Every figure on this page links to the organization that produced it, and each was re-checked against that source before publishing. How driving schools and driving instructors use video, and the numbers behind the field: our YouTube Data API read of the 533 most-viewed ‘driving lessons’, ‘road test’ and ‘how to parallel park’ videos and of a year of uploads from the U.S.-placed driving school and instructor channels; our count of every SEC annual report that names driving schools or driver education; BLS and Census counts of driving schools and their pay in the U.S., Florida and Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties; FHWA and Florida counts of teen license holders and Florida’s own list of driving schools; NHTSA, IIHS and Florida counts of young-driver crashes; peer-reviewed studies of hazard perception training, in-car cameras and graduated licensing; Florida, federal CDL training, FTC and YouTube rules; and where the popular driving numbers came from.
In our November 9, 2026 read of YouTube’s most-viewed ‘driving lessons’, ‘road test’ and ‘how to parallel park’ videos, driving-tips creators with no school or instructor credential drew 44.0% of the views of the 481 on-topic videos; individual driving instructors drew 18.0% and driving schools 5.9%. (Mark Studios)See details
UK-placed driving schools and instructors drew 17.1% of those on-topic views and U.S.-placed ones 1.0%. The most-viewed channel, Clearview Driving, a UK instructor, drew 12.4% on its own. (Mark Studios)See details
Videos of 60 seconds or less were 47.6% of the on-topic videos and drew 75.9% of their views. (Mark Studios)See details
The 12 U.S.-placed driving school and instructor channels in the sample posted 1,511 videos in the year to November 9, 2026, but the median channel posted 3.5 and 6 posted nothing. (Mark Studios)See details
BLS counted 2,790 private U.S. driving school establishments (NAICS 611692) in 2025, 10.8% more than in 2019. They employed 16,602 workers at average annual pay of $30,261. (BLS)See details
Florida had 149 driving school establishments in 2025, 43.3% more than in 2019. Palm Beach County had 8, Broward 21 and Martin 1: 30 across the three counties. (BLS)See details
In 2024, 26.2% of U.S. 16-year-olds and 44.4% of 17-year-olds held a driver’s license, against 37.0% and 57.6% in 2000. (FHWA)See details
NHTSA counted 2,162 drivers aged 15 to 20 killed in U.S. traffic crashes in 2024. Per 100,000 licensed drivers, 39.22 drivers in that age group were involved in a fatal crash, against 21.56 of drivers 21 and older. (NHTSA)See details
The repeated “teens are nearly three times as likely to crash” compares fatal crashes per mile driven at ages 16 to 19 with drivers 20 and older. IIHS’s June 2026 edition says just over 3 times, from 7.5 fatal crash involvements per 100 million miles in 2022; CDC’s oldest form we found, from 2002, said four times and rested on a different measure. (IIHS, CDC)See details
The randomised trials of school driver education, three run in 1982-84 with 17,965 students, found no evidence it reduces crashes. The Nebraska “75 percent more likely to get a ticket” line comes from a 2015 university release about a study in which families chose whether teens took the course. (Cochrane, University of Nebraska-Lincoln)See details
207 Form 10-K annual reports filed from 2001 to 2025 contained “driving school” or “driver education”. Of the 216 through November 9, 2026, 43 came from trucking or fleet operators describing their own school or student drivers. (Mark Studios, from SEC EDGAR)See details
Since July 1, 2025, Florida has required a driver education course before a learner’s license. A 16- or 17-year-old then needs at least 50 hours of supervised driving, 10 of them at night, before a license. (Florida Statutes)See details
Who makes the most-viewed driving lesson videos on YouTube?
In our November 9, 2026 read of YouTube's most-viewed 'driving lessons', 'road test' and 'how to parallel park' videos, driving-tips creators with no school or instructor credential in their own text drew 44.0% of the on-topic views, more than driving schools (5.9%) and individual driving instructors (18.0%) combined. We took YouTube's 200 most-viewed results for each phrase through the YouTube Data API that day: 533 unique videos from 292 channels, with 3,338,505,290 lifetime views in all. 481 of those videos were on-topic, with 2,700,474,665 views, and the median on-topic video had 1,842,088 views (our calculation).
Driving-tips creators made 32.8% of the on-topic videos across 76 channels. Within that group, 18 faceless channels in the 'follow me, learn car knowledge every day' shorts format drew 21.8% of all on-topic views on their own. Individual instructors ran 19 channels and made 18.7% of the videos; driving schools ran 47 channels and made 14.6%. General media, news and viral-clip channels drew 16.8% of the views and motoring media and car reviewers 10.3%. Online driver-ed, theory-test and road-test-prep sellers and apps had 35 videos and 2.1% of the views; government and licensing agencies had 7 videos and 0.6% of the views, and 3 of those agencies were American. Brands, including car makers, GEICO (an insurer), a dealer and motoring clubs, drew 1.3%.
Views are concentrated. Clearview Driving, a UK instructor's channel, drew 12.4% of the on-topic views with 33 videos, and 51.9% of all the views that went to schools and instructors. The three most-viewed channels drew 26.0% of the on-topic views and the ten most-viewed drew 47.7%.
52 videos were off-topic, drawing 19.1% of the sample's views: video games, scripted comedy sketches, film and TV clips, kids' cartoons, and vehicle reviews. 'Road test' is also a car-review term: 29 of the 'road test' results, or 15.4% of that list, were vehicle reviews or vehicle tests from motoring media and car makers, and they drew 3.9% of that list's views. We counted 15 channels of personal uploads by private people or family or classroom uploads showing minors, and withheld 32 videos in all from the public dataset, including single videos in named instructor channels whose text names a student, a relative or a minor. Those rows keep only their class and counts.
Do UK or U.S. driving instructors get more YouTube views?
UK-placed driving schools and instructors drew 17.1% of the on-topic views in our November 9, 2026 sample, and U.S.-placed ones drew 1.0% (our calculation). The UK group was 13 channels with 76 videos; the U.S. group was 12 channels with 19 videos. Most of the UK views went to individual instructors' channels rather than schools. 1 on-topic channel named a Florida place in its own text, and 0 named Palm Beach, Broward or Martin County. A global view-sorted search will not surface a local school, so this says nothing about whether Florida schools post video.
What are the most-viewed driving videos about, and how long are they?
Titles naming parallel parking made 29.3% of the on-topic videos in our November 9, 2026 sample, and titles naming any kind of parking drew 41.5% of the views (our count, hashtags included, words not topics; every matching title was read by hand and hashtag-only misfires removed). Titles naming a road test, driving test, DMV or licence test made 34.9% of the videos and drew 14.9% of the views, and 81 titles named failing or passing. Other subjects were rare: 24 titles named a manual car, clutch or gears, 12 a roundabout, 11 a truck, bus, tractor-trailer or CDL, and 2 a highway, motorway or merging. Those counts are shaped by the three search phrases.
Videos of 60 seconds or less made 47.6% of the on-topic videos and drew 75.9% of the views. The median short had 2,471,768 views against 1,272,925 for the median longer video, and videos over 20 minutes drew 2.0% of the views. 49.7% of the on-topic videos had been published since the start of 2024. YouTube's containsSyntheticMedia field was present on 0 of the 533 videos, and 3 on-topic videos carried the made-for-kids designation. An absent field says nothing either way about how a video was made.
How often do U.S. driving schools post on YouTube?
The median U.S.-placed driving school or instructor channel in our sample posted 3.5 videos in the 365 days to November 9, 2026 (our count, every upload in the window read through the YouTube Data API that day). Together the 12 channels posted 1,511 videos in that year, and 6 of them posted nothing. The spread is wide: Driving Academy, a CDL truck driving school, posted 1,124, and the three busiest channels posted 91.7% of the group's uploads. Across those uploads the median video had 1,108 views by the read date, and 72.0% ran 60 seconds or less. These are the channels that surfaced in a view-sorted global search, so they are not a sample of American driving schools.
Does video or simulator training change how new drivers spot hazards?
A 2015 review in the Journal of Adolescent Health found 19 studies of hazard anticipation training for drivers under 21 published from 1980 to 2013: young drivers improved on selected skills in every one, and none looked at crashes (McDonald, Journal of Adolescent Health). Most of those studies measured the effect within days, by computer test or simulator. So the training changes test, simulator and short-drive results; a crash effect has not been shown.
