The UK Practical Driving test

What is the Practical Driving Test.?

The practical driving test was developed to give you the opportunity to show your practical skills and show your understanding of the Highway Code and the theory of driving safely. Throughout your practical driving test your test examiner will be looking at your driving for safe decisions and courtesy to other road users.

Official DSA car practical test – Are you ready?

The driving test is straightforward and has been designed to see if you can drive safely in different road and traffic conditions, know The Highway Code, and can show this through your driving ability.  So long as you show the standard required, you’ll pass your driving test. There are no pass or fail quotas.

The Eyesight Check

Before you start the driving ability part of your test, you’ll have an eyesight check.  The examiner will ask you to read the number plate on a parked vehicle to test your eyesight.  If you fail the check, your driving test won’t continue.

Vehicle safety questions

You’ll be asked two vehicle safety questions. These are also known as the ‘show me, tell me’ questions.

The examiner will ask you one ‘show me’ question, where you’ll have to show them how you’d carry out a vehicle safety check.  You’ll also be asked one ‘tell me’ question, where you’ll have to explain to the examiner how you’d carry out the check.  For example, the examiner might ask you to identify where the windscreen washer reservoir is and tell them how you’d check the windscreen washer level.  If you give the wrong answer for one or both questions, you’ll be marked with one driving fault.

The Driving Ability Part of your Driving Test

The driving part of your test will last about 40 minutes.  Throughout the test your examiner will be looking for an overall safe standard of driving.

Your general driving ability

During your test the examiner will give you directions which you should follow.  You’ll drive in various road and traffic conditions. You should drive in the way your instructor has trained you.  You might also be asked to carry out an emergency stop and your ability to reverse your vehicle safely.  You’ll be asked to complete an exercise to show how well you can reverse your vehicle.  Your driving test will include around ten minutes of independent driving. This is designed to assess your ability to drive safely while making decisions independently.  If you make a mistake, don’t worry about it as it might be a less serious driving fault and might not affect your result. However, if at any time your examiner considers your driving to be a danger to other road users they will stop your test.

Your Result

You’ll pass your test if you make 15 or less driving faults and no serious or dangerous faults

When the driving test has ended, you can call your instructor over if they didn’t go with you on your test. This is so they can listen to the result and feedback with you.

The examiner will tell you whether you passed or not, and explain how you did during the test.  If you pass your test the examiner will give you a pass certificate. They will also ask you if you want your full licence to be sent to you automatically. Once you have passed you test you can start driving straight away – you don’t need to wait for your full licence to arrive.