Houston is one of the deepest CDL training markets in Texas, with community college, private school, and company-sponsored options across the metro. If you’re outside Houston, you can browse CDL training options near you anywhere in Texas.
Six Houston-area providers publish enough detail to compare properly. Three colleges publish a price themselves, and a fourth — our own partner — has its prices on the public record its state regulator keeps. Houston City College lists $4,350 for Class A and $2,150 for a separate Class B course; Lee College in Baytown lists $4,000 for an 8-week Class A course; Alvin Community College lists $3,435 in-district and $3,575 out-of-district. Lone Star College (Spring) and San Jacinto College (Pasadena) run Class A courses but publish no tuition. Private schools price individually. King CDL Academy, our compensated Houston private-school partner, publishes no price on its own site, but its Texas Workforce Commission record lists $3,700 for a 120-hour automatic Class A course, $4,500 for the manual version and $2,500 for an 80-hour Class B course. Carrier-sponsored training is a different product, not a cheaper school: you sign an agreement with a trucking company before you are licensed, and the terms vary by carrier. Whatever you pick, search the provider by name on the FMCSA Training Provider Registry before you pay a deposit — your entry-level driver training only counts if the provider is listed. Compare Houston programs free →
The Houston CDL Training Market
Houston’s driver demand is concentrated around measurable freight. Port Houston reports that in 2025 its eight public terminals handled 4,303,345 TEUs and 54.5 million short tons, serving about 2.5 million trucks across more than 3.3 million gate transactions at an average turn time of roughly 40 minutes. The 52-mile Houston Ship Channel complex adds more than 200 private terminals serving the refining and petrochemical plants along it. Distribution along I-10, I-45 and I-69 and construction across a growing metro account for much of the rest.
Training for that market comes from three different kinds of provider, and they behave differently. Public colleges run fixed cohorts, publish schedules, and in three cases publish a price: Houston City College at its Northeast Campus, Lone Star College in Spring, San Jacinto College in Pasadena, Lee College in Baytown, and Alvin Community College to the south-east. Private schools are the most common path and price individually. Carrier-sponsored programs are an employment agreement with a training component attached, which is a materially different decision.
More providers means more schedule formats and more chance of a start date that suits you. It does not mean the options are interchangeable. Two of the five colleges above publish no price; only one publishes a Class B course; testing arrangements differ; and funding eligibility is decided by a workforce board, the VA or an institution’s financial-aid office rather than by the school’s admissions desk. The comparison below is organised around those differences.
How We Built This Guide
Get CDL Texas publishes guidance on choosing a CDL school in Houston. We do not publish rankings or aggregate scores. Here is how we evaluated the programs named on this page and how to verify any school yourself.
What we compare
Only what a provider states on its own current pages: license class, published tuition or quote-only status, program length and contact hours, schedule formats, physical training location, what the provider says is included, where testing happens, and which funding routes it names. Where a provider is silent on something, this page says so rather than filling the gap.
What we do not claim
- We publish no rankings, scores, star ratings or pass rates. Nothing here is ordered “best to worst”.
- We have not visited, inspected or audited any school on this page.
- We do not guarantee admission, tuition, financing, a school response, or a job.
- We report FMCSA Training Provider Registry status as the registry returned it on 11 September 2026, including for our own partner. FMCSA does not approve or certify listed providers and listings change, so search the registry yourself, by name, before paying anything.
- Where a provider publishes no price, we leave the cell empty rather than estimating one.
How to verify a school yourself
- Confirm FMCSA TPR listing at tpr.fmcsa.dot.gov.
- Verify Texas DPS requirements at dps.texas.gov.
- Ask the school in writing: total all-in cost and what is billed separately, how many behind-the-wheel hours you actually get, students per truck, where the skills test happens and who provides the vehicle, the refund and retake policy, and how your ELDT completion is reported.
- Check the Texas Workforce Commission Career Schools and Colleges register if the provider is a private school — a school licensed by TWC will normally publish its certificate or school number.
