What HB 4504 Is, in One Paragraph

House Bill 4504 was passed by the 88th Texas Legislature in 2023 and signed by the Governor. It is a "non-substantive recodification" of Chapter 55 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure — meaning the legislature did not (in theory) change the underlying law, but it did rewrite, reorganize, renumber, and clarify it. The repealed Chapter 55 was first enacted in 1977 and had been amended dozens of times over four decades, leaving a tangle of subsections, cross-references, and inconsistencies. The replacement, Chapter 55A, took effect on January 1, 2025. Any expunction petition filed on or after that date — including every petition filed in 2026 — falls under Chapter 55A.

Why Texas Replaced Chapter 55 with Chapter 55A

The old Chapter 55 had a problem familiar to anyone who has ever read a Texas criminal statute: it had grown organically over 47 years of legislative tinkering. New eligibility categories were bolted onto §55.01 with subsection-letter addresses like §55.01(a)(2)(A)(ii)(b), waiting-period rules were scattered across multiple sections, and the procedural requirements lived in a different place from the substantive ones. Texas appellate courts repeatedly noted the chapter was hard to read, hard to apply, and prone to litigation over what was effectively typographical ambiguity.

HB 4504 was the cleanup. The Texas Legislative Council recodified the chapter, regrouped related provisions, gave each substantive ground for expunction its own clean section, and standardized procedural language. The substantive eligibility was supposed to remain unchanged, but as a practical matter, anyone who learned the law under the old §55.01(a)(2) framework now has to relearn the section numbers under the new §55A.151 (and similar) framework.

The bill also moved the "automatic expunction" concept — which had been functionally optional under the old law — to a clearer affirmative duty on prosecutors and trial courts in certain non-conviction cases. That is the most substantive change, and it deserves its own section below.

What's Actually New Under Chapter 55A

Three changes are worth knowing about. None of them is the kind of headline-grabbing expansion ("Texas just made it easier to clear your record!") that some news coverage implied. They are quieter, more procedural changes that nonetheless matter at the filing-petition level.

1. Reorganized section numbering

The old Chapter 55 packed every substantive ground for expunction into §55.01 with deeply nested subsections. Chapter 55A breaks them out: separate sections for arrest-only-no-charge cases, dismissed cases, acquittals, no-bills, completed pretrial diversion, completed Class C deferred, and so on. From a drafting standpoint, this means the petition's "grounds" paragraph is shorter and clearer, but it also means every model petition template predating 2025 is technically miscited until someone updates the section references.

2. Codified automatic expunction triggers

Chapter 55A makes explicit what was implied under the old chapter: when a defendant is acquitted at trial, or when a grand jury issues a no-bill, the trial court or prosecutor is required to initiate the expunction process for the defendant — without the defendant filing a petition. The defendant is not supposed to have to ask. In practice, this provision works inconsistently across counties (more on that below), but it is a real statutory duty now.

3. Modernized agency-service language

The list of agencies that must be served with a signed expunction order has been updated to reflect modern records practice — explicitly contemplating that private background-check vendors hold copies of records that DPS doesn't, and acknowledging electronic records systems and electronic filing. The agencies named in the petition's service list are still the petitioner's responsibility to identify; the change is just that the statute now uses 2025 language instead of 1977 language.

What Did Not Change

Most of what people care about in expunction law is exactly the same under Chapter 55A as it was under the old Chapter 55:

• Substantive eligibility. If you qualified for expunction under the old §55.01, you almost certainly still qualify under Chapter 55A. Dismissals, acquittals, no-bills, completed pretrial diversion, completed Class C deferred — all of these grounds carried over without substantive change.
• The waiting periods. 2 years for Class A and B misdemeanors, 3 years for felonies — these waiting periods are tied to the statute of limitations on the underlying offense and were not altered by HB 4504.
• The court filing fee. Still $450, paid to the district clerk in the county of arrest. Same in every Texas county.
• The $0 cost ceiling for indigent filers. Texas waives filing fees for petitioners who file an Affidavit of Indigency that the court accepts. That mechanism was not changed.
• What an expunction does. Still permanently destroys the record. Still allows the petitioner to legally deny the arrest occurred on most applications. Still requires every named agency — including private background-check vendors — to be served and bound.
• Nondisclosure law. Government Code Chapter 411 was not affected by HB 4504 in any way.

The "Automatic" Expunction Provision — and Why You Still Need to Verify

The most-discussed feature of Chapter 55A is the codified automatic-expunction provision. For certain non-conviction outcomes — primarily acquittals and grand-jury no-bills — the statute now affirmatively says the trial court or prosecutor is supposed to initiate the expunction without the defendant filing a petition. The defendant should not have to ask, and should not have to pay the $450 filing fee.

That is the law. The reality, in 2026, is more uneven.

Some Texas counties have implemented internal procedures to actually trigger automatic expunctions on acquittals and no-bills. Others have not. Many prosecutors and clerks are still treating the trigger as the defendant's responsibility to invoke. The result: a defendant who was acquitted in March 2025 may believe their record was automatically expunged, only to discover months later that the arrest still appears on a background check because no one in the courthouse actually filed the order.

The practical guidance under Chapter 55A is unchanged from what it was under the old Chapter 55: verify, don't assume. Pull a fingerprint-based DPS background check 90 days after any acquittal or no-bill. If the arrest is still there, the automatic trigger did not fire, and you need to file the petition yourself. The §450 filing fee is the same; the petition is the same; the only difference is whether the prosecutor was supposed to do it for free and didn't.