The best-known program is RAPT, a PC-based risk awareness and perception course. In a 2006 simulator study, 24 trained and 24 untrained novices were compared, and the trained drivers were almost twice as likely to look at the places where a hidden risk could appear (Pollatsek, Human Factors). On real roads in a 2009 study of 24 drivers aged 18 to 21, trained drivers looked at risk-relevant areas 64.4% of the time, against 37.4% for untrained drivers (Pradhan, Ergonomics). A 2011 randomized symposium paper on newly licensed drivers (the abstract gives no sample size) found RAPT drivers anticipated hidden hazards 65.8% of the time right after training against 47.3% for a placebo group (Taylor, Driving Assessment symposium), and 61.9% against 37.7% six or more months later (Taylor). These studies measured where drivers looked, not whether they crashed. A 2015 randomized test of a newer version, with 18 trained and 19 untrained teens, found trained teens scored higher on the program’s own test but made no fewer errors or collisions at simulated left turns (McDonald, Transportation Research Record). In a 2024 randomized simulator study of 25 young novices, a second dose of the ACCEL program months after the first improved hazard anticipation more than one dose or a placebo (Glassman, Human Factors).
Training built from video footage shows the same pattern. In a 2009 lab study from New Zealand, 75.2% of immediate hazards in video traffic scenes were spotted by 24 young drivers against 87.5% by 8 experienced drivers, and after video-based road commentary training the young drivers reached the experienced level (Isler, Accident Analysis & Prevention). In a 2013 experiment with 233 novices, every video-based training variant beat a placebo on a video hazard test right afterwards, and every effect faded within a week, with only the full course still significant (Wetton, Accident Analysis & Prevention). A 2014 study of 40 young novices found those who practised spotting hazards in video clips did better on a video test a week later than a control group (Meir, Traffic Injury Prevention). In a 2021 randomized study of an online six-session course built on footage of over a hundred real crashes, 26 learner drivers who finished it improved on both hazard perception tests and kept longer following distances compared with 23 waitlisted learners, but did not change their speed choice or gap acceptance (Horswill, Accident Analysis & Prevention). All outcomes there were computer-based tests.
Driving simulators are in the same position. A 2024 systematic review in the Journal of Safety Research found 15 studies from 2010 to 2022: simulator training improved simulated driving right away, it was unclear whether it improved on-road skill or safety, and the evidence was of low quality (Krasniuk, Journal of Safety Research). A 2026 study randomized 30 novices into three groups of ten (cognitive drills, a game-based simulator, supervised real driving); the simulator group cut simulator errors most, and each method changed where drivers looked in a different way (Lawrence, Journal of Eye Movement Research). The one trial here with real-world crash data is narrow: in a 2022 randomized trial of drivers aged 16 to 19 with ADHD (the abstract does not give the number randomized), a computerized program aimed at long glances away from the road was followed by a 3.4% rate of collisions or near-collisions per g-force event over the next year, against 5.6% after enhanced conventional driver’s education (Epstein, New England Journal of Medicine). Simulators are also used to test rather than train: a 2023 Ohio study linked a virtual driving assessment taken at licensure by 16,914 drivers under 25 to later police-reported crashes, and drivers in the best skill class had a crash risk 10% below average (Walshe, Pediatrics).
On course format, the main randomized comparison is old. In a 2004 study by California DMV researchers, over 1,300 students were randomly assigned to classroom driver education or to home study by CD-ROM, workbook or internet plus workbook; there were few differences in exit knowledge and attitude scores, and the authors found no compelling evidence that home study taught less (Masten, Traffic Injury Prevention). It measured knowledge, not driving or crashes. Whether driver education lowers crash rates at all is covered under the origins of the popular numbers below.
Research on driving videos people actually watch on social media is thin. A 2022 systematic review found only 8 studies of driving-related social media content, all on YouTube or Twitter; some content promoted risky driving, and almost none measured its effect on viewers (Stefanidis, PLoS One). A 2017 review that searched five databases for 2005-2015 found no published study of the content of risky driving videos on YouTube or their effect on viewers (Vingilis, Traffic Injury Prevention). In a 2017 study of the 100 most-viewed English-language YouTube videos on distracted driving, with over 35 million views combined, most came from television or internet outlets rather than ordinary users (Basch, International Journal of Adolescent Medicine and Health). In a 2017 study of 442 YouTube videos on drowsy driving uploaded from 2009 to 2014, videos treating it as funny drew more views, and 39.8% of videos giving countermeasures included an ineffective one (Hawkins, Accident Analysis & Prevention). A 2014 study of 250 distracted driving public service announcements on YouTube found they were generally lacking in health behavior theory (Steadman, American Journal of Health Behavior). None of these studies looked at driving school or instructor channels.
What have in-car cameras, parent programs and licensing laws shown about teen drivers?
In a 2019 randomized trial in which 150 parent-teen pairs finished, in-car video feedback cut unsafe driving events (rate ratio 0.35), and feedback plus a parent communication program cut them further (0.21), both against a control group whose cars recorded but gave no feedback (Peek-Asa, Accident Analysis & Prevention). That is the pattern across these small trials: camera feedback cuts risky-driving events, mostly when parents see the video too, and none of them measured crashes. The first study, in 2007, put event-triggered cameras that saved 20-second clips in the cars of 26 drivers aged 16 to 17 at a rural Midwestern high school, with weekly video reviews with parents, and events fell for the riskier teens (McGehee, Journal of Safety Research). In a 2010 one-group study of 18 newly licensed 16-year-olds with no control group, coachable error events fell 61% during the feedback period (Carney, American Journal of Public Health). In a 2013 randomized trial of 90 parent-teen pairs, hard-braking and sharp-turn events fell when families could watch event videos, and did not change with warning lights for the teen alone (Simons-Morton, Journal of Adolescent Health). A 2026 trial of 240 Ohio teens with a moving violation and a parent found that phone and in-car feedback plus parent training lowered risky driving events (adjusted rate ratio 0.68), while feedback alone did not, though it did cut miles driven while speeding (Yang, JAMA Network Open). A 2014 Israeli data-recorder study without video, with 217 families of young men aged 17 to 22 completing a year, found 29% lower event rates when parents also got coaching (Farah, Accident Analysis & Prevention). The outcomes in all of these are g-force or telematics events, which researchers use as a stand-in for crash risk.
Cameras have also been used simply to watch. The Naturalistic Teenage Driving Study instrumented the cars of 42 newly licensed teens; in a 2014 analysis, texting went with an odds ratio of 3.87 for a crash or near-crash (Klauer, New England Journal of Medicine), and a single glance away from the road longer than 2 seconds with 3.8 (Simons-Morton, Journal of Adolescent Health). The same 42 teens had crash and near-crash rates more than 4 times those of their parents driving the same cars (Simons-Morton, Journal of Safety Research), and in a 2013 analysis split into groups at 21.8, 8.3 and 2.1 crashes and near-crashes per 10,000 km, with only the middle group improving over 18 months (Guo, Journal of Pediatrics).
The largest set of real teen crash videos comes from the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, which is funded by AAA (AAA sells insurance and driver training). Its March 2015 study, by University of Iowa researchers, examined the 6 seconds of DriveCam video before 1,691 crashes of drivers aged 16 to 19 from 2007 to 2013 (AAA Foundation) and found the driver inattentive or doing something other than driving in 58% of them (AAA Foundation). Its June 2016 update covered 2,229 crashes through April 2015 and found a potentially distracting behavior before an average of 59% (AAA Foundation). The peer-reviewed version of the same 2,229 videos found rear-end crashes rising over 2007 to 2015 and phone use shifting from talking to looking at the screen (Carney, Journal of Safety Research), and a 2016 paper on over 400 rear-end crashes found over 75% of drivers in moderate-to-severe ones doing something potentially distracting (Carney, Journal of Safety Research). An earlier AAA Foundation study of 50 North Carolina families found electronic device use in 7% of 7,858 clips triggered by hard g-forces in the first six months of solo driving (AAA Foundation). The drivers were in camera programs, mostly in the Midwest, so they are not a random sample of teens.
Parent-teen driving agreements raise parents’ limits more reliably than they lower crashes. In a 2006 statewide Connecticut trial of the Checkpoints program with 3,743 newly licensed teens, families who got persuasive mailings and an agreement set tighter limits, and teens had fewer traffic violations at 12 months, but crashes did not differ (Simons-Morton, Accident Analysis & Prevention). An earlier randomized study of 469 parents and 16-year-olds found stricter limits lasting to 12 months after licensure (Simons-Morton, American Journal of Public Health). When driving instructors ran a 30-minute Checkpoints session with a video in class, a 2013 trial with 148 parent-teen pairs found more agreements and less self-reported high-risk driving, with no difference in offenses or crashes at six months (Zakrajsek, Journal of Adolescent Health). A web-based supervised-practice plan was tested in a 2014 randomized trial of 217 parent-teen pairs: 6% of plan teens had a blinded road assessment stopped for unsafe driving against 15% of controls, a difference with P = .06 (Mirman, JAMA Pediatrics). A 2015 review of 18 parent-focused programs rated those with active engagement or an in-vehicle recorder as most promising (Curry, Journal of Adolescent Health).
