How to get a British driving licence
Visitors can drive on their own licence for 12 months and need nothing else. If you move to Great Britain, a 12-month clock starts from the day you become resident, and whether you can exchange your licence or must sit both driving tests depends entirely on where you passed your test.
First, check this is about you
If you are coming to the UK as a visitor — on an ETA or a visitor visa — you almost certainly do not need a British licence at all. You can drive any small vehicle listed on your full, valid licence for 12 months from the day you last entered Great Britain. There is nothing to apply for and nothing to pay.
This page is about what happens when you move here. If you are visiting, you can stop reading.
The clock that matters is residency, not arrival
Once Great Britain is where you normally live, a different 12-month clock starts, and it runs from the day you became resident rather than from any particular journey. What happens when it runs out depends on one thing: where you passed your driving test.
Where you passed your test decides everything
A designated country or territory
You can exchange your licence for a British one without taking a test. You have five years from becoming resident to do it, and the licence must not have expired. Miss that window and the exchange route closes — you would then need a provisional licence and both the theory and the practical test.
The EU or EEA
You can keep driving on an EU licence until you turn 70. If you were already 67 or older when you became resident, you get three years instead. After that you exchange it, with no retest.
One trap: if your EU licence was itself obtained by exchanging a non-EU licence, you only get 12 months.
Anywhere else
There is no exchange. After 12 months you need a GB provisional licence and must pass the theory test and the practical test. If your country is not on the list below, plan for that from the day you arrive — not in month eleven.
The designated countries and territories
These are the places with a licence exchange agreement with Great Britain: Andorra, Australia, Barbados, the British Virgin Islands, Canada, the Cayman Islands, the Falkland Islands, the Faroe Islands, Gibraltar, Hong Kong, Japan, Monaco, New Zealand, the Republic of Korea, the Republic of Moldova, the Republic of North Macedonia, Singapore, South Africa, Switzerland, Taiwan, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates and Zimbabwe. Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man are treated the same way.
The list is the whole decision. Being on it means a form and a fee. Being off it means two driving tests, whatever your experience — a driver of thirty years from a country that is not listed starts again as a learner. Check your own country against the list before you make plans that assume you will be driving.
How the exchange actually works
Get a D1 application form from a Post Office that offers DVLA services. It is a paper form, and there is no online route for exchanging a non-GB licence.
Send the completed form, the £43 fee and your supporting documents — including your current driving licence — to the address printed on the form. The new licence usually arrives in about three weeks, and takes longer if you have declared a medical condition that DVLA needs to check.
Some countries add a step. If your licence is from the United Arab Emirates, you must first request a Licence Data Verification Letter from the Ministry of Interior — sign in with your UAE Pass, choose 'To whom it may concern certificates', then 'Licence Data Verification Letter' — and send it with the form.
You are posting away your only licence. DVLA needs the original, so for those weeks you will not be holding it. If you need to hire a car or prove your entitlement during that period, do it before you post the form, not after.
Automatic or manual: the detail that catches people
An exchange carries across what you can prove. If you cannot show that you passed your test in a manual vehicle, the British licence you get back can be automatic-only — and you would have to sit a practical test in a manual car to lift that restriction later.
This is not uniform. A Canadian licence, for example, exchanges to automatic-only unless you can prove a manual test; an Emirati licence that already allows manual vehicles usually exchanges with that entitlement intact. Find the proof before you post the form, because it is far harder to add afterwards.
If you came from Ukraine
If you came to the UK on a Ukraine visa scheme, you can drive small vehicles for at least three years after becoming resident, and that still applies if you later switched to a different type of visa. Depending on when you were granted entry clearance or permission to stay, you may be able to continue for a further year and a half.
Great Britain is not the United Kingdom
Everything above covers England, Wales and Scotland. Northern Ireland runs its own licensing and has a separate process, so if you are moving to Belfast rather than Birmingham, none of the addresses or forms here are the ones you want.
This one is not us
We file UK ETAs. We have no part in the DVLA process and no agent can make it faster — there is no priority tier and no queue to skip. The only fee is the £43 that goes to DVLA, and the form is free from the Post Office. If a website offers to obtain a British licence for you for a service charge, it is selling you a stamp and an envelope.
We are a private agency, not the UK Government.
Checked against the official sources below on 6 September 2026.