Waiting Periods Under Chapter 55A

The waiting period before you can file an expunction petition is tied to the statute of limitations on the underlying offense, not to the disposition date or to anything HB 4504 changed. The numbers are the same under Chapter 55A as they were under the old Chapter 55:

• Class C misdemeanor — file 180 days after the date of the arrest, regardless of disposition.
• Class A or B misdemeanor — 2 years from the date of the offense.
• Felony — 3 years from the date of the offense.
• Class C deferred completed successfully — file as soon as the deferred period ends and the court enters an order of dismissal.
• Pretrial diversion completed — file as soon as the program is completed and the case is dismissed.
• Acquittal or no-bill — no waiting period; file immediately. (Or wait for the automatic trigger, with the verification caveat above.)

Note that the waiting period runs from the date of the offense, not from the date of the dismissal. A case dismissed three months after a misdemeanor arrest still has to wait the remainder of the 2-year limitations period before the petition can be filed. This is a frequent source of pro-se denials — the clerk's intake doesn't catch the date math, but the DA's office does, and an early-filed petition can be denied for lack of ripeness.

If You're Filing in 2026: A 5-Step Map

Whether you came across this article because of a 2018 dismissal you've been sitting on, a 2024 case you waited to file, or a 2025 acquittal you're not sure ever got the automatic treatment — the practical 2026 filing path under Chapter 55A is this:

1. Confirm eligibility under Chapter 55A. The substantive grounds are essentially the same as under the old §55.01, but make sure the petition cites the correct Chapter 55A section. Templates predating January 1, 2025 cite repealed sections.
2. Compute the waiting period. 2 years for Class A/B misdemeanor (felony 3 years), running from the date of the offense, not the date of dismissal.
3. Pull current case records. Get a certified copy of the charging document and the disposition (dismissal, acquittal, no-bill order) from the district clerk in the county of arrest. The petition has to recite the case number, court, and disposition exactly.
4. Draft the petition under Chapter 55A and serve every required agency. The service list under Chapter 55A still has to include DPS, the FBI (through DPS), the arresting agency, the county sheriff, the district attorney, the district clerk, TxDOT (for DWI cases), and every private background-check vendor that may have pulled the underlying record. Missing any of these is the #1 reason an "expunged" record still appears on background checks.
5. File via eFileTexas or in person, pay the $450 fee, and follow up. Most uncontested expunctions are signed by the judge in chambers within 30–60 days. Once the order is signed, the district clerk distributes certified copies to the named agencies — but agency follow-up is not optional. Verify each agency received the order.

The full pro-se walkthrough is in our how to expunge for free in Texas pillar; the policy-and-eligibility deep dive is in the complete Texas expungement guide.

If Your Case Was Dismissed Before 2025

This is a question we get constantly: "My case was dismissed in 2018. Does the new law apply to me?"

Yes — but probably not in the way you think. The law that applies is the law in effect when you file the petition, not when your underlying case was dismissed. If you file in 2026, your petition is processed under Chapter 55A. The substantive eligibility test is essentially identical to what it was under the old Chapter 55, so a 2018 dismissal that would have qualified for expunction under the old law still qualifies under the new one.

What changes is the procedural framework: the section numbers your petition cites, the service-list requirements, and the availability of the automatic-expunction trigger if your disposition was an acquittal or no-bill. For a straightforward 2018 dismissal that you're filing on in 2026, the petition just looks marginally cleaner under Chapter 55A.

The waiting periods are also worth re-checking. If your case was dismissed in 2018 and you've been sitting on it, the 2-year limitations period (for Class A/B misdemeanors) ran in 2020 — meaning you've been eligible to file for years and didn't know it. We see this constantly. The single biggest reason eligible Texans don't file is that no one ever told them they were eligible.

Three Pro-Se Traps That Got Worse Under Chapter 55A

1. Stale petition templates

Every expunction template floating around online predates January 1, 2025. The Texas State Law Library has updated some of its forms; most law-firm-published templates and PDF "free DIY guides" still cite the old §55.01 framework. A petition that cites repealed sections is technically defective. Some judges will sign it anyway; some district clerks return it for refiling. We see at least one of these per week.

2. Belief that automatic expunction always works

News coverage of HB 4504 leaned heavily on the "automatic expunction" headline. The reality is that automatic triggers fire inconsistently across Texas counties. If you were acquitted or no-billed in 2025 or 2026, the only way to know for sure that your record was actually expunged is to pull a fingerprint-based DPS check and look. If the record is still there, file the petition.

3. Wrong service list

Chapter 55A modernized the agency-service language but did not change the underlying responsibility: the petitioner names the agencies, and the petitioner is responsible for missing one. Private background-check vendors — Checkr, HireRight, Sterling, First Advantage, GoodHire, Truework, and others — are the most-missed category. They are not bound by the order unless they were named in the petition and served separately. An "expunged" record that still shows up on a background check 6 months after the order was signed is almost always a missed-vendor problem.

A Reminder About Nondisclosure (Chapter 411)

HB 4504 did not touch nondisclosure law. If you completed deferred adjudication and want to seal the record under Government Code §411.0725 or §411.0726, the eligibility test, waiting period, and filing process are exactly the same in 2026 as they were in 2023. If you had a first-time DWI conviction and want to seal under §411.0731, same — the §411.0731 framework, including the 0.15 BAC cliff and the interlock-cuts-the-wait rule, is unchanged. Our DWI expunction and nondisclosure guide covers the §411.0731 path in detail; the expunction vs. nondisclosure editorial covers when to use which.

The reason this matters: a meaningful share of people searching for "Texas HB 4504 nondisclosure" are conflating the two bodies of law. HB 4504 changed Chapter 55 (expunction). It did not change Chapter 411 (nondisclosure). If you are pursuing record sealing rather than record destruction, the relevant statute is Government Code Chapter 411, and HB 4504 is essentially irrelevant to your case.

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