Graduated licensing laws have the strongest crash evidence of anything here, from population data rather than trials. A 2011 Cochrane review of 34 studies found a median 15.5% fall in population crash rates for 16-year-olds in a program’s first year (Russell, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, via PubMed), and a 2007 review put the reduction in the youngest drivers’ crash risk at roughly 20 to 40% (Shope, Journal of Safety Research). In Michigan, 16-year-olds’ crash risk fell 25% from 1996 to 1999 after adjusting for adult trends (Shope, JAMA). The gains are not uniform: a 2011 national study of 1986 to 2007 found stronger programs linked to fewer fatal crashes for 16-year-olds (rate ratio 0.74) but more for 18-year-olds (1.12), with no change for ages 16 to 19 combined (Masten, JAMA), and a 2013 three-state study found a 3.6% rise in minor crashes among 18-year-olds in Michigan and no effect in Florida, where the rules apply only under 18 (Ehsani, American Journal of Preventive Medicine).
How many U.S. teenagers have a driver's license?
In 2024, 26.2% of U.S. 16-year-olds held a driver's license, against 37.0% in 2000, a fall of 10.8 percentage points (our calculation), according to the Federal Highway Administration's Highway Statistics tables, which compile counts reported by each state's licensing agency (FHWA, Table DL-20, 2024). FHWA's 2024 table counts 44.4% of 17-year-olds, 60.4% of 18-year-olds and 68.8% of 19-year-olds as licensed, each a share of the Census population estimate for that age.
In 2024, FHWA counted 239.8 million licensed drivers in the United States (239,824,944), up from 190.6 million in 2000 (190,625,023) (FHWA, Table DL-20, 2000). Of the 2024 total, 9.1 million (9,083,348) were 19 or younger. FHWA counted 1,189,261 licensed 16-year-olds in 2024 against about 1.7 million (1,688 thousand) in 1983, 29.5% fewer (our calculation), using FHWA's historical Table DL-220 (FHWA, Table DL-220); the 16-year-old population was not the same size in 1983 and 2024, so this compares counts, not shares.
At what age do young Americans get their first license?
In a 2019 survey of 1,402 U.S. adults aged 18 to 24, 41% said they got their first driver's license at or before age 16 and 60% before age 18 (AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, 2019). The 2019 survey ran online in the summer of 2019 on two Ipsos research panels (YouthPulse and KnowledgePanel), was weighted to the national population, and relied on each person's memory of when they were licensed; the AAA Foundation is funded by AAA clubs, which sell auto insurance and driver training. At the time of the 2019 survey, 88.1% of the weighted sample held a driver's license (AAA Foundation 2019 brief, Table 1).
The AAA Foundation's earlier 2012 survey of 1,039 people aged 18 to 20 found 54% licensed before their 18th birthday and 44% licensed within 12 months of their state's minimum age (AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, 2012 survey, published 2013). In that 2012 survey, licensing by 18 tracked household income: 25% of those from households earning under $20,000 a year against 79% of those from households earning over $100,000. The reason for waiting named most often in 2012 was not having a car, cited by 44% of those who delayed.
How many Florida teenagers hold a license or a learner's license?
As of January 26, 2026, Florida's Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (DHSMV) counted 96,899 licensed 15-year-olds and 165,102 licensed 16-year-olds statewide, out of 18.8 million license holders of all ages (18,778,573) (FLHSMV, licensed drivers by county, age and sex, 2026). A 15-year-old in Florida can hold only a learner's license (see the rules section), so the 2026 age-15 count is learner's licenses; the 2026 report does not split license classes at any age. Between January 2006 and January 2026, DHSMV's count of licensed 16-year-olds rose 19.1% and its count of all license holders rose 23.0% (our calculation).
FHWA's 2024 table, built from state reports, lists only 61,334 licensed 16-year-olds in Florida and none under 16, against 17,137,725 Florida license holders of all ages in 2024 (FHWA, Table DL-22, 2024). The gap between FHWA's 2024 figure and DHSMV's own January 2026 count of 16-year-olds is too large to be timing alone, and FHWA's 2024 Florida figures appear to leave out learner's licenses; neither FHWA's 2024 table nor DHSMV's 2026 report explains the difference, so we print both.
How many teen license holders and driving schools are there in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties?
As of January 26, 2026, DHSMV counted 10,665 licensed 16-year-olds in Palm Beach County, 13,085 in Broward County and 1,273 in Martin County (FLHSMV, 2026). In November 2026, DHSMV's list of commercial driving schools providing behind-the-wheel training had 48 entries under Broward, 25 under Palm Beach and 2 under Martin, by our count.
How many driving schools and third-party testers does Florida list?
In November 2026, DHSMV's list of commercial driving schools providing behind-the-wheel training had 316 entries statewide, with the most, 68, under Miami-Dade County (our count). The 2026 list is a directory, not a census of every school licensed under Florida's commercial driving school law: a few entries sit under one county with an address in another, some are second locations of one school, and one is marked as moved, so we count entries, not firms.
In November 2026, DHSMV's table of driver license exam providers, the third-party administrators allowed to give the Class E tests, listed 100 providers; 90 offered the knowledge exam and 44 offered the driving skills test (our count of the DHSMV exam provider table). The 2026 provider table gives an address but no county, and some providers are online-only or based outside Florida, so we do not split it by county. As of November 2026, DHSMV's reports pages publish no pass or fail rates for the knowledge exam or the driving skills test.
How many entry-level CDL training providers are registered with FMCSA?
On October 13, 2026, FMCSA's Training Provider Registry listed 18,278 active entry-level driver training providers at 31,053 active locations (FMCSA Training Provider Registry, Internet Archive capture of 13 October 2026). The registry's counters recorded 32,549 entry-level drivers trained in September 2026 and 2.0 million (2,043,270) trained between February 2022 and October 13, 2026. Providers register themselves, and FMCSA lists locations under review and removed locations apart from the active count in its 2026 counters. The registry's provider search runs only in a script, and FMCSA's main site answered our requests with a block in November 2026, so we publish no Florida provider count and no FMCSA count of CDL holders.
How many driving instructors work in the United States?
Self-Enrichment Teachers, the shared occupation closest to driving instructors, held 332,110 wage and salary jobs in the United States in May 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey (BLS). No federal survey counts driving instructors on their own. The 2018 Standard Occupational Classification has no code for them. The nearest is Self-Enrichment Teachers (25-3021), which it defines as teaching “for the primary purpose of self-enrichment or recreation, rather than for an occupational objective” (BLS). The code’s own examples are a citizenship teacher, a knitting instructor and a recreational activities instructor. OEWS counts people on an employer’s payroll in any industry, so the total covers teachers of music, art, dance, languages and other subjects and leaves out the self-employed.
Other Schools and Instruction (NAICS 611600), the industry group that holds driving schools along with sports, fine arts and language schools and tutoring, employed 184,830 of those teachers in May 2025 (BLS). That is 55.7% of the occupation (our calculation). OEWS publishes no estimate for automobile driving schools (NAICS 611692) alone, so no federal survey shows how many of these teachers work at driving schools.
BLS Employment Projections, which add the self-employed, put Self-Enrichment Teachers at 419.1 thousand jobs in 2025 (BLS). Self-employed workers held 14.9% of them (BLS), about 62.4 thousand, computed from BLS’s rounded figures (our calculation).
How much do self-enrichment teachers earn?
The median annual wage for U.S. Self-Enrichment Teachers was $46,800 in May 2025, per BLS OEWS (BLS). That is 8.2% below the $50,980 median for all U.S. occupations (BLS) (our calculation). The figure covers payroll teachers of every subject in the occupation. It does not show what a driving instructor earns, and it leaves out school owners who take profits rather than a wage. Average pay at driving schools themselves is in the next section.
Will there be more self-enrichment teaching jobs by 2035?
