Quick answer: Any building permit application filed in the City of Los Angeles on or after January 1, 2026 is checked against the 2025 California Building Standards Code, which the City adopted with its local amendments in Ordinance 188797. For homeowners, the biggest practical changes are in the energy code — heat pumps are now the baseline for both space and water heating in new homes — plus a new standalone wildfire code, battery-ready panels on most new homes and an EV-capable circuit in new attached garages. Los Angeles also repealed its all-electric building mandate in 2025. APLA Construction (CA Lic #1136359) designs and permits projects to the current code across Greater Los Angeles.
California rewrites its building code every three years. The 2025 edition was published on July 1, 2025, and the California Building Standards Commission set January 1, 2026 as its statewide effective date. What decides which code your project follows is the date your permit application is submitted, not the date construction starts:
| Permit application submitted | Code that applies |
| On or before December 31, 2025 | 2022 California Building Standards Code |
| On or after January 1, 2026 | 2025 California Building Standards Code |
The City of Los Angeles adopted the 2025 codes, carrying forward its existing local changes, in Ordinance 188797 (Council File 25-1217), approved in December 2025 and in place for permits filed from January 1, 2026. Independent cities such as Glendale, Pasadena, Santa Monica and Burbank adopt the same state code through their own ordinances, so check with the building department that will issue your permit.
One reason the 2026 changes are modest at the local level: AB 130 (2025) imposed a moratorium on new state and local building standards affecting residential units. According to the Los Angeles City Attorney’s report on the 2026 code ordinance, the moratorium runs from October 1, 2025 to June 1, 2031 (Health and Safety Code § 17958(b)), with limited exceptions, and the City’s ordinance therefore “does not introduce any substantive new amendments” to the state code. In practice, the 2025 code is likely to be the rulebook for Los Angeles home projects for several years.
The 2025 Energy Code changes matter most for new homes and new ADUs. The California Energy Commission summarizes the headline change for homes as using heat pumps for both space heating and water heating, expanding on the single heat-pump baselines of the 2022 code. Other single-family changes the CEC lists include:
This is not a gas ban. The CEC states plainly that it “does not mandate specific fuel types.” A design using gas appliances can still comply through the code’s performance method, but it has to meet the same energy budget. These baselines apply to newly constructed homes; additions and alterations follow their own sections of the Energy Code, and what a remodel triggers depends on its scope. That is settled in your project’s Title 24 energy report, which should be done before the design is final. See our Title 24 compliance guide and our comparison of heat pumps and gas furnaces in Los Angeles.
From April 2023, Los Angeles Ordinance 187714 required newly constructed buildings to be all-electric. That rule is gone. Ordinance 188716, passed by the City Council on August 20, 2025, repealed it in its entirety, effective October 13, 2025, and made the repeal retroactive to any building permit for which a certificate of occupancy had not yet been issued. The City had first stayed enforcement in May 2025 after federal court rulings on local gas bans. New homes and ADUs in the City of Los Angeles may again include gas appliances, subject to the state Energy Code described above.
Under the 2025 CALGreen mandatory measures, effective January 1, 2026, a new one- or two-family dwelling or townhouse with an attached private garage must be EV capable, not fitted with a charger. That means:
Installing a 40-amp EV circuit at construction satisfies the requirement without the separate raceway. ADUs and junior ADUs without additional parking facilities are exempt from this requirement.
The 2025 cycle created a new California Wildland-Urban Interface Code (Title 24, Part 7). The Building Standards Commission’s summary explains that all of the wildfire construction rules formerly in Chapter 7A of the Building Code and Section R337 of the Residential Code were relocated into Chapter 5 of the new code; the commission describes the other edits as clean-up. Los Angeles applies Part 7 to buildings in the wildland-urban interface or a Fire Hazard Severity Zone (LAMC 91.101.6). The new code also adds a non-mandatory Appendix G of home-hardening recommendations for existing houses.
