New York · DMV knowledge test
New York DMV practice test
Free · No sign-up · Every answer explained
Our practice test
- Questions
- 20
- Correct to pass
- 14
- Score needed
- 70%
- Question bank
- 100
- all explained
Written from the New York State Driver's Manual (MV-21) (April 2026 version). How we write the questions
New York issues its licenses in stages, and the stages are not the same everywhere in the state. The learner permit comes first, then supervised practice, a pre-licensing course and the road test; a teenager who passes gets a junior license whose limits depend on whether they are driving in New York City, on Long Island or upstate, and an adult starts out on probation. Below, each stage is laid out with the page of the New York State Driver's Manual that sets its rule, followed by what our practice test does and a way to work through the rest of this site one topic at a time.
What the questions cover
100 questions in 7 topics. Pick one to practice only its questions, or read the whole bank grouped by topic.
How the practice test works
Each attempt at our practice test draws a fresh random set from the New York question bank, and after every answer you see the explanation and the manual page the rule sits on, so a wrong answer sends you straight to the paragraph you need to read. The attempt is multiple choice and scored against a passing line, the way the DMV describes its written test.
Two modes cover two kinds of studying. In the standard test you pick an answer and it is marked on the spot. In review mode the question comes first on its own: you decide, then reveal the answer and grade yourself, which is closer to what the test asks of you than recognizing the right line in a list.
At the end you get the list of what you missed and can run through just those again. The misses are kept in this browser only, so on the same device they are waiting the next time you come back, and nothing you answer is sent anywhere.
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How an attempt is built
Each attempt draws 20 questions at random from the bank and asks for 14 correct answers.
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An explanation after every answer
Right or wrong, you see why, which other option people confuse it with, and the section and page of the handbook it comes from.
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Retry only what you missed
The result lists exactly the questions you got wrong. Retry those alone, as many times as you need; your misses stay in your browser between visits.
From learner permit to license, step by step
The manual is the source for every requirement in this list, and the number beside each one is the page printed in the DMV's current PDF, so a rule can be checked against the original in a moment. What makes New York different from most states is geography: the same permit allows different things in New York City, on Long Island and in the rest of the state, and a junior license can let you drive on your own by day in one part of the state and not at all in another. Where a rule changes by region, the point says so.
Step 1: apply for the learner permit
The permit application is where everything starts, and the written test belongs to it: you pass it before the permit exists, not after. Expect the paperwork, not the test, to be the hard part of the visit. New York proves identity with points added up across several documents rather than with a single card, so the pile you bring decides whether you leave with a permit.
- Nobody under 16 may drive in New York State, even with a license from another state or country. p. 6
- The Class D license is for drivers 18 and over, or 17 with a driver education Certificate of Completion. The junior Class DJ license can be held from 16. p. 6
- The application is form MV-44. Along with it you take a vision test and a knowledge test and pay the fees for the application and the license; most drivers also go through an approved 5-hour pre-licensing course and a road test before the license itself. p. 8
- Proof of name runs on points: the documents you bring must add up to six points or more, and at least one of them must show your signature. You also give your Social Security number. p. 8
- Proof of date of birth is one document from the manual's own list, in the original or a certified copy: a birth certificate, a passport or a military photo ID, among others. p. 10
- A first New York license is issued for no more than 5 years and expires on your month and day of birth. p. 8
Step 2: pass the vision and written tests
Our question bank is built for this stage. The DMV publishes how it scores the written test, and the score has two floors rather than one: a floor for the test as a whole and a separate floor for the questions about road signs, so a strong result on the rules of the road cannot rescue a weak one on signs. Study signs as a subject of their own, and expect the chapter on alcohol and drugs to be on the test alongside the rules of the road.
- The vision test asks for 20/40 vision in at least one eye, with glasses or contact lenses if you use them. p. 10
- The written test covers the rules of the road, safe driving, road signs and the laws on alcohol and drugs while driving. p. 10
- To pass the written test you must answer at least 14 of its 20 questions correctly, and at least two of the four questions about road signs. p. 10
- Class D knowledge tests are given in several languages, on a touch screen or on paper. p. 10
- High school students can take the written test early, from age 15 and 11 months, through the Online Knowledge Test Application at participating schools, in English or Spanish. p. 10
- A student who passes online gets a receipt and, from age 16, brings it with the completed forms to a motor vehicle office to apply for the permit. Whoever fails can retake it online as often as the school allows. p. 11
- Once you pass both tests and pay the fees, the learner permit is issued and you can start learning to drive. p. 11
Step 3: practice on the road with the permit
With the permit in hand you drive on public roads, but only with a supervising driver beside you, and New York adds a map to that rule: who may supervise, at what hours and on which roads all change between New York City, Long Island and upstate. Several parkways and every street inside a New York City park are off limits to learners altogether. A teenager spends longer at this stage than at any other, because the road test cannot be taken until the permit has aged and a parent has certified the practice hours.
