Driving Permit for United Kingdom

The United Kingdom drives on the left, and for most visitors an International Driving Permit (IDP) is not a strict legal requirement to get behind the wheel. Under GOV.UK's rules for driving on a non-GB licence, a visitor can drive in Great Britain for up to 12 months from the day they last entered the country using a valid full licence from their home country. The UK is a party to the 1968 UN Convention on Road Traffic and recognises the IDP issued under it, so an IDP is honoured here as an official translation of your national licence, but it does not replace that licence and must always be carried alongside it.

Where the IDP genuinely matters is language. If your driving licence is written in English or the Roman (Latin) alphabet, you can generally drive and hire a car without one. If it uses a non-Latin script (such as Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Cyrillic or Greek), an IDP or a certified translation is strongly recommended so that police at a roadside check and staff at the car-hire desk can read your entitlement. Rental companies set their own policies on top of the law: major firms such as Hertz generally require an IDP only when a licence is not in Roman script, so holders of English-language licences from countries like the USA and Canada are typically not asked for one, while many other non-Latin-script licence holders are routinely asked to present an IDP with their passport.

In practice, the on-the-ground reality is straightforward. To hire a car you must show a full valid licence, a passport, and usually have held your licence for a minimum period (commonly around 12 months), with minimum-age rules that vary by rental firm. Carrying an IDP alongside your original licence removes friction at the rental counter and at any police stop, which is why many travellers driving in the United Kingdom on a non-English licence choose to obtain one even though it is not legally mandatory for short visits.