DRIVING LESSONS IN HARLOW

Manual and automatic driving lessons in Harlow (CM18, CM19 & CM20) cost the same: £38.00 per hour pay-as-you-go (£76 for a 2-hour starter session). Block bookings reduce the hourly rate to £37.00/hr for 10 hours (£370), £36.30/hr for 20 hours (£726), £36.10/hr for 30 hours (£1,083), and £35.90/hr for 40 hours (£1,436, saving £84). A £1.99 booking admin fee applies.

According to the official DVSA 2025/26 practical test dataset, Bishops Stortford Driving Test Centre (South Road, Bishops Stortford, Hertfordshire, CM23 3JQ) recorded a 51.3% overall pass rate across 6,409 tests, compared with the 51.2% Great Britain average. Manual candidates achieved 54.5%, automatic candidates achieved 42.8%, and first-attempt candidates achieved 52.1%.

The nearest active official DVSA / Pearson VUE car theory test centre for Harlow (CM18, CM19 & CM20) learners is Ilford Theory Test Centre at 253-257 High Road, Ilford, London, IG1 1NE (6.4 miles S via Central line / A1168). The official GOV.UK car theory test fee is £23.00, and every Rated Driving learner gets free access to our DVSA Theory & Hazard Perception App.

Bishops Stortford is nearest and publishes 51.3%. Enfield publishes 53.9% and is about a mile further. Loughton and Chingford are both further and both lower. Since none of them is local, the sensible approach is to pick one early and spend real hours on its roads rather than deciding late. Rated Driving matches you to an instructor and the test booking stays with you on GOV.UK.

Yes, and at the same price as manual. Automatic suits Harlow's road layout, because on a network this dependent on roundabouts the hour goes further when it is spent on observation and lane choice instead of gear changes. Ask for automatic at the booking stage. Bishops Stortford, 7.0 miles north east, passed 42.8% of 1,752 automatic tests in the DVSA 2025/26 figures, against 54.5% for manual. One instructor page offers automatic lessons and says it mostly covers Harlow. That instructor is David Barry.

No. Rated Driving is an agent matching learners to independent instructors. The person you are offered already covers your CM postcode and has been checked for a current DVSA licence and a DBS, a female instructor can be asked for, and the fee is held until the lesson has taken place.

All of the designated town: Netteswell, Mark Hall North and South, Little and Great Parndon, Burnt Mill, Hare Street, The Stow, Passmores, Bush Fair, Brays Grove, Staple Tye, Katherines and Sumners, plus Old Harlow, Church Langley and Potter Street on the east side. Enter a postcode and your street is checked rather than the neighbourhood name.

Waiting times move week by week and differ between the four centres, so check GOV.UK for each one at the point you book rather than working from a figure somebody quoted. Two things are fixed: a test can be reserved up to 24 weeks ahead, and no official queue or priority list exists. If the date you hold is wrong, the free Driving Test Swap will look for a learner who would rather have it.

The DVSA's figure is around 45 hours of professional lessons plus 22 hours of private practice. Harlow adds a particular cost at the end rather than the start, because the test is on roads outside the town and those hours have to be found somewhere. Build them into the plan from the beginning instead of discovering them in the last fortnight.

Yes. Both are CM17 addresses on the eastern side and are covered by the same instructors working the rest of the town. They are also the natural side to practise from if you are testing at Bishops Stortford, because Gilden Way and the A1184 start there.