- Whoever supervises you is at least 21, holds a license good for the kind of vehicle you are in, and sits in the front seat next to you. p. 11
- On Long Island and in New York City, that supervisor must be a parent, a guardian or a driving instructor. p. 13
- No learner may practice in a DMV road test area, on a street inside a New York City park, on a bridge or tunnel of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, or on the Taconic State, Cross County, Hutchinson River and Saw Mill River parkways in Westchester County. p. 13
- With a junior permit in New York City you drive only from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m., supervised by a parent or guardian, a person in loco parentis, a driver education teacher or a driving school instructor aged 21 or over, in a vehicle with dual brakes. From 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. you do not drive. p. 12
- On Long Island the same list applies, plus anyone the parent or guardian names in writing, and the same ban from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. Upstate, any licensed driver aged 21 or over may supervise by day; at night it has to be a parent or guardian, a person in loco parentis, a driver education teacher or a driving school instructor. p. 12
- A junior permit allows no more than one passenger under 21 from outside your immediate family, unless the supervisor is a parent or guardian, a person in loco parentis, a driver education teacher or a driving school instructor. The front seat is for the supervisor only, and everyone wears a seat belt. p. 13
- Before the road test you need at least 50 hours of practice, 15 of them after sunset, and the DMV recommends that 10 of those hours be in moderate to heavy traffic. p. 13
- A junior permit has to be held, in valid status, for at least six months before you can take the road test. p. 14
- Any time the permit spends suspended or revoked does not count toward those six months. p. 19
Step 4: take the pre-licensing course and the road test
The road test cannot be booked until a safe driving course is done, and the course people take to lower their insurance is not the same course, so check which one you are signing up for. Test day is mostly paperwork and the car: the examiner needs the right certificates and a vehicle that passes a look-over.
- You cannot book the road test until you complete an approved safe driving course. A high school or college driver education course fulfills it, and so does the pre-licensing course that most licensed driving schools give; drivers 18 or older can also take a pilot version online. p. 13
- The certificate from an in-person course is valid for one year, and the Point and Insurance Reduction Program does not count as the safe driving course. p. 14
- At the test a junior driver gives the examiner the photo learner permit, the pre-licensing course certificate (MV-278) or has the driver education certificate (MV-285) on file, and a Certification of Supervised Driving (MV-262) in which a parent or guardian certifies the 50 hours of practice, 15 of them after sunset. Other drivers bring the permit and the course certificate. p. 14
- You bring the car, correctly registered, inspected, insured and equipped, in good working order, doors and seat belts included, with the passenger seat belt clean and ready for the examiner. If you drive there yourself, a supervising driver aged 21 or over with a license valid for that vehicle rides with you. p. 14
- You book through the Road Test Scheduling System, online or by telephone, with the learner permit in hand and the course certificate already in order. p. 14
- The DMV can cancel road tests for bad weather. After a pass, an interim license you can drive on is available online, and the photo license comes by mail in about 2 weeks. p. 15
- A junior driver who passes receives a junior license, Class DJ, with the regional limits of the next step. p. 14
Step 5: the junior license and where it is good
Pass the road test before you are an adult and the license you get is a junior one, and what it is worth depends on where you are driving. In the city it does not let you drive at all; on Long Island it covers a short list of trips on your own; upstate it is close to a full license by day.