How we are paid, and what that does not buy
This is a non-exhaustive comparison of five public colleges plus Get CDL Texas’s disclosed compensated private partner. King CDL Academy is the only private school named here, and it is named partly because of that commercial relationship. Other Houston private schools were not researched to the same depth, and some were not researched at all. This is not a ranking and it does not represent the whole private-school market. Our advertising disclosure explains that commercial relationships may influence which schools we present. See our editorial policy.
Last reviewed: September 2026.
Houston-Area CDL Programs Compared
Every figure below was read from the provider’s own current page on 11 September 2026 and is linked to its source. Blank cells mean the provider does not publish that detail — not that it does not exist. Nothing here is ranked.
| Provider | Class | Published tuition | Length & format | Where | Funding routes the provider names |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Houston City College public college |
A and B separate courses |
$4,350 Class A $2,150 Class B |
Class A: 200 contact hours — 5-wk day (Mon–Thu), 10-wk evening (Mon–Fri 5:30–10:30 p.m.), or 10 weekends (Sat/Sun). Class B: 6 wks / 120 hrs, Sat & Sun. |
Northeast Campus, 555 Community College Drive, Houston 77013 | None stated on either CDL program page |
| Lone Star College public college |
A only | Not published — request a quote | 6 wks full-time weekdays, 8 wks part-time evenings, or 15 wks part-time weekends | Transportation & Global Logistics Technology Center, 1200 E Cypresswood Dr, Spring 77373 | GI Bill, Hazlewood Act, TWC Vocational Rehabilitation Services, periodic grants and scholarships |
| San Jacinto College public college |
A only | Not published — request a quote | 246 contact hours; page states 4 weeks in one place and “as little as six weeks, or a longer format” in another — confirm. Day, evening and weekend options described. | Central Campus, Pasadena | TPEG, Workforce Solutions scholarships, Promise Scholarship, GI Bill, Hazlewood, TWC Vocational Rehabilitation, WIOA |
| Lee College public college |
A only | $4,000 due in full a week before class starts |
8 weeks; 240 hours of classroom and behind-the-wheel training | McNair Center, 3411 I-10, Baytown 77521 | TPEG, which the college says may cover up to 75% of tuition for eligible students |
| Alvin Community College public college |
A only | $3,435 in-district $3,575 out-of-district |
Evening sessions 6–10 p.m.; day sessions 7 a.m.–5:30 p.m.; weekend Sat/Sun sessions | 3110 Mustang Road, Alvin 77511 | “Financial aid available” — no specific program named |
| King CDL Academy Our paid partner — disclosed |
Class A and Class B (TWC record; registered with FMCSA for behind-the-wheel only) | $3,700 Class A automatic $4,500 Class A manual $2,500 Class B TWC record, not a quote |
3 weeks weekday, or 4 weeks weekend | 3318 Fondren Rd, Houston 77063 (south-west Houston) | None stated |
| Other private schools | Varies | Quote required — no verified Houston average | Varies; confirm in writing | Across the metro | Varies |
It does not average the private-school column. We have not verified a Houston private-school tuition average, and a range borrowed from another metro would look like information while telling you nothing about the program in front of you. Get a written quote on the exact course.
It reports registry status as we found it on 11 September 2026. We searched the FMCSA Training Provider Registry for every provider named here and record what it returned, including where the answer was awkward. FMCSA does not approve or certify providers — being listed means the provider applied and self-certified, so treat it as a minimum requirement rather than a quality signal. Look each provider up yourself at tpr.fmcsa.dot.gov before paying anything.
The public colleges
Suits you if: you want a published price, a fixed cohort date, and the option of Class B
Suits you if: you are north of the city and want the longest weekend format available
Suits you if: you live on the east or Ship Channel side and want to check workforce funding first
Suits you if: you are east of the metro and want a published price with the most stated training hours
Suits you if: you are south-east of Houston and want the clearest published statement of what is excluded
Private schools, including our Houston partner
King CDL Academy is a current Get CDL Texas partner school, and qualifying Houston private-school requests may be shared with it after human review. We may be paid if a student we refer enrolls. That relationship is why it appears here by name; it is not a ranking, an endorsement, a rating, or a statement that it is the best option for you. Our advertising disclosure explains that commercial relationships may influence which schools we present. Everything below comes from the school’s own site and from two public regulator records — its Texas Workforce Commission certificate and the FMCSA registry — including the things that do not line up. Read our full advertising disclosure.
