Texas hub · checked October 19, 2026
On July 1, 2026, Texas did the thing operators in every other state are still asking their legislatures for: it abolished the city-by-city permit patchwork for mobile food vendors and replaced it with one license from the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS), good in every city and county in Texas. If you learned the old system — a permit here, a different permit one town over, a day of sales lost to each inspection — unlearn it. This hub is the new map.
| DSHS license type | Who it covers | Application | Pre-licensing inspection | To open |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Type I | Prepackaged, non-perishable (non-TCS) food; low risk | $309 | — | $309 |
| Type II | Prepackaged perishable (TCS) food, or limited handling and preparation | $618 | $400 | $1,018 |
| Type III | Cooks, holds, and serves food from the vehicle | $876 | $500 | $1,376 |
Fees from the DSHS Mobile Food Vendor Guide, verified October 19, 2026. Renewals run $300–$850 a year; routine and complaint inspections are billed at $300 (Type I complaint), $400 (Type II), $500 (Type III) when they occur.
Already licensed locally? Vendors holding a current local mobile food license may keep operating while their DSHS pre-licensing inspection is pending — if they apply, pay, and include proof of the current local license. No local license and no DSHS application means no legal operation: the queue is not a grace period for people who never filed.
The queue is real. DSHS expected roughly 19,000 vendors in the new system; 6,000+ applications arrived in the first two weeks of July 2026. The statute gives DSHS 14 days to inspect (§437B.054); the agency has acknowledged it cannot always meet that, and operators report waits of months (trade reporting, October 2026 — we label it reported, not verified, because the agency publishes no wait clock). Plan your opening date around the queue, not around the statute's promise.
What cities may no longer do: require a mobile food permit of their own, charge a permit fee for selling food, or impose rules that conflict with chapter 437B. What cities still control: where you may park — zoning, rights-of-way, location and distance rules that don't conflict with the chapter — plus event permits and fire checks at events. The permit question is settled; the placement question is forever.
Go deeper: HB 2844 in plain words — the law section by section · Getting the DSHS license — the application sequence, step by step · or run your move through the checker.
The trap in Austin is not the permit anymore — it is the spot.
Dallas is the proof of why this site date-stamps everything: months after the law changed, the city's pages still taught the abolished process.
Houston's freedom is real but it is about land, not licenses: with no zoning, your constraint is property permission and fire checks, not the permit that HB 2844 already settled..
San Antonio event season is the metro's real second permit system — the DSHS license gets you legal, the event applications get you placed..
The Fort Worth–Dallas pair is exactly what HB 2844 was built for: one metroplex, one license, finally.
El Paso operators who also work Las Cruces live the two-state life: Texas is now one license, New Mexico is a different office entirely.
Get the FoodTruckCleared Kit — $29
One payment of $29. No subscription. The kit is a web page you can return to and print — Permit Path sheets for all 51 jurisdictions, the Texas transition guide, reciprocity playbooks, the commissary agreement template, inspection checklists, the event pack, and fee worksheets.