is four times greater, you can die at speeds as low as 12 mph, and ejected occupants usually die or are badly hurt. You are exempt only while driving in reverse, in a seat whose belts are all in use, with a physician's written certificate, doing work that means constantly getting in and out at no more than 25 mph, as a rural mail carrier, in a pickup during farm work, or in a vehicle built before January 1, 1965. Wear the lap belt snug across the hipbones or upper thighs, never the abdomen, and the shoulder belt across the chest and mid-shoulder.
Child safety seats
The back seat is safest, and children under 13 must ride in back when it is available. Seats must be federally approved and installed by the manufacturer's instructions. A child under 2 rides rear-facing until outgrowing the seat's height or weight limit, and after turning 2 stays rear-facing while still within both limits; a child over 2 who has outgrown rear-facing uses a forward-facing seat to its limit (typically 40 to 60 pounds); a child 4 to 9 who has outgrown the car seat uses a booster with the belt; at 9, or when the booster's limits are exceeded, the child uses the seat belt alone. Never use a seat that has been in a crash; seats expire six years from manufacture unless stamped otherwise; never put a rear-facing seat in front of an active airbag; never hold a child on a lap; and children do not ride in a truck or wagon cargo area.
Unattended vehicles, animals, airbags and litter
Never leave children or vulnerable adults alone in a vehicle: they can set it moving, heat and cold can kill, and the vehicle can be stolen or broken into with them inside. Lock up, take the keys, never leave it running and leave nothing valuable in sight. Do not leave pets in a vehicle on hot or cold days. Airbags supplement belts and do not prevent ejection; keep at least 10 inches between yourself and the wheel, hold it at 8 and 4 or 9 and 3, avoid 10 and 2, keep your thumbs turned out, and move front passenger seats well back. Throwing anything from a vehicle onto a road or land is illegal, including cigarettes, fireworks, snow, ice, glass, nails, garbage and carcasses.
What to do in a crash
Stop, pulling onto the shoulder if possible, and turn off the ignition to cut fire risk; protect the scene with warning lights, flares or a flashlight; call the nearest law enforcement agency or 911 quickly if anyone is hurt or killed; give first aid if you are able and qualified, or make the injured comfortable, since the law requires reasonable assistance; give your name, address, date of birth and registration number to the other drivers and any officer, and show your license to anyone who asks and to any officer; give your insurer's name and address and your agent's name to the investigating officer, within 72 hours if you do not have it with you. A property-damage-only crash need not be reported to law enforcement; have a disabled vehicle towed promptly and tell the owner of any damaged property other than a vehicle.
Insurance and registration
Owners of vehicles driven on public roads must carry no-fault and liability insurance and keep valid proof in the vehicle at all times. Failing to show it to an officer can revoke your license and registration; reinstating after a lack-of-insurance revocation means passing the written test, paying a $30 reinstatement fee plus any court fines, applying for a new license and filing an insurance certificate. Driving an uninsured vehicle can revoke the plates and registration and your privileges for up to one year, with a fine of up to $1,000 and up to 90 days in jail on conviction. Motorcyclists need liability coverage for property damage and injuries to others; no-fault and uninsured coverage are optional. A new resident registers all vehicles within 60 days, bringing the title or registration card and a license or other ID to a deputy registrar.
Cell phones
You may not use a wireless device to compose, read or send electronic messages (email, texts, instant messages) or access the internet while driving, including while stopped in traffic. Exceptions: getting emergency help, reporting a crash or crime, and voice-activated or hands-free use. Two or more convictions add a $275 fine to the court's fine. Drivers under 18 with a permit or provisional license may not use a phone at all except to call 911.
