The 30-Hour Driving Log

30 Hours Goes Fast

If your state requires 30 hours, count yourself lucky. Maine wants 70. Pennsylvania wants 65. You got 30.

At 3 hours per week, you’re done in 10 weeks. At 5 hours per week (one longer weekend drive plus a few errands), you’re done in 6 weeks.

Which States Require 30 Hours

Texas and Arizona both require 30 hours of supervised practice driving. Texas splits it 20 day and 10 night. Arizona also wants 10 night hours out of the 30 total.

Texas has an additional wrinkle: 30 hours of parent-supervised practice is on top of 7 hours of behind-the-wheel instruction and 7 hours of observation with a licensed instructor. So the total training time is actually 44 hours, but only 30 of those are with a parent.

Night Hours Are Still the Bottleneck

Even with only 10 required night hours, families procrastinate. The same advice applies: start early. One evening drive per week from the beginning and you’ll hit 10 before you even think about it.

In Texas, night isn’t precisely defined by statute. In Arizona, it’s sunset to sunrise. If you’re logging night hours in December, drives after 5:30 PM count. In June, you’re waiting until 8:30 PM.

Tracking 30 Hours

Thirty hours seems manageable on paper. It is — until you forget to log three drives in a row and have to guess at the times from memory. Then your 30 hours becomes 25 hours of real data and 5 hours of “I think that was about 45 minutes.”

Moda tracks every session automatically. Start, drive, stop. Day or night tagged by actual sunset data. Weather logged from Apple WeatherKit. When you hit 30, export a PDF. Done.

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