It's on the windshield. Now what?

Got a NYC parking ticket. Do I just pay it, or is it worth fighting?

That's the question, and New York has already answered it 27,174,101 times — it just doesn't put the answer anywhere you'd look.

26.2%
of contested tickets are dismissed outright at a hearing. The driver pays nothing. Asking for that hearing is free.
Free · no plate stored · about 30 seconds

NYC parking ticket lookup — search by plate

Every open ticket on the plate, what's owed, how long until each one hits judgment, and the dismissal rate on each. The plate never appears in the address bar.
Or check the ticket itself for a fatal defect →

First, the number you came for

$35 – $250

That's the spread across the common New York tickets, straight from the Department of Finance schedule. Street cleaning is $65. A hydrant, a bus stop or a bike lane is $115. A red light camera is $50. Every one of those already includes the $15 state surcharge, and none of them grows unless you answer late.

What every violation costs, next to how often it gets dismissed → · DOF fine schedule, checked 2026-09-02.

Pay it, or fight it?

Pay it if…

the charge on the ticket is one of those near the bottom of the table — a bike lane, a crosswalk, a no-stopping zone, a camera photo that is clearly your car — and you have nothing specific: no photograph of a missing sign, no timestamped receipt, no error on the ticket itself. Paying inside 30 days keeps the amount exactly where it is (nyc.gov — Dispute a ticket).

Where to pay: the city's own system, CityPay — Parking and Camera Violations, or the Pay or Dispute app. We never take ticket payments. No part of this site touches your money, and nothing here is a payment page.

Fight it if…

your charge sits above the citywide 26.2% dismissal line, or you hold one concrete thing: a photo of the sign (or of where it should have been), a meter receipt or app session covering the time, or a mistake in the plate, place or time printed on the summons. A hearing costs you an evening and no money at all.

Where to fight: free at nyc.gov — Dispute a ticket — online, on the Pay or Dispute app, or by mail on the back of the ticket. Same hearing officers either way.

Look up your exact charge first → Which violation is written on the ticket predicts the outcome more than anything else about your case.

You have thirty days. That's more room than it feels like.

Ask for a hearing within 30 days of the date on the ticket and late penalties never start. Miss that and you can still be heard, but a guilty finding will come with penalties added. Leave it alone entirely and the ticket goes into judgment about 100 days after it was issued (nyc.gov — Dispute a ticket, checked September 4, 2026) — and once judgment debt on your plates reaches $350, the car can be booted and then towed if that's unpaid 48 hours later (nyc.gov — Booting and towing, checked September 4, 2026). Tonight you are nowhere near any of that.

What the city's own hearing records show

26.2%
of decided hearings end NOT GUILTY
58.5%
end dismissed or reduced — the driver pays less or nothing
80
violation types with their own published rate, not one average

The citywide average hides the useful part. Broken out by charge, the dismissal rate runs from 4.3% to 89.8%. What's written on your ticket predicts the outcome more than anything else about your case.

You're not the only one who thought this was unfair. 27,174,101 New Yorkers have already argued a parking or camera ticket in front of a hearing officer and had it decided. The city wrote down how every one of those went — win, lose, or fine cut in half — and then published the file. This site is that file, read for you.

What to do tonight

  1. Photograph the evidence tonight, before it changesThe sign and the curb where you parked, from both directions. The meter receipt or the parking app session. The car where it stood, if it's still there. Signs get replaced, receipts fade, and a photo taken tonight carries far more weight than one taken next week.
  2. Ask for the hearing — online, on the app, or by mailAll three are free, and all three are read by the same hearing officers. The city itself says an in-person hearing is no more likely to end in a dismissal, and points people to the online, app and mail routes instead. By mail: fill in the back of the ticket, attach copies (never originals), and send it to the address printed on it. Start at nyc.gov — Dispute a ticket.
  3. Put the date on a calendar, not in your headThirty days from the date on the ticket to request a hearing before late penalties start. About 100 days from issue and an unanswered ticket goes into judgment (nyc.gov — Dispute a ticket). Once judgment debt on your plates hits $350 the car can be booted, and towed if that's unpaid 48 hours later (nyc.gov — Booting and towing). Tonight, you're early.

Start with your own plate, then let the free tools do the reading

Your plate: every open ticket, what's owed, and the odds on each →
Plate plus state, straight into the city's live records. Nothing is stored — no account, no database, and the plate never even appears in the address bar.

Your ticket: does it have a fatal defect? →
Eight required elements, sixty seconds, answered in your browser. Nothing you type leaves the page.

Your charge: what it costs and how often it's beaten →
All 80 violation types the city publishes outcomes for, ranked.

Your borough: where hearings go the driver's way →
A measurable spread across the five, from the same records.

I built this because the honest answer to "should I fight it?" is a number, and nobody was showing anyone the number. New York publishes the result of every contested ticket and then buries it in a file of 150 million rows. So we read the file. Some of what's in here will tell you to fight; some of it will tell you, plainly, to pay — the hardest charge on the site is beaten only 4.3% of the time and we say so on its page. Everything above is free and stays free, the city's own dispute route is free too, and I'd rather you use it and never buy a thing than feel sold to on the worst evening of your week. If a number here looks wrong, email me. One person reads that mail and answers it; expect a reply within a few days.

— Andrew at Axion Labs · hello@getaxionlabs.com

And if you'd rather not write it yourself

Everything you need to do this alone is on this site, free. This is the shortcut, and it's the only thing here that costs anything.

Found a defect, or your violation has strong dismissal odds? Turn your facts into a ready-to-file hearing statement.
Build your defense statement — $12.99 →
Flat $12.99 — we never file for you and never take a cut of your fine. You stay in control on the city's own site at nyc.gov.

Hearing outcomes computed August 6, 2026 from NYC Open Data, "Open Parking and Camera Violations" (updated daily by the City of New York); percentages are shares of hearings with a recorded disposition (~27.0M). Fine amounts from the NYC Department of Finance schedule, checked 2026-09-02. Deadlines from nyc.gov, Dispute a ticket; boot and tow rules from nyc.gov, Booting and towing, checked September 4, 2026.

Published · Updated

Your words, in a box, read by a person. We ask for no name and no email.