Losing your driving privilege
Driving is a privilege, DVS records your violations in Minnesota and other states, and serious or repeated violations bring withdrawal by suspension, revocation or cancellation, with a notice listing reinstatement requirements. Suspension can follow repeated violations, a conviction for a violation that contributed to a crash with death, injury or serious damage, lending your license or using it illegally, an out-of-state offense that would suspend here, a court finding of unfitness, failing to report a medical condition, failing to stop for a school bus within five years of a prior conviction, a fake or altered license, a fraudulent application, taking a test for someone else, falsely identifying yourself to police, failing to appear or pay a traffic fine, a misdemeanor traffic conviction, unpaid child support, using a license to buy tobacco for someone under 18 or alcohol for someone under 21, driving after drinking while under 21, paying a fee with a bad check, or gasoline theft; reinstatement needs the fee and, if the license expired or your name or address changed, a new application. Revocation follows refusing or failing an alcohol or drug test, manslaughter or another crime with a vehicle, a DWI conviction, a felony using a vehicle, driving over 100 mph, fleeing police, failing to stop and give aid after a crash, lying under oath or on vehicle documents, three jail-eligible traffic violations in one year, an out-of-state offense that would revoke here, knowingly driving an uninsured vehicle or letting others drive yours uninsured, a gross-misdemeanor school bus conviction, or selling or possessing controlled substances while driving; after the period you must meet the notice's requirements, show ID for any tests and apply for a new license. A limited license may be issued to a suspended or revoked driver after any waiting period, for travel to work, to chemical dependency treatment, to a post-secondary school and for dependents' medical, educational or nutritional needs. Cancellation applies when you have no legal right to the license: a new disabling condition, failing a DPS-ordered test, false or misleading application information (canceled 60 days or until corrected, whichever is longer), a crime punishable by cancellation, or not qualifying under state law. Commercial privileges can be disqualified separately.
Practise this with Minnesota Driver License questions
More of this guide
Who needs a Minnesota license and the 60-day rule, identification, Driver's License for All, REAL ID and enhanced cards, the written test, the 20/40 and 105-degree vision standards, the road test and its instant failures, the instruction permit and provisional license with their night and passenger limits, Vanessa's Law, the under-21 license, farm, medical and moped licenses at 15, license classes and renewal.
Required equipment and headlight rules, tire pressure and the penny test, window tint, the basic speed law and default limits, the 10 mph passing allowance, signaling 100 feet, blind spots, left and right turns, turning on red, roundabouts, J-turns, divided highways, U-turns, right-lane travel, passing rules and the 700-foot sight line, backing, and every parking rule.
Where you must come to a complete stop, school bus yellow lights at 100 and 300 feet, stopping 20 feet from red lights and the $500 penalty, safety patrols and crossing guards, who yields at intersections, transit buses, funeral processions, pulling over for sirens, the Move Over law, careless and reckless driving, how to behave when police stop you, fleeing penalties and pedestrian rules.
Bike lanes, the three-foot pass across the center line, bicycle laws and hand signals, mopeds, following and crowding motorcycles, lane splitting at 25 mph and lane filtering, vulnerable road users, neighborhood electric vehicles, passing and following trucks, the No Zones, crossing devices and the 10-foot rule, second trains, the ENS sign, work zone fines and the zipper merge.
Sign colors and shapes, regulatory signs from Stop to Center Lane Left-Turn Only, warning signs including railroad, school, slow-moving vehicle and intersection signs, construction signs and the $300 fine, route markers, every signal light and arrow, gridlock, pedestrian signals, lane-use control signals, ramp meters, white and yellow lines, turn, center, reversible and carpool lanes and traffic officers.
Scan, Identify, Predict, Decide and Execute, the three-second rule, stopping distance, low beams within 1,000 and 200 feet, entering and leaving the freeway, ramp meters, buses on the shoulder, the diverging diamond, stopping on a freeway, distraction types and illegal behaviors, aggressive drivers, projecting loads, towing rules and limits, winter driving, snowplows, the survival kit and being stranded.
Staying alert every 100 miles or two hours, handling a skid, anti-lock brakes, rain and fog, hydroplaning at 35 mph, never coasting downhill, blowouts, steering and brake failure, running off the pavement, deer from dusk to dawn, a vehicle in your lane, stalling on the tracks, flooded roads, plunging under water, fire, overheating, a stuck gas pedal, utility poles and carbon monoxide.
Alcohol in a third of road deaths, drugs and household products, how alcohol attacks judgment, vision and reaction, standard drinks and proof, one drink per hour, the 0.08 and 0.04 limits, implied consent and refusal, first, second and third offense penalties, the ignition interlock and 0.02, felony DWI, the under-21 no-tolerance rule, commercial drivers, cannabis and open container laws.