Test day: what to bring and what actually happens
Nothing on test day is a mystery, and the fastest way to be calm is to know the boring parts cold. Here is the whole day, in order.
What you must bring
Your UK photocard driving licence. That is the one thing the test cannot happen without. If you have an old paper-only licence, special rules apply; check what to take on GOV.UK well before the day rather than at the desk.
Bring your theory test pass certificate or its number if you can find it; you may be asked. And if you need glasses or contact lenses to read a number plate, wear them, because the first thing that happens is:
The eyesight check
Before you drive, the examiner asks you to read a number plate on a parked car, from 20 metres for a modern plate. Fail it and the test ends there, is marked as a fail, and the fee is gone. If you have not read a plate at distance recently, do it on the walk in.
What the car needs
Most people use their instructor's car, which handles all of this. If you take your own, it must be taxed and insured for you to take a test in, have an MOT if it needs one, be roadworthy with no warning lights showing, carry L plates front and rear, have legal tyres with no space-saver spare fitted, and have an extra interior mirror and a working passenger seatbelt and head restraint for the examiner. The full car rules are on GOV.UK, and a car that fails them means a cancelled test and a lost fee, so check the week before.
How the 40 minutes run
The driving part lasts around forty minutes: general driving, one reversing manoeuvre, possibly a hill or angle start, about twenty minutes of independent driving following a sat nav or signs, and one show me question on the move. Going the wrong way in independent driving is not a fault; how you handle it is what is marked.
You pass with fifteen driving faults or fewer, and none that are serious or dangerous. Your instructor can sit in on the test and can listen to the debrief afterwards, and it is usually worth saying yes to both.
The night before
Sleep beats revision. Eat before you go. Get to the centre about ten minutes early, not forty-five, because an hour in a waiting room helps nobody. If your lesson can end at the test centre, arrive already driving.
If the day itself is wrong
A test you are not ready for, or one so far away you are losing what you have learned, is not something you have to sit out. DVSA will swap your test date with another learner's over the phone; the only hard part is finding the learner, and that is what this site does, free. Bear in mind a swap needs at least ten working days before the earlier of the two tests, so the time to list is now rather than the week before.
Waiting for a date you did not choose?
Somebody out there wants yours. List your test free, and we email you the moment a learner who fits appears. DVSA does the actual swap on the phone.