BLS projects 3.5% growth for Self-Enrichment Teachers from 2025 to 2035 in its Employment Projections (BLS), the same rate it projects for all U.S. occupations, 3.5% (BLS). It expects about 50.0 thousand openings a year in the occupation, on average, over the decade (BLS). Openings include workers who leave the occupation or the labor force, not only new jobs. None of these figures is specific to driving instructors.
How many self-enrichment teachers work in Florida and South Florida, and what do they earn?
Employers in Florida counted 11,800 self-enrichment teachers on a payroll in May 2025, per BLS OEWS (BLS), 3.6% of the U.S. total (our calculation). Their median annual wage was $45,830 (BLS), 4.3% below Florida’s $47,880 median for all occupations (BLS) (our calculation). The code is shared, so these counts cover teachers of every subject, not driving instructors alone.
Area, May 2025 (BLS OEWS, Self-Enrichment Teachers, shared occupation)
OEWS publishes no county estimates, so Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties appear only inside their metro areas. The Port St. Lucie figure is small and BLS rates it as less precise than the state and Miami-area figures.
Who teaches truck driving, and how many truck drivers are there?
Postsecondary career and technical education teachers, the shared occupation nearest to CDL instructors, held 114,110 wage and salary jobs in the United States in May 2025, per BLS OEWS (BLS). Instructors at truck-driving schools have no code of their own. The 2018 Standard Occupational Classification defines Career/Technical Education Teachers, Postsecondary (25-1194) as teachers of vocational courses below the bachelor’s level “in subjects such as construction, mechanics/repair, manufacturing, transportation, or cosmetology” (BLS), so the count spans every vocational subject.
The drivers that entry-level CDL training prepares, Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers (SOC 53-3032), held 2.06 million wage and salary jobs (2,062,040) in May 2025, per BLS OEWS (BLS). Both figures are context for CDL training only. Neither counts CDL instructors or CDL students.
Which businesses count as driving schools in federal data?
The 2022 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Manual puts car driving schools in one clean code, U.S. industry 611692, Automobile Driving Schools: establishments “primarily engaged in offering automobile driving instruction” (OMB, NAICS Manual). Its index lists motorcycle driving schools and driver education under 611692 too (OMB, NAICS Manual). Truck and bus driving schools are not in it. The manual classifies them in 611519, Other Technical and Trade Schools (OMB, NAICS Manual), a shared code that also holds bartending, broadcasting, real estate and computer repair schools. No federal industry series counts CDL schools on their own, so every business figure below is car and motorcycle driving schools only.
How many driving schools are there in the United States?
BLS’s Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) counted an annual average of 2,790 private automobile driving school establishments in the United States in 2025 (BLS). In 2019 the count was 2,519 (BLS), so it rose 10.8% in six years (our calculation). QCEW counts worksites with employees covered by unemployment insurance. A chain counts once per location, and instructors with no payroll are not in it.
These schools employed an annual average of 16,602 workers in 2025 (BLS), 7.8% more than the 15,402 of 2019 (BLS) (our calculation). That works out to 6.0 workers per establishment (our calculation). Average annual pay was $30,261 (BLS). That average spreads total wages over every worker, part-time and full-time, so it sits well below a full-time salary.
The Census Bureau counts from its own business register. County Business Patterns counted 2,648 U.S. driving school establishments with paid employees in 2023 (Census). The 2022 Economic Census counted 2,593 establishments (Census) run by 2,396 employer firms (Census). QCEW and the Census programs use different records and reference periods, so their counts never match exactly.
How much revenue do driving schools bring in?
U.S. automobile driving schools with paid employees had revenue of $1.33 billion ($1,330,809 thousand) in 2022, according to the 2022 Economic Census (Census). That is about $513,200 per establishment (our calculation). In the 2017 Economic Census the industry took in $845.9 million ($845,874 thousand) (Census), so revenue rose 57.3% in five years before adjusting for inflation (our calculation).
The Census Bureau’s Annual Integrated Economic Survey, a sample of employer firms, put the industry’s revenue at $1.63 billion ($1,634,904 thousand) in 2024 (Census), up 16.7% from 2023 (Census). The survey estimate carries more sampling error than the census count, and the two are not directly comparable.
Driver education training made up 97.3% of the industry’s revenue in 2022 (Census). The census product lines record what was sold, not how it was delivered, so they do not split online courses from in-car or classroom lessons. The four largest firms held 18.7% of revenue (Census); the rest was spread across the other employer firms in the 2,396 counted.
How many driving instructors run a business with no employees?
Census counted 924,679 U.S. educational services businesses with no paid employees in 2024 (Census), and it publishes no driving school line inside that total. Nonemployer Statistics returned no data for NAICS 611692, 61169 or 6116 for 2024, for 611692 for 2023, or for 611692 in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties. The lowest level published is NAICS 611, all educational services.
In 2023, the latest year both programs cover, Census counted 893,520 such businesses (Census) beside 118,004 employer establishments in NAICS 611 (Census). That is 7.6 businesses with no employees for every employer establishment across all educational services (our calculation). The ratio covers every subject and is not a measure for driving schools.
How much do education businesses spend on advertising?
U.S. educational services employer firms spent $3.27 billion ($3,266,271 thousand) on purchased advertising and promotional services in 2024, per the Census Bureau’s Annual Integrated Economic Survey (Census). That covers every private school, college, training firm and instruction business with employees (NAICS 61), not driving schools alone. The survey publishes no advertising figure for driving schools or for NAICS 6116, and the 2022 Economic Census has no class-of-customer table for the industry. The figure counts money paid to agencies, ad platforms, media and printers, not staff time, and it is not split by medium, so the share spent on video is not known.
How many driving schools are there in Florida and in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties?
BLS QCEW counted an annual average of 149 private automobile driving school establishments in Florida in 2025 (BLS), 5.3% of the U.S. total (our calculation). That is up 43.3% from 104 in 2019 (BLS) (our calculation). Florida’s driving schools employed an annual average of 801 workers (BLS) at average annual pay of $42,473 (BLS), 40.4% above the U.S. average for the industry (our calculation).
County Business Patterns counted 124 Florida driving school establishments with paid employees in 2023 (Census). The 2022 Economic Census counted 115 (Census), with revenue of $102.8 million ($102,828 thousand) (Census). That is 7.7% of the U.S. industry’s revenue (our calculation) and about $894,200 per establishment (our calculation).
County (automobile driving schools, NAICS 611692)
Establishments, 2025 (BLS QCEW)
Jobs, 2025 (BLS QCEW)
Average annual pay, 2025 (BLS QCEW)
Establishments with employees, 2023 (Census CBP)
Establishments with employees, 2022 (Economic Census)
Together the three counties had 30 private driving school establishments in 2025, per BLS QCEW (our calculation), 20.1% of Florida’s (our calculation). Palm Beach and Broward had 112 driving school jobs between them (our calculation). BLS withholds Martin County’s employment and wages to protect the confidentiality of its single establishment.
County Business Patterns counted 21 establishments with paid employees in Palm Beach and Broward in 2023 (our calculation), 16.9% of Florida’s (our calculation). The 2022 Economic Census counted 25 in the two counties (our calculation), 21.7% of the state’s (our calculation). Neither Census program published a row for Martin County. These counts cover car and motorcycle driving schools with employees; truck-driving schools and solo instructors are not in them.
How many young drivers die in U.S. crashes each year?
2,162 drivers aged 15 to 20 were killed in U.S. traffic crashes in 2024, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration counts (NHTSA). The count comes from NHTSA’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), which records every fatal crash on a public road; the 2024 file is the annual report file, which NHTSA revises when the final file is released.
The same NHTSA count was 3,474 in 2005 (NHTSA) and 1,717 in 2014 (NHTSA). The 2024 figure is 37.8% below 2005 (our calculation) but higher than the 2014 count. NHTSA also estimates that 184,129 drivers aged 15 to 20 were injured in 2024; that figure comes from a national sample of police crash reports, not a full count (NHTSA).
The Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA), the association of state highway safety offices, compared 2002 with 2021 in its own FARS analysis. It found that fatal crashes involving a driver under 21 fell 38% while they rose for drivers 21 and older (GHSA), and that deaths of drivers under 21 fell about 45% (GHSA).
What share of drivers in fatal crashes are aged 15 to 20?
Drivers aged 15 to 20 were 9% of all drivers involved in fatal U.S. crashes in 2024 and 5.2% of all licensed drivers, NHTSA reports from FARS and Federal Highway Administration licensing data (NHTSA). In all, 4,873 drivers aged 15 to 20 were involved in a fatal crash that year, whether they died or survived (NHTSA).
