New York childcare licensing: the 418-1 ratios, the NYC carve-out, and the 30-hour training clock
If you run a child day care center in New York, the first licensing question isn’t “what are the ratios” — it’s “which New York am I in?” Outside New York City, centers are licensed by the Office of Children and Family Services (OCFS) under 18 NYCRR Part 418-1. Inside NYC, centers serving children under six aren’t OCFS-licensed at all — they’re permitted by the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene under Health Code Article 47, with a materially different ratio table. Most guides blend the two. This one won’t.
I went through the current regulations while building a childcare platform, so this is the version I wish existed: the requirements that actually come up, with citations, so you can verify everything against the source. This isn’t legal advice; it’s a map. When in doubt, the regulation wins.
(Disclosure: I’m the founder of TinyGuard, a childcare platform. The requirements below are the state’s, not ours — they’re true whether you track them on paper or in software.)
Statewide (OCFS) ratios and group sizes — 18 NYCRR 418-1.8
New York sets both a teacher-to-child ratio and a maximum group size, and they’re the tightest in this series:
| Age of children | Ratio | Max group size | Cite (418-1.8(k)) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 6 weeks* | 1:3 | 6 | (k)(1) |
| 6 weeks – 18 months | 1:4 | 8 | (k)(2) |
| 18 – 36 months | 1:5 | 12 | (k)(3) |
| 3 years | 1:7 | 18 | (k)(4) |
| 4 years | 1:8 | 21 | (k)(5) |
| 5 years | 1:9 | 24 | (k)(6) |
| School-age through 9 | 1:10 | 20 | (k)(7) |
| 10 – 12 years | 1:15 | 30 | (k)(8) |
*Care for children under 6 weeks requires specific OCFS approval (418-1.15(b)(30)).
For scale: a room of three-year-olds runs 1:7 in upstate New York, 1:11 in Florida-equivalent age bands, and 1:15 in Texas. Mixed-age rules are their own maze: infants may never be mixed with older groups outside an approved continuity-of-care classroom (418-1.8(l)(7), (r)); toddler-plus-preschool groups take the 18–36-month ratio (l)(9); and 3-to-5-year-olds grouped together all day use the ratio of the majority age (l)(6) — note that’s a third different mixing rule after the “youngest child” states (TX, CA, MN) and Florida’s “largest cohort.”
The NYC carve-out — Health Code Article 47
In the five boroughs, a center for children under six needs a DOHMH permit (Article 47 § 47.03), and the ratio table is NYC’s own (§ 47.23(f)):
| Age | Ratio | Max group size |
|---|---|---|
| Under 12 months | 1:4 (or 1:3) | 8 |
| 12 – 24 months | 1:5 | 10 |
| 2 years | 1:6 | 12 |
| 3 years | 1:10 | 15 |
| 4 years | 1:12 | 20 |
| 5 years | 1:15 | 25 |
A program using 1:4 for under-ones must show a 1:3 evacuation staffing plan (§ 47.23(f)(4)). And this table just moved: DOHMH adopted emergency amendments in August 2025 (education-director designees, “core operating hours,” and stretching from 3 to 5 the days an assistant teacher plus aide may cover a group teacher’s absence) — a staffing-shortage response worth knowing if you’re hiring against the public-school system.
Staff qualifications (418-1.13(g), statewide)
Three tiers, each with credential-or-experience pathways: director (bachelor’s plus early-childhood credits plus teaching and supervising experience, or the NYS Children’s Program Administrator Credential, or an associate’s/CDA on a study plan with more experience); group teacher (associate’s in early childhood, or CDA plus a year, or nine college credits on a study plan plus two years — with separate variants for infant/toddler and school-age programs); assistant teacher (high-school diploma or a year of experience). Every group requires a qualified group teacher (418-1.8(e)), nobody under 18 supervises alone (418-1.8(d)), and at 45+ capacity the director can’t double as a group teacher (418-1.13(f)).
Training: 30 hours per two years — front-loaded (418-1.14)
- 30 hours of OCFS-approved training every two years for each staff member and volunteer (418-1.14(c)) — with 15 of the 30 in the first six months (c)(1) and at least 5 hours every year (c)(2).
- Federal health-and-safety training before service or within 3 months; untrained staff can’t be alone with children (418-1.14(b)).
- Ten mandated topics, from child development to shaken baby syndrome to adverse childhood experiences (418-1.14(d)).