Suits you if: you are in south-west Houston, want a short schedule, and want to compare an automatic against a manual Class A course
On the FMCSA registry the school is listed and not under review, registered for behind-the-wheel instruction on the range and the public road in both Class A and Class B. No theory instruction is registered at this location. Providers may register theory and behind-the-wheel separately, and a driver may take theory from a different registered provider, so this is not a defect — but the school advertises free ELDT theory, so ask who delivers and reports that part.
Two regulators, two addresses. The FMCSA registry and the school’s own site say 3318 Fondren Road, Houston 77063. Its TWC record says 3710 South Highway 6, Building B, Houston 77082. We found no first-party explanation and we have not resolved it. Confirm where training actually happens before you enroll.
What it still does not publish: tuition on its own site, financing or payment plans, WIOA or Workforce Solutions eligibility, and GI Bill or VA approval. It lists job placement as a feature with no placement guarantee and no placement rate — treat it as assistance and ask which employers have hired recent graduates. Its own pages describe behind-the-wheel road training, an online permit book, a pre-trip inspection book and videos, backing maneuvers, three-week weekday and four-week weekend formats, refresher and hazardous-materials courses, "CDL class A testing", and say it provides the truck for your test.
It is a private school, not a carrier. If what you want is a trucking company to pay for your training in exchange for driving for it, that is a different arrangement with a different provider — see the next section.
Suits you if: you need a specific location, class or start date the colleges cannot cover
Carrier-sponsored training — a different pathway, not a cheaper school
Suits you if: upfront cash is the binding constraint and you are open to the route and schedule the work requires
Two distinctions worth holding onto. Tuition reimbursement is not sponsorship — you pay a school yourself, get licensed, then are reimbursed in installments while you remain employed. And a private school with carrier relationships is not a carrier sponsoring you: ask who holds the agreement. A carrier having a Houston terminal also does not mean it trains new students in Houston. Read our guide to company-paid CDL training in Texas, and if you are weighing the two, private school versus company-paid training.
The Criteria That Actually Decide It
Proximity and sticker price are the two things people compare, and they are rarely the two that matter most. Work through these instead.
1. Class A or Class B
This narrows the field before anything else does. Class A covers combination vehicles and is what most Houston port, Ship Channel and regional freight work runs on. Class B covers single vehicles — buses, dump trucks, straight delivery trucks — and is more common in local, home-daily work. Availability is genuinely uneven here: of the providers on this page, Houston City College publishes a separate Class B course at $2,150, and King CDL Academy’s TWC record lists an 80-hour Class B course at $2,500. Class B is not as scarce here as it first looks, but it is not everywhere either. See Class A vs Class B if you are still deciding.
2. Whether the price is published or quoted
Three providers here publish a figure and three do not. That is not a quality signal in either direction, but it changes how you compare: against a published price you are checking what is excluded, and against a quote you are first establishing what the course even is. Never compare an all-inclusive figure with a tuition-only one. Our Houston cost page lists what to ask about item by item.
3. Schedule, honestly assessed
A full-time weekday course is the fastest route and the hardest to combine with a job. The published out-of-hours options run from Houston City College’s 10-week evening course to Lone Star’s 15-week weekend track. A longer calendar is usually the same training spread thinner, not more of it — and enrolling full-time then dropping out still costs you the tuition. Count the earnings you keep, or lose, as part of the comparison.
4. Location and the commute you will actually do
Training sites in this metro are far apart: Spring in the north, Pasadena in the east, Baytown further east on I-10, Alvin to the south, Houston City College’s Northeast Campus, and King CDL Academy on Fondren Road in the south-west. At Houston traffic speeds that is the difference between a workable eight weeks and an abandoned course. Our Pasadena, Baytown and Sugar Land pages set out what is realistic from each.