Per 100,000 licensed drivers, 39.22 drivers aged 15 to 20 were involved in a fatal crash in 2024, against 21.56 drivers aged 21 and older (NHTSA). These rates are per licensed driver, not per mile driven. The per-mile comparison that is often quoted for teen drivers is traced in the origins section of this page.
NHTSA’s license records show 1,030 of the 4,873 young drivers in fatal crashes in 2024 did not hold a valid license (NHTSA), or 21.1% (our calculation; the total includes drivers whose license status was unknown).
Why do counts of teen crash deaths differ by source?
Published counts of U.S. teen crash deaths for 2024 run from 2,162 to 2,921, because each counter uses a different age band and a different record. NHTSA’s young-driver count covers only drivers aged 15 to 20. NHTSA’s distracted-driving sheet and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS, funded by auto insurers) count every road user in their age band from FARS crash reports. The CDC injury center counts death certificates.
The CDC’s teen driver page, last updated in August 2025, still gave 2020 figures when the Internet Archive captured it in October 2026, including about 227,000 teens injured that year (CDC). IIHS reports that 2024 teen crash deaths were 67% fewer than in 1975 (IIHS). NHTSA’s preliminary estimate for 2025, which groups ages 15 to 24 and counts everyone killed, is 6,113 deaths (NHTSA).
Who else dies in crashes involving young drivers?
5,247 people died in U.S. crashes involving a driver aged 15 to 20 in 2024, NHTSA counts, 7% fewer than in 2023 (NHTSA). 893 of them were passengers of the young drivers (NHTSA), and 66% of those passengers were aged 15 to 20 themselves (NHTSA). IIHS, counting ages 13 to 19, reports that 58% of teen passenger deaths in passenger vehicles in 2024 happened with another teenager driving (IIHS).
The key-findings list on the NHTSA fact sheet calls the 2023-to-2024 change an increase, though the overview and table in the same sheet show a decrease (NHTSA). GHSA’s teen driver page repeats the key-findings line, saying the figure “increased 7%” while quoting counts that fell (GHSA).
What does NHTSA record about alcohol, speed and seat belts in young-driver deaths?
In 2024, 29% of drivers aged 15 to 20 killed in U.S. crashes had any measured alcohol (a blood alcohol concentration of .01 g/dL or higher), and 25% were at .08 g/dL or higher, NHTSA estimates (NHTSA). NHTSA estimates alcohol levels where test results are missing. IIHS, looking at younger drivers, estimates 20% of passenger vehicle drivers aged 16 to 17 killed in 2024 were at or above 0.08% (IIHS).
39% of male drivers aged 15 to 20 in fatal crashes in 2024 were speeding, the highest share of any age group in NHTSA’s chart (NHTSA). Among passenger vehicle drivers aged 15 to 20 killed in 2024 whose belt use was known, 53% were unrestrained (NHTSA). IIHS reports 41% of passenger vehicle drivers aged 16 to 19 in fatal crashes in 2024 were in single-vehicle crashes, the highest share of any age group (IIHS).
Distraction is recorded from police reports, which NHTSA says under-count it. NHTSA counted 241 distracted drivers aged 15 to 19 in fatal crashes in 2024 (NHTSA) and 264 people killed in crashes involving them (NHTSA).
Motorcycle riders are counted apart from drivers: 583 riders aged 15 to 20 were killed in 2024, NHTSA counts (NHTSA).
How many teen drivers crash in Florida and in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties?
Florida’s Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles counted 42,204 drivers aged 15 to 19 in crashes in 2024 (FLHSMV). Its annual report, built from police crash reports and closed out in January 2026, counts 100 of those drivers killed (FLHSMV). A further 190 people died in Florida crashes involving a driver aged 15 to 19: other drivers, passengers and people outside vehicles (FLHSMV).
NHTSA’s state table uses a wider age band, so its Florida counts differ:
Everyone killed in crashes involving a driver aged 15 to 20
388
NHTSA puts Florida’s 2024 rate at 54.27 drivers aged 15 to 20 in fatal crashes per 100,000 licensed drivers that age, against 24.72 for Florida drivers 21 and older (NHTSA). Both are per licensed driver, not per mile.
DHSMV’s county table, by county of crash, gives these 2024 counts for drivers aged 15 to 19:
County
Drivers aged 15 to 19 in crashes
Drivers aged 15 to 19 killed
Palm Beach
2,864
6
Broward
3,331
9
Martin
329
0
Source: FLHSMV, Florida Traffic Crash Facts Annual Report 2024. Together the three counties held 15.5% of Florida’s teen drivers in crashes (our calculation). The report prints two Martin County blocks labelled ages 15 to 19; the table uses the first, since the second sits where the 20-to-24 block belongs.
How often do public companies’ annual reports mention driving schools?
10 Form 10-K annual reports filed in 2025 contained the phrase “driving school” or “driver education,” by our count with SEC EDGAR full-text search (our calculation; one count per filing). From 2001 to 2025, 207 such filings were made, and 9 more were filed in 2026 through November 9, for 216 in all from 44 registrants (our calculation). Counting every annual report form, including amendments and the older 10-K405 and 10-KSB forms, the total is 266 filings from 51 registrants (our calculation). The yearly count of 10-K filings stayed small throughout: it peaked at 12 in both 2011 and 2013 and was lowest in 2006, at 4 (our calculation). The yearly counts, filer names and query URLs are in our EDGAR counts file.
The search covers filings from 2001 on and only companies that file with the SEC. Most driving schools are private and file nothing, and Form 20-F filers are outside the count. Full-text search does no stemming, so we searched “driving school,” “driving schools,” “driver education” and “drivers education” and merged the results; filing year 2025 mostly means fiscal 2024 reports. The count measures a phrase, not a business.
The phrase “driver training” is more common and is counted separately, without hand classes: 449 Form 10-K filings from 2001 to 2025 contained it, 17 in 2001 and 23 in 2025, with a peak of 32 in 2023 (our calculation). “Traffic school” is rare: 14 Form 10-K filings from 2001 through November 9, 2026 contained it, most of them Daily Journal Corporation’s, describing a court payment service where users can get traffic school information (our calculation).
Which kinds of companies mention driving schools in their annual reports?
Trucking and fleet operators filed 121 of the 216 Form 10-K filings with “driving school” or “driver education” from 2001 through November 9, 2026, or 56.0%, and they came from 14 registrants (our calculation). In 2025, 7 of the 10 filings were theirs (our calculation). We read the passages around the phrase in every filing and gave each one class; the classes and an example passage per filing are in our contexts file.
What the passage is about (Form 10-K filings, 2001 through November 9, 2026)
Filings
Examples
Trucking or fleet operator’s driver-supply risk text only
78
Students’ access to financial aid for driving school, capacity at driving schools
Racetrack or racing-experience driving school
53
Speedway rentals to racing schools, entertainment oval driving classes
Trucking or fleet operator’s own driving school or student drivers
43
Company academies, a school subsidiary, school partnerships, student-driver programs
Auto maker or dealer
13
A dealer group’s driver education subsidiary, a carmaker’s teen driving program
Other
10
Car rental, fleet cameras, a railroad’s school bus safety program, classifieds
A director who owns a driving school (names not listed here)
Landlord, lessor or lender list
3
A truck driving school as a tenant, lessee or borrower
The registrant’s own driver education or driver training business
2
A development-stage company with a planned training website
The own-school filings came from 9 trucking or fleet registrants (our calculation). The racing group is not driver education: its “driving schools” are racing classes held at speedways. 57 of the 216 filings also use the word “video” or “videos” somewhere in the matching document (our calculation); we did not class those uses. In the passages around the phrase itself, video appears twice: a racetrack operator’s video production services, and a development-stage company’s plan for a driver training website for seniors that would offer video presentations, in its report for the fiscal year ended November 30, 2001 (Superior Networks 10-KSB).
What do trucking companies with their own CDL schools disclose?
Werner says it operated 20 driver training locations at the end of 2025 (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K), and that 11 of its 20 school locations were in leased facilities (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K). Schneider’s fiscal 2025 report says it hires driver candidates into its own nationwide network of 19 training academies (Schneider fiscal 2025 10-K), and that it has invested in simulators for initial and ongoing training (Schneider fiscal 2025 10-K). These are the companies’ own descriptions of their schools; none of these reports gives a count of students trained in 2025, by our search of each document.
Knight-Swift says that in areas without its own academies it contracts with driver training schools managed by third parties (Knight-Swift fiscal 2025 10-K). PAMT says it remodeled a driver training facility at its Tontitown, Arkansas headquarters during 2025 (PAMT fiscal 2025 10-K).
