California is letting more drivers add their license and ID card to their phones. Here's how

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Set us as preferred The California Department of Motor Vehicles, long synonymous with slow lines and bureaucracy — immortalized by the sloths of the Department of Mammal Vehicles in Disney’s “Zootopia” — is expanding its digital services.Last week, Gov.Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 169, expanding its mobile driver’s license pilot program, which allows Californians to securely add their driver’s license or state identification card to their smartphones.Here’s how you can add it to your phone and a look at what the program offers.The expansion is the latest in Newsom’s effort to modernize state agencies including the DMV.

Since expanding the agency’s online services, DMV officials say more than 90% of transactions can be done online.The agency also has introduced QR codes at its facilities, which it said helped reduce customer wait times by nearly 40%.

It also added digital signature barcodes on driver’s licenses and identification cards as an added safeguard against identity fraud.As part of that effort, the DMV launched the mobile driver’s license pilot program in 2023, allowing participants to store a digital version of their driver’s license or state ID in the DMV Wallet app as well as in Apple, Google and Samsung wallets.Since then, about 3.9 million Californians have enrolled in the program, according to state data.

The program initially limited enrollment to 4.2 million.In California, there are more than 35 million driver’s license and state identification holders, according to DMV data.

Newsom’s signing of the bill into law last week raises the enrollment cap for the program from 15% of California’s licensed drivers to 60% — making as many as 21 million Californian’s eligible to participate.Once that cap is reached, no additional drivers will be able to enroll, according to state...