5. Behind-the-wheel time and what is included
FMCSA sets no minimum number of behind-the-wheel hours — completion is judged by the instructor — so total hours are a real point of difference rather than a formality. The published figures are Houston City College’s 200 minimum contact hours, San Jacinto’s 246 catalog contact hours, Lee College’s 240 classroom and behind-the-wheel hours, and King CDL Academy’s 120 course hours on its TWC record. Those four are counted in different ways by different institutions, so treat them as four separate disclosures rather than one league table. Ask how many hours you actually drive, and how many students share each truck.
6. Where you test, and who provides the vehicle
Some providers test on site, some send you to a Department of Public Safety location, and some charge separately for the test vehicle. King CDL Academy states that it provides the truck for your test. Ask every school where the skills test happens, who supplies the vehicle, what a retest costs, and whether any of it is inside the quoted price.
7. Funding eligibility — decided elsewhere, so settle it first
The provider does not decide this. Workforce funding runs through Workforce Solutions Gulf Coast and the workforce board decides; the Texas Workforce Commission states that appearing on the statewide eligible provider list “does not guarantee that a Board will refer any student to the program” and “does not promise that a program will receive any funds”. Veteran benefits depend on the benefit you hold and whether the exact program is approved. San Jacinto and Lone Star name the most routes; Houston City College’s CDL pages name none. Get approval in writing before you pay a deposit.
8. Placement support versus a guarantee
No school can guarantee employment, and a school that implies one is telling you something about itself. Ask the two questions that produce real answers: which employers have hired your recent graduates, and what does your placement support actually consist of. Completing training makes you eligible to apply — it is not an offer, and Houston employers set their own requirements on driving record, background checks, endorsements and experience.
9. What you are signing
Refund policy, retake policy, withdrawal terms, and — for carrier-sponsored training — the driving commitment and what you owe if you leave early. These are the terms people discover late. Read our CDL school contract red flags and refund policy guide before signing anything.
Want us to narrow it down with your ZIP code, schedule and how you plan to pay?
Compare Houston CDL Programs Free →Not sure if you’re ready to enroll yet? Use our free CDL readiness checklist to confirm your DOT physical, permit, schedule, budget, and school questions before you commit to a Houston-area CDL program.
Red Flags to Avoid When Choosing a Houston CDL School
Houston’s deep market has strong programs — and a few weaker operators. These are the warning signs that should make you walk away or at minimum ask hard questions before signing anything:
- Not on the FMCSA Training Provider Registry. Training from an unlisted provider does not count toward CDL testing eligibility, so check before you pay a deposit. No exceptions.
- Can’t or won’t provide an itemised written quote. Not publishing a price online is normal; refusing to put one in writing when you ask is not. The quote should separate tuition from the DOT physical, the commercial learner permit, skills testing, use of a test vehicle, retests and materials, and say which you pay to the school and which you pay elsewhere.
- Unusual payment demands. Cash-only requests, wire transfers and pressure to pay before you have seen the enrollment agreement are warning signs. Be careful to separate that from a published, documented payment policy — Lee College, for instance, states openly that tuition is due in full a week before class starts, which is a term to plan around, not a red flag.
- Guaranteed job placement, or a pass-rate figure with nothing behind it. No school can guarantee employment. Treat “100% placement” and unaudited first-attempt pass rates the same way: ask for the employers, the period, the denominator and what counts as placed. A school that answers precisely is telling you something; so is one that pivots.
- No clear refund or retake policy. What happens if you fail the skills test on the first attempt? What if you have to drop out mid-program due to illness or family emergency? Schools without written policies on retakes, refunds, and extensions are protecting themselves — not you.
- High-pressure enrollment tactics. Pressure to sign on a first visit, or artificial urgency — “this price is only good today”, “seats are nearly gone” — is a playbook, not information. A real cohort start date is a fact you can verify; urgency you cannot check is not. You should be able to take the enrollment agreement away and read it.
- Funding promised by the school. No school decides whether you get WIOA or workforce funding, and none decides your VA eligibility. A provider that tells you funding is arranged, rather than telling you who decides and how to apply, is over-promising something it does not control.
Get everything in writing. Verify FMCSA registration. Ask for employer references. Any school that can’t or won’t provide these three things isn’t worth your tuition — no matter how convenient the location or how low the sticker price.