Werner gives the most financial detail. It employed 8,677 drivers at December 31, 2025, and 1,251 associates in Werner Logistics, international, driving schools and other non-trucking operations, a group it does not split (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K). It provides financing to some people who attended its driver training schools (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K), and reported student notes receivable of $71,475 thousand at December 31, 2025 and $68,546 thousand a year earlier, before an allowance for doubtful accounts (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K). That is a rise of 4.3% (our calculation). Werner counts revenue from its driver training schools within other revenues and does not report it on its own (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K).
What do these carriers say about the entry-level driver training rule?
Knight-Swift’s fiscal 2025 report says FMCSA’s entry-level driver training (ELDT) standards took effect in 2022 for people applying for or upgrading a Class A or Class B commercial driver’s license (Knight-Swift fiscal 2025 10-K), and that it must follow the rule in operating its own driving schools (Knight-Swift fiscal 2025 10-K). The rule itself is covered in the rules section of this page.
The same report says the FMCSA announced in December 2025 that it could revoke the accreditation of more than 7,000 training schools nationwide over falsified training data, curriculum, facility or instructor failures and missing records (Knight-Swift fiscal 2025 10-K). This is the FMCSA announcement as Knight-Swift reports it, not a count of schools that lost accreditation. Knight-Swift says the FMCSA had not notified it that its own training school was at risk of losing accreditation (Knight-Swift fiscal 2025 10-K), and Heartland Express’s fiscal 2025 report says the same about its own schools’ accreditation (Heartland fiscal 2025 10-K).
Several carriers repeat a risk-factor sentence naming limited financial aid for students attending driving school among the things that can shrink the pool of drivers (Knight-Swift fiscal 2025 10-K). Werner’s fiscal 2025 report names a declining number of, and more competition for, driver training school graduates among the causes of tighter driver supply (Werner fiscal 2025 10-K).
What do they say about driver turnover and their own trainees?
Covenant’s fiscal 2025 report says it is common for a truckload carrier’s driver turnover rate to exceed 100% in a year, as a statement about the industry (Covenant fiscal 2025 10-K), and says its own rate is higher than the industry average and its peers’, without giving the rate (Covenant fiscal 2025 10-K). Heartland Express says its driver turnover rates are lower than the industry average, also without a rate (Heartland fiscal 2025 10-K).
Celadon’s report for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2016 says it believed turnover among drivers trained through its own school was lower than among other student drivers, and gives no rates (Celadon fiscal 2016 10-K). It says it had expanded that school to two other U.S. locations (Celadon fiscal 2016 10-K). Celadon opened the school in March 2013, which its fiscal 2013 report says raised its recruiting expense (Celadon fiscal 2013 10-K). These are historical statements.
What did trucking companies say about driving schools in earlier years?
The filings show carriers opening schools of their own. U.S. Xpress’s fiscal 2000 report says it had run a professional driving school in Medway, Ohio since January 1998 (U.S. Xpress fiscal 2000 10-K). Covenant’s fiscal 2000 report names the addition of a driving school in Arkansas among the reasons its general supplies and expenses rose (Covenant fiscal 2000 10-K). Frozen Food Express opened the FFE Driver Academy in February of 2011 (Frozen Food Express fiscal 2012 10-K), and it graduated and hired 935 drivers from the academy in 2012 (Frozen Food Express fiscal 2012 10-K). Sysco, a food distributor with its own delivery fleet, said in its report for the fiscal year ended July 3, 2021 that it had developed partnerships with driving school organizations to hire drivers (Sysco fiscal 2021 10-K).
Earlier reports also blamed driver shortages partly on schools. Werner’s fiscal 2000 report says management believed the elimination of federal funding for driving schools had reduced the number of qualified drivers (Werner fiscal 2000 10-K), and USA Truck’s fiscal 2000 report cites declining enrollment in driving schools without giving a figure (USA Truck fiscal 2000 10-K). These are company beliefs, not measured findings.
What do auto insurers disclose about driver education, teen drivers and telematics?
The two large auto insurers in the set, Progressive and Allstate, mention driver education only in their fiscal 2006 and 2007 reports. Progressive’s fiscal 2006 report named driver education, with vehicle safety and road design, among possible contributors to lower auto accident frequency and called the list not conclusive (Progressive fiscal 2006 10-K). Allstate’s fiscal 2006 report named increased driver education and restrictions for new drivers among several possible causes of lower claim frequency (Allstate fiscal 2006 10-K). Neither report measured the effect of driver education.
The fiscal 2025 reports of Progressive, Allstate and Root do not use the words “teen,” “driver education” or “driver training,” by our search of each document. They describe telematics instead. Progressive offers its Snapshot usage-based program in all states except California (Progressive fiscal 2025 10-K), and says it has analyzed data from billions of driving miles from its devices and app (Progressive fiscal 2025 10-K). Allstate’s Drivewise program was available in 48 states and D.C. at December 31, 2025, and its DynamicDrive app in 44 states (Allstate fiscal 2025 10-K). Root says it was founded on the idea that car insurance rates should be based mainly on driving behaviors, not demographics (Root fiscal 2025 10-K), and that a two-to-four week smartphone “test drive” measuring braking, turning, time of day and attentiveness is part of underwriting in some channels (Root fiscal 2025 10-K). These are sellers’ descriptions of their own products.
One auto maker described a teen program. Ford’s fiscal 2013 report calls Ford Driving Skills for Life its flagship driver-education program for new drivers (Ford fiscal 2013 10-K), and says that in the United States the program focuses on teen drivers (Ford fiscal 2013 10-K). The report gives no participant count or outcome.
Is any driver education or traffic school company on EDGAR?
We found no operating teen driver education, online driver education or traffic school company that files annual reports with the SEC (EDGAR full-text searches for the phrases above and for named sellers, November 9, 2026). The nearest was a shell company. School4Chauffeurs, a development-stage company, described its business in its fiscal 2008 report as training programs for the limousine business and its drivers (School4Chauffeurs fiscal 2008 10-K). Its fiscal 2009 report says it had no revenues from inception through December 31, 2009 (School4Chauffeurs fiscal 2009 10-K), and in 2010 it changed its name to POWRtec International Corp. after a reverse merger (POWRtec fiscal 2010 10-K).
Other driving schools reach EDGAR through someone else’s filing. Sonic Automotive’s fiscal 2025 subsidiary list names EchoPark Driver Education, LLC, with no description of what it does (Sonic Automotive fiscal 2025 10-K, Exhibit 21). Lafayette Square USA, a business development company, describes a borrower, 160 Driving, as one of the largest vocational training schools for commercial driving in the U.S. in its fiscal 2024 report (Lafayette Square USA fiscal 2024 10-K). An EDGAR full-text search for Aceable, an online driver education seller, returns Form D notices of private securities offerings it filed and no annual report (searched November 9, 2026).
Racing schools are a separate business. Dale Jarrett Racing Adventure’s fiscal 2014 report says it offers entertainment-based oval driving schools and events at racetracks (Dale Jarrett Racing Adventure fiscal 2014 10-K), and Speedway Motorsports’ fiscal 2018 report lists driving schools among its event-related revenue streams with corporate partners (Speedway Motorsports fiscal 2018 10-K). Franchise disclosure documents for driving school franchises could not be checked: the Minnesota CARDS database refused our one request on November 9, 2026, even for its robots.txt file, and Wisconsin’s database bars AI agents, so this page has no franchise figures.
What does Florida law require before a teenager can drive?
Florida lets its Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (DHSMV) issue a learner’s driver license at age 15, as the 2026 Florida Statutes read on November 9, 2026 (Fla. Stat. 322.1615). Since July 1, 2025, the applicant must first complete a DHSMV-approved driver education course that meets or exceeds the Department of Education’s Driver Education/Traffic Safety-Classroom 1900300 course description (Fla. Stat. 322.1615(1)(c)). That requirement came from Chapter 2025-104, Laws of Florida (Senate Bill 994), signed May 30, 2025 and in effect from July 1, 2025 (Laws of Florida). A learner’s license holder may drive only in daylight for the first 3 months after it is issued (Fla. Stat. 322.1615(3)), then until 10 p.m. (Fla. Stat. 322.1615(3)), always with a licensed adult supervisor in the front passenger seat.
