How to learn driving Car in budget?

17 comments

1. If you are fluent in Japanese, then search online in Japanese 🙂

   Seriously. Going to a driving school is technically not required, and there are guides & blogs and such about the process that is required to practice and document your practice, including how to rent places to drive for practice, etc. I have actually researched this before.

   It’s not a super common thing to do, so probably information available in English would be very limited.

2. driving school isn’t required, but seeing you have zero driving experience, you might have a hard time with the road test.

   one of my friends talked with one of those schools and negotiated going out on the course for an hour with an instructor, just to brush up on his driving skills and get pointers as to what the real test will be judging you on.

   good luck

3. If you know some private property you can practice on, and have a friend with a car, you can practice on your own to get down the basics.

   Then you can pay a small fee (several thousand yen) to go practice on the actual driving test course. Car is included in the fee.

   Here’s the page for Okinawa:

   https://www.safety-okinawa.or.jp/practice/

4. Driving school will be worth it if you don’t otherwise have access to a car/course/instructor, as that’s kinda what you’re paying for.

   Japan is tricky in that, a lot of the test isn’t about your ability to actually drive well or safely. So even for those who know how to drive, I recommend taking at least a one off class to find out the tricks needed just to pass the test (that don’t necessarily relate to your driving ability)

5. There are some freelance driving tutors who hang around the test centers during the day looking for people who want to be tutored on the test course before taking the test. You could see if you can find one who would be willing to give you actual driving lessons for less than you would pay to go to a driving school.

6. search for

   合宿　自動車学校　安い

7. If you were fluent in Japanese, you wouldn’t need to ask on an English Reddit.

8. if you dont have to work for 2 weeks, bootcamp style sometimes is cheaper.

   I saw few non japanese agency offer driving lesson, but I cant say how good they are.

   Worth it or not depends. If you love driving and plan to drive alot and you are settling here in japan, 400k is nothing.

9. Most of the instructors at the licensing center are former police officers, and they tend to fail you several times for any number of small but technically true violations.

10. I went to a school in Hamamatsu 3 years ago to get my license (UK one expired). Cost 180,000 total (room + 3 meals) took about 16 days and they paid for the Shinkansen too.

    Absolutely awful awful school but if you can grit your teeth for two weeks you’ll be aight

11. Look up つかま自動車学校 in matsumoto city. 25万 or so depending on what options you choose. Full board, food if you choose and you can ask for extra lessons if you dont feel confident. You can finish an AT course in 2 weeks. Their class lessons are all online in your own time except for med and 1 discussion session.

12. Ok.

    I highly recommend you to find a driving school. They isn’t only teach you how to drive a car (skill) but also have a lot of time teaching you the law and rules in Japan, and if you don’t have ANY other driving license in other country, you need to pass a writing test for license : 100 questions true or false within an hour. Sound easy but the passing is only 50-60%, questions are extremely tricky and try to trap you all the time.

    There are two type of school. You want to find a government certificate driving school, which means you can do the driving test (the actual driving and road test) in the school and with the teacher. If you pick a school which isn’t certified for that, you need to do the test in license center with the police department.

    And for the price if you want something cheaper, you can find those 合宿 school. Usually those school are quite common for school kids who can take a week to 10 days off living in those kind of school and finish everything (except the true or false test) there. You will expect to study and learn how to drive from 9-5 there. That could be around half of the common price. If your Japanese is ok and if you have the time that will save you a lot.

    So:
    1) find a certificated school which can do the skill test
    2) once you got the passing paper from the school’s road test, you can go to license center for the paper test (true or false)
    3) if you pass (95 or up correct answer is pass, you make more than 5 mistakes then you are fail) the center will let you know in 15 mins, then you can go and take a picture.

    Yeah you got your Japanese driving license.

13. If you want a cheap option, 320K yen is definitely not a good choice. Generally, accommodation course (合宿免許) of driving school is cheaper than going there at times. The course will require you to take time off 2-3 weeks. You will stay at a hotel or so and concentrate on studying of driving everyday.

    [This school](https://www.nanyoko.co.jp/lodge/plans/#car_at) in Yokohama offers an accommodation course around 290K yen including taxes and other expenses.

    [This page](https://www.menkyo-concierge.jp/) shows many cheaper plans, but not around Yokohama.

14. Go to a driving school.
    It’s nearly impossible to pass without going there. Only people who are really good at it can pass without driving school, since you get tested by a police officer.

15. I took the easy route and went to a school. I had years of driving experience so it was super easy.

    There were a few students who were older and had never driven, on one of the courses a car lost control and launched over the median, 3 wheels in the air. Was one of the students with no driving experience.

    I’d highly recommend just going to a school. If you’ve never driven before then you should learn how from a professional.

16. I know how you feel. 37M here, never drove anything with a combustion engine attached. And honestly never felt like I needed a license in Japan for 13 years until I moved to Okayama this spring. So, I pulled the trigger and went to driving school in summer. 280,000jpy for the basic plan. My work schedule allowed me to take unpopular early morning or late evening time slots. I got license in 6 weeks, but I took all time slots allowed/available during weekdays, so I went to school almost every working day.

    I was temped to only practice in wife’s car and just take the police exam, but considering I had 0 prior experience driving and the thing that police exam is actually known to be difficult, for the sake of my family and people around I decided to get a proper training.

    Never had an issue with language barrier and did everything in Japanese, and I’m happy I chose the driving school path. Getting basics taught by professionals is the right way to do it. Driving school graduates are exempted from driving test at the police, so I had to take paper test only, which I did 100/100. I will never forget the police officer’s face when he read my name and my score.

17. I’m in the same position and..honestly I would just pay the 320k.

    If that’s the cheapest in your area (and if that place has relatively good reviews) then at the very least you are not getting ripped off relative to the other options nearby.

    You could spend a bunch of time and effort trying to figure out how to do it all by yourself and maybe finding some independent driving teacher but even then there’s no guarantee you won’t end up spending a similar amount of money overall.

    The question is how much you think should pay (in total) to learn to drive and then whether that amount is realistic. If it isn’t (ie you’re holding out for something that doesn’t exist) then just accept your fate and pay the 320k 😉