Schedules Side by Side
The same providers, reordered by how long the course takes, so you can see what a schedule choice costs you in calendar time. Published tuition is in the comparison table above.
| Format | Published length | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| King CDL Academy — weekday (our paid partner) | 3 weeks | Shortest published weekday schedule |
| King CDL Academy — weekend (our paid partner) | 4 weeks | Shortest published weekend schedule |
| Houston City College — Class A day | 5 weeks (Mon–Thu), 200 contact hours | Published price, fastest college route |
| San Jacinto College — Class A | 4–6 weeks stated, 246 contact hours | East side; widest funding list, incl. WIOA |
| Lone Star College — Class A full-time | 6 weeks | North of the city |
| Houston City College — Class B weekend | 6 weeks / 120 hours (Sat & Sun) | The only Class B course published by a provider in this comparison |
| Alvin Community College — Class A | Day, evening and weekend sessions | South-east; publishes what is excluded |
| Lee College — Class A | 8 weeks / 240 hours | Publishes both a price and an hour count; Baytown |
| Houston City College — Class A evening | 10 weeks (Mon–Fri, 5:30–10:30 p.m.) | Keeping a weekday job |
| Houston City College — Class A weekend | 10 weekends (Sat & Sun) | Keeping a weekday job |
| Lone Star College — Class A weekend | 15 weeks | Longest published out-of-hours option |
| Carrier-sponsored | Varies by carrier | Upfront cash is the binding constraint |
A longer calendar is normally the same course spread over more weeks, not more training. Ask what the same program costs in each format — and count the earnings a part-time schedule lets you keep as part of the total.
What a Houston CDL Actually Costs
Three Houston-area colleges publish a Class A price. Everything else on this list is either a state fee, which is fixed, or a charge that varies by provider and belongs in your written quote.
- Tuition: three of the six providers publish a Class A price and three do not, as the comparison table above sets out. King CDL Academy publishes none on its own site; the figures shown for it come from its Texas Workforce Commission record and are not a quote. We have not verified a Houston private-school average and do not publish one
- Original commercial learner permit: $25, set by Texas DPS and identical wherever you train
- Standard new CDL, ages 18–84, without a hazardous materials endorsement: $97 at Texas DPS. Other transactions — a CDL with hazmat, renewals, replacements — are priced separately
- Charges that vary and must be itemised: medical examination, drug screening, skills testing, use of a test vehicle, extra practice or remedial instruction, retests, books and materials
- Charges some providers publish separately: Alvin Community College is the one provider here that publishes what its tuition excludes — its card above has the detail
We do not publish a Houston “total out-of-pocket” range, because the only honest total is the published tuition of the specific program you choose plus the specific charges that provider bills you. Build yours on the Houston cost page, which works through each line and the funding routes, or compare across the state on the Texas CDL cost page. Current state amounts: DPS fee schedule.
If you may qualify for workforce or veteran funding, settle it first. Approval is decided by the workforce board or the VA, not by the school, and paying first can put you outside what would otherwise have been covered. Start with Workforce Solutions Gulf Coast, which describes an assessment with a career advisor as the first step, and check the exact program in the VA’s comparison tool. Our CDL financing and GI Bill guide covers both.
How Fast You Can Start in Houston
Colleges run cohorts on fixed published start dates; private schools generally start more often. Confirm the next actual start date with the school rather than working from a general impression of availability. Two fixed requirements set the floor whatever a school tells you, and both are in the timeline below.
The realistic timeline from decision to first day of training:
- Days 1–3: Submit an inquiry, and compare schedules and costs yourself using the table above
- Days 3–7: Complete DOT physical, apply for CLP at Texas DPS, begin online ELDT knowledge training
- Day 14+: Permit held the required 14 days — Texas Transportation Code §522.014 puts it as “not before the 15th day after” the permit is issued — so the skills test becomes possible once training is complete
- Weeks 2–8: Behind-the-wheel training at your enrolled school
- End of program: CDL skills test, license issued
For a full-time course, the published schedules plus the permit period put a realistic figure at roughly six to ten weeks from decision to license, assuming nothing goes wrong. An evening or weekend format stretches the training portion to somewhere between ten and seventeen weeks. Neither is a promise: cohort availability, the DOT physical, permit test results and retests all move the date.
