When Are Panic Bars Required on a Door?

The short answer

When are panic bars required? Under the International Building Code, which Wisconsin's commercial building code follows, a door needs panic hardware when it serves a high-hazard space, or a room or space with an occupant load of 50 or more people in an assembly or educational use, and the door has a latch or a lock. Assembly means places like restaurants, bars, churches, theaters, and event halls. Educational means schools. Certain electrical rooms need panic hardware too. Offices, stores, and apartment buildings are not covered by that rule on their own. In Milwaukee a panic bar installation starts at $349 and a repair at $129. Your local building inspector or fire department has the final word for your building.

Which code applies in Wisconsin

Wisconsin's Commercial Building Code adopts the International Building Code, with state changes. The state moved from the 2015 edition to the 2021 edition of the IBC, effective September 1, 2025, and began requiring building plans to meet the new code from November 1, 2025. Panic hardware rules in the 2021 IBC are in section 1010.2.9.

The threshold has changed over time. The 2000 and 2003 editions of the IBC set it at 100 people for assembly and educational spaces. The 2006 and later editions lowered it to 50. NFPA 101, the Life Safety Code, which some buildings must also follow, still uses 100 people for assembly, educational, and day care occupancies. That is why an older building may have a door that met the code when it was built and would not meet it today.

How the 50 people are counted

The occupant load is not the number of people you expect. It is the floor area divided by a factor from Table 1004.5 of the IBC, and each kind of space has its own factor:

• A dining room or meeting room with tables and chairs: 15 square feet of net floor area per person.
• A room with chairs only, such as rows of loose chairs: 7 square feet per person.
• Standing space, such as a bar area or a waiting area: 5 square feet per person.
• An office: 150 square feet of gross floor area per person.
• A store: 60 square feet of gross floor area per person.

So a restaurant dining room with 750 square feet of net floor area, at 15 square feet per person, has an occupant load of 50, and its latched exit doors need panic hardware. An office of 1,000 square feet, at 150 square feet per person, counts as 7 people. The architect's plans for a building usually show the occupant load of each room, and your building inspector confirms it.

Electrical rooms and other spaces

The 2021 IBC also requires panic hardware on the exit doors of some rooms that hold large electrical equipment. A room with equipment rated 800 amperes or more, with breakers, switches, or controls, needs panic hardware on doors within 25 feet of the required working space around that equipment. Rooms for transformer vaults, battery or energy storage systems, and some refrigeration machinery rooms have their own rules. A facilities manager or an electrician usually knows which rooms in a building fall under these.

What the hardware must do

Where panic hardware is required, the code also sets how it works:

• The push bar or touchpad must measure at least half the width of the door leaf.
• It must be mounted between 34 and 48 inches above the floor.
• A force of no more than 15 pounds on the bar must release the latch.
• No other lock, chain, padlock, or slide bolt may be added to the door.
• On a fire-rated door, the device must be fire exit hardware, which carries its own label and cannot be held open mechanically.

Panic hardware comes in three main kinds. A rim device sits on the face of the door with the latch at the edge. A vertical rod device latches at the top and bottom of the door, which suits pairs of doors. A mortise device controls a lock body set inside the door.

The main door exception

The IBC allows one common exception: the main exit of an assembly space may use a key-operated lock in place of panic hardware, with a sign saying the door must stay unlocked while the space is occupied, where the building official allows it. A restaurant can lock its front door at night with a key and keep it unlocked during business hours. Every other door from that space still needs panic hardware.

When you remodel or change use

The code applies when a building is built, remodeled, or changes use. A store that becomes a restaurant, or an office that becomes an event space, can move a room over the 50-person line and trigger panic hardware on its exit doors. If a permit is involved, the building inspector checks the doors at the final inspection. Fire inspectors also check exit doors in existing buildings during their routine inspections.

Dogging and security

Many panic bars have dogging, a hex key or a key cylinder that holds the latch pulled back so the door pushes open during business hours. Dogging is allowed on panic hardware but not on fire exit hardware. When the door must stay locked from the outside, outside trim with a key or a pull with no latch release keeps people out while the bar still lets everyone out. Our page on panic bars shows the trim options and the repairs we make.