Separately, the state’s Zone 0 rules for the first five feet around a home were adopted by the Board of Forestry in August 2026 but are not in force: the filing with the Office of Administrative Law was withdrawn on September 8, 2026, and no effective date has been set. To check whether your property is in a fire hazard zone, see our guide to LA neighborhoods in Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zones and our wildfire home hardening guide.
Los Angeles’s code (LAMC 91.5.309.2, carried into the 2026 code) requires an automatic residential fire sprinkler system in every newly constructed one- or two-family dwelling. For existing homes it sets a trigger that catches many large remodels: where the aggregate value of alterations within a one-year period equals or exceeds 50% of the replacement cost of the existing building, sprinklers must be installed throughout the entire dwelling.
A detached ADU is exempt from LA’s sprinkler requirement when it is no larger than 1,200 square feet, it is on the same lot as the primary residence, and the primary residence itself does not have sprinklers. If you are planning a whole-house remodel or a large addition, ask for the 50% calculation early — it is far easier to plan sprinkler lines before walls are closed than after.
For the full permit process, see our Los Angeles building permit guide.
State ADU law sits outside the building code but changed on the same January 1, 2026 date, mostly through SB 543 and AB 1154:
For the number of units allowed on a lot, see how many ADUs you can build in Los Angeles.
Los Angeles’s mandatory soft-story program (Ordinance 183893, in effect since 2015) applies to wood-frame buildings with parking or similar open space on the ground floor and one or more stories above, built under codes in effect before January 1, 1978. It does not apply to buildings with three dwelling units or less used solely for residential purposes — so it covers residential buildings of four or more units, and mixed-use buildings, rather than single-family homes. Homeowners with older raised-foundation houses should look instead at our guides to seismic retrofits and the Earthquake Brace + Bolt grant.
APLA designs every project to the code that applies on its filing date and identifies upgrade triggers, such as sprinklers or fire-zone construction, before the contract is signed rather than as change orders after plan check.
The 2025 California Building Standards Code with the City’s local amendments, adopted in Ordinance 188797. It applies to permit applications submitted on or after January 1, 2026; applications submitted on or before December 31, 2025 generally remain under the 2022 code.
No. Los Angeles repealed its all-electric ordinance (Ordinance 187714) through Ordinance 188716, effective October 13, 2025, retroactive to permits without a certificate of occupancy. The state’s 2025 Energy Code uses heat pumps as the baseline for new homes, but the California Energy Commission does not mandate specific fuel types, and gas designs can comply through the performance method.
No charger is required. A new one- or two-family home or townhouse with an attached private garage must be EV capable: a raceway for a dedicated 208/240-volt circuit and panel capacity for a 40-amp circuit, both marked “EV CAPABLE.” ADUs and junior ADUs without additional parking facilities are exempt.
Not for a one-story detached tool or storage shed of 120 square feet or less with no heating, plumbing or electrical, outside Fire District No. 1 and placed where zoning allows (LAMC 91.101.5). A larger shed, or one with utilities, needs a permit.
Every new one- or two-family dwelling needs them. For an existing home, Los Angeles requires sprinklers throughout the dwelling when the aggregate value of alterations within one year equals or exceeds 50% of the building’s replacement cost (LAMC 91.5.309.2).
Understanding the code before you start saves time and money. APLA designs every project to current code from day one — no surprises at plan check, no change orders for compliance upgrades mid-construction.
Call: (818) 818-4419
Email: info@aplaconstruction.com
CA General Contractor License #1136359 — verify on CSLB
Sources, read 14 October 2026: California Building Standards Commission Information Bulletin 25-01 (effective date), Information Bulletin 25-05 (AB 130) and Summary of Code Changes in the 2025 Title 24; City of Los Angeles Ordinance 188797, City Attorney report R25-0621 and Ordinance 188716; LAMC Section 91.101; California Energy Commission 2025 Energy Code fact sheet and What’s New for 2025: Single-Family; HCD 2025 CALGreen residential mandatory measures and ADU Handbook (March 2026); CSLB Industry Bulletin on AB 2622; LADBS Soft-Story Retrofit Program. Codes are interpreted by the building official for each permit — general information, not a determination for a specific property.