The keep right sign stands at the nose of a median, traffic island, or other obstruction in the roadway, and it tells you which side to pass on: stay to the right of the obstruction. The symbol is a picture of the situation, the vertical bar is the obstruction and the arrow is your path around it.
It is a regulatory sign, so passing on the wrong side is a violation, not just a bad idea. Divided roads depend on it: the same divider that protects opposing traffic becomes a head-on hazard the moment someone passes it on the left.
Move right early and pass the obstruction on its right side. At night or in poor visibility, treat the sign itself as the marker of something solid directly ahead, and adjust your lane position before you reach it, not at it.
Tests contrast it with the Divided Highway warning diamond, which announces a median beginning ahead, and with lane-use arrows that assign turns. Keep Right is the one posted on or immediately before the obstruction itself, telling you the side, not the distance.
This sign appears in 5 questions across 5 of our state banks, on Driver License practice tests. Start with your state:
How should you pass the obstruction shown on the pictured sign?
Why: The keep-right sign requires traffic to pass to the right of a median or other obstruction. Therefore, the supported response is "Keep to its right".
Every practice test explains its answers this way. Pick your state and take one free; no sign-up.
Choose your stateAn obstruction such as a median or island is directly ahead in the roadway, and you must pass it on the right side. The vertical bar in the symbol is the obstruction and the arrow is your path.
On or just before the nose of medians, traffic islands, and the start of divided sections, exactly where the roadway splits around something solid.
Yes. It is a regulatory sign, and on a divided road passing on the wrong side puts you head-on into opposing traffic. The sign is law, not advice.
The yellow divided-highway diamond warns that a median begins ahead. The white keep right rectangle stands at the obstruction and commands the side to pass on. One prepares you, the other directs you.
Usually as symbol recognition, since the bar-and-arrow drawing is unlike any other sign, and occasionally as a night-driving scenario where the sign marks an unlit island ahead.