Alaska Child Care Home Ratios and Capacity Limits

The State Ratio Rule

Alaska's child-to-caregiver ratios for home-based child care are set by 7 AAC 57.505. They aren't optional guidelines — the CCPO treats them as hard capacity limits, and exceeding them during an unannounced inspection can trigger enforcement action.

The ratios depend on your license type and the ages of children in your care.

Child Care Home (One Caregiver)

A licensed child care home with a single caregiver may care for a maximum of eight children under the age of 13. That total includes the caregiver's own children under 13 — they aren't counted separately.

Within those eight slots, two age-based sub-limits apply:

• No more than three children under 30 months old
• No more than two nonambulatory children (children who aren't physically or mentally capable of exiting the building without another person's aid)

So a provider with two toddlers of their own (both under 30 months) has already used two of three infant-toddler slots. They can accept one more child under 30 months before hitting the sub-limit, even though the total-capacity number still has room.

Child Care Group Home (Typically Two Caregivers)

A licensed child care group home typically operates with at least two caregivers on-site and may care for nine to twelve children under 13, including the caregivers' own children.

The age-based sub-limits also scale up:

• No more than five children under 30 months old
• No more than four nonambulatory children

Group homes are licensed only by the State of Alaska (the CCPO), not by the Municipality of Anchorage's delegated program.

How Sleeping Children Affect the Ratio

When all children in a group are sleeping, 7 AAC 57 allows the staff-to-child ratio to be doubled — but the ratio that applies is based on the youngest child in the group. If you have seven children sleeping and one is a four-month-old infant, the infant ratio governs the entire room, not the ratio for the older children.

This means nap time doesn't simply halve your staffing requirements. You still need to maintain sight-and-sound supervision from the same floor, and the doubling only applies when every child is actually asleep.

Anchorage's 2025 Alignment

Before July 2025, the Municipality of Anchorage maintained its own local child-to-caregiver ratios under AMC 16.55, and some of them were more restrictive than the state's. The Anchorage Assembly changed that with AO No. 2025-70, which fully aligned local ratios with the state's 7 AAC 57.505 standards.

The same ordinance also eliminated the previous local rule that capped first-year programs at six children — Anchorage providers can now operate at the full state capacity of eight children from day one, provided they have local fire safety approval.

Practical Planning

The ratio rules matter most when you're deciding how many children to accept and how to set your tuition. Here's a quick way to map your capacity:

1. Count your own children under 13 — they fill total-capacity slots
2. Count any under-30-months children (yours and enrolled) — these fill the sub-limit
3. The remaining slots are what you can offer to new families

A home provider with one toddler of their own has seven available total slots and two remaining infant-toddler slots. That's the real capacity number that drives your revenue projection.

For a full breakdown of how ratios interact with CCAP subsidies, background check requirements, and inspection standards, see our Alaska Home Daycare License guide.

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