To get a full license at 16 or 17, a Florida teen must have held a learner’s license for at least 12 months (Fla. Stat. 322.05(2)), and a parent, guardian or responsible adult must certify not less than 50 hours of behind-the-wheel experience with a licensed adult driver (Fla. Stat. 322.05(3)), of which not less than 10 hours must be at night (Fla. Stat. 322.05(3)). The statute calls this a certification by the adult; it does not require a log or a driving school. Once licensed, a driver under 17 may drive after 11 p.m. and before 6 a.m. only with a licensed driver aged 21 or older, unless driving directly to or from work (Fla. Stat. 322.16(2)), and a 17-year-old faces the same rule after 1 a.m. and before 5 a.m. (Fla. Stat. 322.16(3)).
Adults have a separate course. Since July 1, 2025, each Florida license applicant aged 18 or older must complete a traffic law and substance abuse education course, unless licensed in another jurisdiction or a graduate of a Department of Education driver education course (Fla. Stat. 322.095(1)). DHSMV approves these courses, including courses that use communications technology as the delivery method (Fla. Stat. 322.095(2)), and each must give a minimum of 4 hours to course content, less at most 30 minutes of breaks (Fla. Stat. 322.095(9)). The state also contracts with providers of approved online traffic law courses to give the learner’s license knowledge exam online on its behalf, with a parent certifying that they watched the applicant (Fla. Stat. 322.56(8)).
Florida’s road test does not have to be given by the state. DHSMV may contract with a person, a school or another entity to administer the written and driving skills portions of the license exam for any class of license, and the test must be the same one the state gives (Fla. Stat. 322.56). For motorcycles, the state’s safety course must include a minimum of 12 hours of instruction, at least 6 of them riding (Fla. Stat. 322.0255(2)).
How does Florida license driving schools and driving instructors?
Under chapter 488 of the Florida Statutes, as read on November 9, 2026, DHSMV licenses all commercial driver schools except truck driving schools, which are licensed by the Commission for Independent Education under chapter 1005 (Fla. Stat. 488.01). A school license costs a nonrefundable application fee plus a further $200 once the application is approved (Fla. Stat. 488.03). No one may be paid to teach driving without a DHSMV instructor’s certificate, whose initial application fee is $25 (Fla. Stat. 488.04), and applicants must take special eye tests, written tests and road tests (Fla. Stat. 488.04). DHSMV’s rules, in effect since September 20, 2010, add that instructors who teach permit holders must be at least 21 years old and hold a Class E license (Fla. Admin. Code R. 15A-11.006), and that instructors at truck driving schools must have at least three years of driving experience as a Class A CDL driver (Fla. Admin. Code R. 15A-11.009).
Two of the rules touch what a school may say and film. A school may not advertise that it can issue or guarantee the issuance of a driver license, or that it can influence DHSMV (Fla. Admin. Code R. 15A-11.002(3)). The rule speaks of advertising in general and does not mention video. Instructors, employees and agents may not use a license office’s driving route, on or off the premises, while road tests are being given (Fla. Admin. Code R. 15A-11.005(2)). DHSMV may also suspend or revoke a school’s license if its staff solicit business on premises, including parking areas, that DHSMV or a tax collector uses to license drivers (Fla. Stat. 488.06). Chapter 2026-94 (Senate Bill 584), in effect from July 1, 2026, lets DHSMV authorize county tax collectors to enforce chapter 488, including keeping driving school licensees and agents off their premises unless they are there as customers (Laws of Florida).
What does Florida law say about recording conversations, such as in-car audio?
Florida’s interception law, section 934.03 as read on November 9, 2026, says it is lawful to intercept a wire, oral or electronic communication when all of the parties to it have given prior consent (Fla. Stat. 934.03(2)(d)). Apart from the narrow exceptions in subsection (4)(b), a violation of the prohibition is a felony of the third degree (Fla. Stat. 934.03(4)(a)). The law defines an oral communication as one spoken by a person showing an expectation that it is not subject to interception, under circumstances justifying that expectation (Fla. Stat. 934.02(2)). We quote the text only. Whether a given lesson recording falls under these sections is a legal question that the statute’s words alone do not settle.
What does federal law require of CDL training schools?
Since February 7, 2022, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has required entry-level driver training for new commercial drivers, under 49 CFR Part 380, subpart F, as read on the eCFR on November 9, 2026 (49 CFR 380.600). Anyone applying for a Class A or Class B commercial driver’s license for the first time, or upgrading to one, must train with a provider listed on FMCSA’s Training Provider Registry (49 CFR 380.609). The rule sets content, not time: the Class A curriculum has no required minimum number of instruction hours for theory or for behind-the-wheel training, but instructors must cover every topic and trainees must show proficiency in every behind-the-wheel skill (49 CFR Part 380, Appendix A). Trainees must score an overall 80 percent on the written theory assessment (49 CFR 380.715).
The rule took years to arrive. FMCSA’s final rule, published December 8, 2016, took effect February 6, 2017 with a compliance date of February 7, 2020 (Federal Register, 81 FR 88732). The 2016 proposal behind it would have required at least 30 hours of behind-the-wheel training for Class A applicants and 15 hours for Class B; the final rule dropped any minimum hours (Federal Register, 81 FR 88732). An interim final rule published February 4, 2020 moved the compliance date to February 7, 2022 to give FMCSA time to finish the registry (Federal Register, 85 FR 6088).
How do first-license driver education rules compare across states?
Four states’ rules, as read on November 9, 2026, show how far the requirements differ. Florida sets a course but no classroom or behind-the-wheel hours in its statute, while Michigan, Illinois and California set both, and all four set the same supervised-practice figure.
The Illinois hours are the conditions a school district’s course must meet to get state reimbursement, in a section renumbered from 105 ILCS 5/27-24.3 in August 2025. The California row comes from the DMV’s own pages rather than the Vehicle Code, because the California Legislature’s code site answered our reader with a bot challenge. Texas’s statute site loads its text only with JavaScript, and the New York, Ohio, Virginia and Washington legislature sites bar automated or AI readers, so those states are not in the table.
What do the FTC and YouTube rules say about driving lesson videos?
The Federal Trade Commission’s Endorsement Guides (16 CFR Part 255, read on the eCFR on November 9, 2026) say a material connection that must be disclosed can include free or discounted products given to an endorser, whether or not an endorsement is required in return (16 CFR 255.5). When an endorsement is made with both pictures and sound, as in a video, the disclosure should appear in both the visual and audible portions (16 CFR 255.0). A student who films a review in exchange for a free lesson is the kind of case these sections describe, though the Guides do not mention driving schools. The FTC’s children’s privacy rule, COPPA, defines a child as anyone under 13 (16 CFR 312.2), and counts a photograph, video, or audio file containing a child’s image or voice as personal information (16 CFR 312.2). The martial arts school page covers the rest of these federal rules.
YouTube’s child safety policy, read on November 9, 2026, defines a minor as someone under 18 (YouTube Help), so a teen on a learner’s license is a minor on the platform. Its harmful or dangerous content policy lists “Extremely dangerous driving”, using a vehicle in a way that presents imminent risk of serious injury or death, among the dangerous acts by minors it does not allow (YouTube Help). The same page gives, as an example of educational content that may be allowed, a video showing dangerous driving or vehicle crashes in controlled environments to teach safe driving practices or vehicle safety features (YouTube Help). The policy does not mention driving lessons or road tests.
What do the popular driving numbers really say?
Driving schools, driver education sellers, insurers and the marketers who sell to them repeat a handful of numbers more than any others: how much riskier teen drivers are, how much driver’s ed cuts crashes, how much video lifts conversions, how close to home crashes happen and how many truck drivers the country is short. We traced each one to the earliest document we could find and read what it measured. Most are real figures that measured something narrower than the sentence now built on them. Pages that repeat a number are linked only as dated evidence of how it spread, never as the source of the number itself.
“Teen drivers are nearly three times as likely to crash”
The claim as repeated. CDC’s teen driver page, as captured in October 2026, says drivers ages 16-19 have a fatal crash rate almost three times as high as drivers ages 20 and older per mile driven (CDC, archived). It is about fatal crashes, per mile, against every driver 20 and older, not about crashes in general. CDC’s reference for the line is IIHS’s teenager fatality facts dated May 2022 (CDC, archived), an edition built on travel from April 2016 to March 2017.