- With a junior license you carry no more than one passenger under 21 who is not immediate family, wherever in the state you drive. p. 15
- In New York City a junior license does not let you drive, day or night. p. 16
- On Long Island, from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m., you may drive alone only directly between home and work, a work-study program, a college course, a registered evening high school, a driver education course or farm work; any other trip needs your licensed parent or guardian, a person in loco parentis, a driver education teacher or a driving school instructor with you. p. 16
- From 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. on Long Island, the chart allows solo trips only directly between home and a work-study program, a college course, a registered evening high school, a driver education course or farm work. p. 16
- Upstate you drive on your own from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. From 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. you may drive alone only directly between home and work or a school course, and every other trip needs your licensed parent or guardian or a person in loco parentis in the car. p. 16
- Driving alone to work means carrying proof of it: a Certificate of Employment (MV-58A) or, upstate only, a dated letter signed by the employer. A trip to a school course or work-study program needs a dated letter on the school's letterhead, signed by an official. p. 16
- To swap the junior license for a senior one you need the driver education certificate (MV-285) on file and you turn in the junior license at a motor vehicle office. Without the certificate, the junior restrictions last until you turn 18, when the senior license comes on its own. p. 14
Step 6: the first months on probation
A new license in New York is not yet a settled one. Adults start on probation, and a junior permit or license carries sanctions of its own, in both cases for the violations a new driver is most likely to commit. The phone rules are the ones to memorize: they hit new drivers harder than anyone else.
- Pass the road test at 18 or older and you are on probation for six months. The same goes for a license obtained after a revocation. p. 19
- During probation, a conviction for speeding, reckless driving, following too closely, a speed contest or DWAI, or any two traffic violations, brings a 60-day suspension and then a new six months of probation; a repeat in that second period means a revocation of at least six months. p. 19
- A junior permit or license is suspended for 60 days after one serious violation, worth three points or more, or after two lesser ones; the same within six months of getting it back is a 60-day revocation. p. 19
- A texting or hand-held phone conviction suspends a junior or probationary license for 120 days. p. 19
- A change of address reaches the DMV within 10 days, by mail on form MV-232 or online, and you write the new address on the back of your license yourself. p. 17
Page numbers refer to the New York State Driver's Manual (MV-21), April 2026 version.
Three sample questions
- Ahead of you is a yellow, diamond-shaped sign with black symbols. What kind of sign is it?
- On a highway you notice a blue sign with white symbols. What is it most likely telling you?
- You want to know how far it is to the next town and which way to go. Which color of sign is meant to give you that information?
A study plan, topic by topic
The order below is the one we would study in. It opens with what you can learn before you ever drive, signs and lights, moves through the rules that need a scene in your head, and ends with the license rules that tie back to the path above. Each step names the questions in our bank for that topic and the part of our handbook summary that covers it: read one, practice it, then move on.
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1. Before you start
The three general guides come first. One is a study routine, one is a map of what a written test keeps asking about, and one takes a question apart to show how a wrong option is made to look right. None of them is about New York in particular, and all of them make the New York topics faster.
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2. Signs, signals and markings
Start with colors and shapes, then the lights, where New York City keeps a rule on red of its own, then the lines on the pavement. Most of this is recognition, so it is the quickest topic to practice.
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3. Right of way
Work through who waits in each scene: an intersection with no signs, a left turn, a parking lot exit, an emergency vehicle coming the other way, a roundabout. Sketch the scene on paper when the words will not settle.
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4. Speed
Three limits to keep apart, the statewide one, the New York City one and the expressway one, plus the idea that a posted number is a ceiling the conditions can lower. The questions want the exact figure, so drill them until each number comes to you before the options do.
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5. Turns, passing and parking
This is the topic of distances: how far ahead you signal, how much room a pass needs, how far from a hydrant or a crossing you may leave the car. Learn the parking distances as a set, together with what each of the no-parking signs still allows.
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6. Sharing the road
Everything that does not drive like a car: school buses, bicycles and their lights, motorcycles, mopeds, trucks and their blind spots, snowmobiles and horses. The questions put you in the car and ask for the distance, the stop or the lane change that the other road user is owed.
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7. Alcohol and drugs
Learn each blood alcohol threshold together with the offense and the penalty row it carries: a threshold on its own is how the wrong options here are built. Then cover what refusing a chemical test costs, and what changes for a driver under the legal drinking age.
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8. License and probation
Close with the license rules, the ones the path at the top of this page already walked through: how probation works, what suspends a junior permit or license, and the phone rules that cost new drivers the most.
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9. Take full practice tests
With every topic covered, take the full practice test until you reach 14 of 20 without guessing, and retry your misses after each attempt.
To see how the questions and this page are written and checked against the manual, read our methodology. How we write and check every question.
Study the handbook
Handbook summary, section by section
The rules and numbers the test asks about, with the page each one comes from.
New York State Driver's Manual (MV-21)
The official handbook, April 2026 version, on the DMV website.
Road sign games
Memory, matching and a one-minute sprint with 54 US road signs.