- CPR/first aid: at least one certified person on premises during all operating hours, with age-appropriate certification including an in-person competency component (418-1.14(k)–(l)).
The two-year clock with a front-loaded first six months is exactly the kind of requirement that’s easy to meet and hard to prove — per person, per cycle, with the year-minimum inside it.
Inspections: annual, and complaints move fast (SSL § 390)
The statute is direct: OCFS “on an annual basis shall inspect all child day care programs” (SSL § 390(4)(a)), may inspect announced or unannounced (§ 390(3)(a)), and must run an unannounced inspection within 15 days of a noncompliance complaint — next business day if the complaint suggests imminent danger. A satisfactory inspection is also a precondition of getting or renewing the license in the first place (§ 390(2)(d)(i); 418-1.2(d), (f)).
Records — including real-time attendance (418-1.15(c))
The center file must be current, accurate, and available to OCFS at any time: child identifying and emergency-contact information, authorized pick-up persons, health records with medication logs and daily health checks, personnel files with background-check approval letters, training records, and staff schedules with actual arrival/departure times. The one worth reading twice: daily attendance records must be “filled out at the time a child arrives and departs” — with arrival and departure times (418-1.15(c)(5)). Not reconstructed at nap time, not batch-entered Friday. At the time.
And the honest note this series keeps having to make: Part 418-1 states no retention period in years for these records. Anyone quoting you a hard “keep for X years under 418-1” figure is inventing it — retention obligations come from elsewhere (subsidy contracts, insurers, counsel), so ask yours.
Background clearances (SSL § 390-b; 18 NYCRR 413.4)
Every operator, employee, and volunteer clears the comprehensive, CCDBG-conformed check before unsupervised work: fingerprint-based NYS criminal history through DCJS, FBI national check, the NYS Sex Offender Registry, the Statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment — plus, for anyone who lived out of state in the past five years, that state’s repository, registry, and abuse register. Rechecks run at least every five years (SSL § 390-b(2)(c)). A person may start work supervised once the initial NYS components clear while the rest complete (413.4).
The pattern behind all of it
Same two piles, fifth state running. Have the thing: the credential on file, the clearance letter, the CPR certificate. Prove it happened over time: ratio in the toddler room at 1:5 every hour of the year, the 30-hour training clock per person with its front-loaded six months, and — uniquely explicit in New York — attendance recorded at the moment of arrival and departure. New York is the state where the regulation itself tells you a reconstructed sign-in sheet doesn’t satisfy the rule.
Where TinyGuard fits (briefly)
(Short, as always.) Real-time attendance is literally what a QR check-in kiosk does: the record is created at the moment the child arrives, with the time, and the ratio log computes from it hour by hour. Training hours accumulate per person against the two-year clock; incident reports are auto-numbered and parent-signed; the packet exports when the licensor arrives — announced or not. We’re pre-launch and honest about it — no paying-customer testimonial to show you yet, but the export is real and built. The numbers are on the pricing page, no demo required to see them.
The short version
Figure out which New York you’re in first: OCFS Part 418-1 statewide, DOHMH Article 47 in NYC — two different ratio tables, never blend them. Statewide: 1:4 infants (group 8), 1:5 toddlers (12), 1:7 threes (18), group sizes capped everywhere, majority-age rule for all-day 3–5 groups. Training: 30 hours per two years, 15 in the first six months. Inspections: annual by statute, unannounced within 15 days on complaint. Attendance: recorded at arrival and departure, in the moment. Keep the “have the thing” documents current, let the “prove it over time” records accumulate as they happen — in New York, “as they happen” is the rule’s own words.
— Del Peck Founder, TinyGuard
Figures above are quoted from the official OCFS compilation of 18 NYCRR Part 418-1 (effective October 13, 2021 — the current edition as of this writing), Social Services Law §§ 390 and 390-b, 18 NYCRR 413.2/413.4, and the official NYC Health Code Article 47 text including DOHMH’s August 2025 amendments. Regulations get revised — confirm current numbers at ocfs.ny.gov (or nyc.gov for Article 47) or with your licensor before relying on them.
Running a center in another state? Same breakdown for Texas, California, Minnesota, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Georgia, North Carolina, Michigan, New Jersey, Virginia, Washington, and Massachusetts.
TinyGuard puts cameras, care logging, billing, and compliance on one on-site box. Book a 15-minute demo or see the pricing.