Frequently Asked Questions
Two checks do most of the work, and the verification list above walks through both. First, search the school by name on the FMCSA Training Provider Registry at tpr.fmcsa.dot.gov — if it is not listed as an entry-level driver training provider, your training will not count toward CDL testing eligibility. Listings change, so check it yourself before you pay. Second, a private school needs a Texas Workforce Commission certificate of approval — King CDL Academy publishes school number S6143. A long-established public college answers the legitimacy question but not the fit question.
The shortest published schedules are King CDL Academy's three-week weekday format and Houston City College's five-week weekday Class A course. Schedule length is not the whole clock: the permit must be held at least 14 days before the skills test and entry-level driver training has to be complete first, which puts roughly six to ten weeks between decision and license on a full-time course. Book the DOT physical early. None of it is a guarantee.
Nothing here is reliably free, and two things get called free that are not. Workforce funding may cover approved training, but the workforce board decides eligibility, not the school. Carrier-sponsored training is a contract, not a gift: tuition in exchange for a driving commitment, with repayment terms if you leave early. Veteran benefits depend on the benefit you hold and whether the exact program is approved. Criterion 7 above quotes what the Texas Workforce Commission actually promises. See our free and low-cost CDL training guide.
It depends on four things, and this page will not pick for you: which license class you need, whether you need a published price now rather than a quote, which schedule you can actually sustain, and how far you are willing to drive in Houston traffic. The comparison table above carries the published class, price and schedule for each provider, and the criteria section works through all four.
It is an agreement with a trucking company rather than a course you buy, and every term in it varies by carrier: what is covered, whether you are paid during training, and what you repay if you leave early. The carrier-sponsored section above sets out the distinctions. This page names no carriers because we cannot verify a current offer for you. Read the agreement you are asked to sign, not the recruiting page, and see our company-paid CDL training guide.
They differ on predictability rather than quality. The colleges publish schedules and fixed cohort dates, three of the five publish tuition, and several name specific funding routes — San Jacinto names WIOA, Lone Star names the GI Bill and the Hazlewood Act. Private schools generally start more often and can be closer to you, but most publish nothing, so the comparison only becomes real once you have a written itemised quote on the exact course. Neither category is automatically cheaper: the lowest published Class A figure on this page belongs to a community college, and the shortest published schedule belongs to a private school.
Among providers that publish a figure: Alvin Community College $3,435 in-district or $3,575 out-of-district, Lee College $4,000, and Houston City College $4,350 for Class A or $2,150 for its separate Class B course. Lone Star College, San Jacinto College and King CDL Academy publish no tuition, so request a written quote. We do not publish a Houston private-school average because we have not verified one. State fees are separate and fixed: $25 for the original commercial learner permit and $97 for a standard new CDL for ages 18–84 without a hazardous materials endorsement. Full breakdown on our Houston CDL cost page.
It varies by direction, which is why each has its own page. San Jacinto College runs a Class A course at its Central Campus in Pasadena. Lee College runs one at its McNair Center on I-10 in Baytown, at a published $4,000. We verified no CDL program inside Sugar Land itself, so Fort Bend County residents commute — most plausibly toward south-west Houston. Each page sets out the realistic options and travel from that area.
Every provider detail on this page was read from that provider’s own current page on 11 September 2026: Houston City College Class A, HCC Class B, HCC Northeast Campus, Lone Star College, San Jacinto College, Lee College, Alvin Community College and King CDL Academy. Freight volumes from Port Houston; state fees from the DPS fee schedule; licensing steps from Texas DPS and FMCSA; funding rules from Workforce Solutions Gulf Coast and TWC. Limits: Registry status was read on 11 September 2026, with the caveat given above. We could not reconcile Lee College’s published Baytown program with its registry listing, and we say so on the Baytown page rather than leaving it out. We have not surveyed every Houston-area provider, have not inspected or audited any school, and publish no ratings or pass rates. Published details change — confirm anything you plan to act on directly with the provider. Reviewed September 2026.