Where it came from. The oldest CDC form we found is on its teen motor vehicle fact sheet captured in October 2002: per mile driven, teen drivers ages 16 to 19 were four times more likely than older drivers to crash (CDC, archived). The source CDC cited, NHTSA’s Traffic Safety Facts 2000: Young Drivers, said something narrower: in 1996 the driver fatality rate per mile of estimated travel for drivers 16 to 19 was about 4 times as high as the rate for drivers 25 through 69 (NHTSA). That counted drivers killed, not crashes, and compared teens with middle-aged drivers, not all older drivers. The same NHTSA fact sheet’s age table used a third base: 64.7 drivers aged 15-20 involved in fatal crashes in 1999 per 100,000 licensed drivers (NHTSA). The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), which is funded by auto insurers, wrote in its teenager fatality facts captured in June 2006 that, based on crashes of all severities, the crash rate per mile driven for 16-19 year-olds was 4 times the risk for older drivers (IIHS, archived).
How it changed. IIHS’s 2010 edition, captured in April 2012, switched to fatal crashes: the fatal crash rate per mile driven for 16-19 year-olds was nearly 3 times the rate for drivers ages 20 and over, from its own unpublished analysis of 2008 travel survey and crash data (IIHS, archived). CDC followed. By January 2013 its fact sheet said teen drivers were three times more likely than drivers aged 20 and older to be in a fatal crash per mile driven (CDC, archived), and by January 2015 nearly three times (CDC, archived). The move from “four times” to “three times” came with a change of measure, from crashes of all severities to fatal crashes, so the two figures are not a trend. The IIHS edition CDC still cites, posted in May 2022, kept the nearly 3 times wording (IIHS, archived) and put drivers 16-19 at 4.8 fatal passenger vehicle crash involvements per 100 million miles traveled from April 2016 to March 2017 (IIHS, archived).
What to use instead. The current IIHS edition, posted in June 2026, says that, using National Household Travel Survey data, the fatal crash rate per mile driven for 16-19 year-olds is just over 3 times the rate for drivers ages 20 and over (IIHS). Its table puts drivers 16-19 at 7.5 fatal passenger vehicle crash involvements per 100 million miles traveled in 2022 (IIHS). The teen rate moved between editions partly because each rests on a different travel survey’s estimate of teen miles, so cite the rate with its year and its survey. Within the teen years, CDC says the crash rate per mile driven is about 1.5 times as high for 16-year-old drivers as for 18-19-year-old drivers (CDC, archived). A correct sentence names the measure, the year and the comparison group: in 2022, teen drivers’ fatal crash rate per mile driven was just over 3 times that of drivers 20 and older, by IIHS’s count.
“Driver’s ed cuts crashes” and the Nebraska “75% more likely to get a ticket”
The claim as repeated. A June 2018 NHTSA fact sheet for driver education instructors says teen drivers who have not completed driver’s education are 75 percent more likely to get a traffic ticket, credited to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (NHTSA, archived). It drops the study’s state and its first-year scope. A driving school chain, 911 Driving School, repeated the figure in August 2025 with the scope kept: teens without formal training were 75% more likely to get a traffic ticket in their first year (911 Driving School).
Where it came from. The wording comes from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s release of August 13, 2015: young drivers who have not completed driver’s education are 75 percent more likely to get a traffic ticket, 24 percent more likely to be involved in a fatal or injury crash and 16 percent more likely to have a crash (University of Nebraska-Lincoln). These are first-year comparisons. In that year, 11.1 percent of the driver’s education group was in a crash, against 12.9 percent of teens who did not take driver’s education (University of Nebraska-Lincoln); 10.4 percent of the driver’s education group was ticketed for moving violations, against 18.3 percent of the others (University of Nebraska-Lincoln). The release’s “more likely” figures are close to the ratios of these unadjusted shares. The paper behind it, by Shell and colleagues in Accident Analysis and Prevention (2015), was a descriptive epidemiological study of all 151,880 Nebraska teens who got a provisional permit from 2003 to 2010 (Shell et al., PubMed abstract, archived). It was not randomised. About 53 percent of the teens chose a state-approved driver’s education course and the rest qualified by logging supervised practice with a parent or other adult (University of Nebraska-Lincoln). The abstract reports higher odds of crashes and violations for the log group after controlling for gender, race and ethnicity, household income, urban or rural residence and age, and gives no percentages.
What the other studies measured. The randomised evidence is older and points the other way. A Cochrane review of school-based driver education (Roberts and Kwan, 2001) found three trials run in 1982-1984 with 17,965 students (Cochrane review, PubMed abstract, archived). In the US trial, in DeKalb County, Georgia, 27.5% of students given driver education were involved in one or more crashes as a driver, a share slightly above the control group’s and within the trial’s margin of error, while 87% of them got a licence, slightly more than controls (Cochrane review, PubMed abstract, archived). The reviewers found no evidence that driver education reduces crash involvement and said it leads to earlier licensing (Cochrane review, PubMed abstract, archived). A 1986 reanalysis of the DeKalb data by IIHS researchers (Lund, Williams and Zador) found students assigned to the enhanced course were more likely to obtain drivers licenses, to crash and to get violations than controls, which the authors put down to earlier licensure (Lund et al., PubMed abstract, archived). A 1999 Johns Hopkins review (Vernick and colleagues) found Nine studies that met its criteria and no convincing evidence that high school driver education reduces crashes (Vernick et al., PubMed abstract, archived). Mayhew and Simpson’s 2002 review for the Traffic Injury Research Foundation found the international literature gives little support to formal driver instruction as a safety measure (Mayhew and Simpson, PubMed abstract, archived).
The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety (AAA sells insurance and driver training) published in September 2014 what it called the most comprehensive look at driver’s ed in decades (Mayhew and colleagues, Manitoba and Oregon). Its crash results are for Oregon only: a cross-sectional comparison of the driving records of 94,342 teens who did and did not take driver education found a 4.3% lower incidence of collisions for driver education teens and a larger drop in traffic convictions (AAA Foundation). In both Manitoba and Oregon there was no significant difference in road test pass rates (AAA Foundation). The report summed up its findings as positive but modest effects (AAA Foundation). The Oregon groups were self-selected and differed before the course: driver education teens were younger, more often male and more often urban.
What to use instead. No single “driver’s ed cuts crashes by X%” figure holds across studies. Name the study, its design and its outcome: in Nebraska’s 2003-2010 permit records, teens who chose driver education had fewer first-year crashes and tickets than teens who logged supervised hours; in the randomised trials of the early 1980s, driver education did not reduce crash involvement and led to earlier licensing. We found no version of the Nebraska figures with a different crash percentage in the release, the researchers’ own follow-up, NHTSA’s fact sheet or the repeats we checked.
“Video lifts conversions 80%”
The claim as repeated. Beverly Boy Productions, a video production company, tells tutoring and driving schools that marketing videos can increase landing page conversions by 80%, citing no study (Beverly Boy Productions). We found no driving school test behind the figure.
Where it came from. The figure is a best case from one video vendor, EyeView, in 2009-2010, about financial and tutoring websites. EyeView, which made the videos it tested, first reported on its blog in December 2008 that eToro visitors who watched its video were 20% more likely to download the product (EyeView, archived). In February 2009 it said viewers of its videos for UMOO were 80% more likely to become depositing users, comparing viewers with non-viewers for one client (EyeView, archived). In November 2009 its blog quoted a manager at TutorVista, an online tutoring seller, saying the first test on one landing page boosted conversion by over 80 percent (EyeView, archived).
How it changed. By August 2010 Unbounce, a landing-page software seller, wrote that a study by EyeView shows video on landing pages can increase conversion by 80% (Unbounce, archived), dropping the single-client scope. In March 2016 WordStream, a pay-per-click software seller, repeated 80%, credited to “EyeWideDigital” (WordStream). Unbounce’s own August 2021 analysis of approximately 35,000 customer landing pages in each of three periods (Unbounce) concluded that video appears to have a minimal or negative impact on landing page performance (Unbounce). Its April 2025 article of landing page examples still says landing pages with video can increase conversions by 80% (Unbounce).
What to use instead. A school’s own split test of the same page with and without video, with visitor counts. If the EyeView figure is cited, it should say it was one vendor’s report on its own clients’ pages in 2009, comparing people who chose to watch with people who did not.
“The U.S. is short 80,000 truck drivers”
The claim as repeated. The U.S. has a record shortage of truck drivers. The number in circulation comes from the American Trucking Associations (ATA), the trucking trade group, whose chief economist said on October 25, 2021 that the driver shortage had risen to 80,000, an all-time high (ATA).
Where it came from. ATA’s 2019 report says the shortfall was first documented in a 2005 report, when it was roughly 20,000 (ATA), and puts the 2018 shortage at roughly 60,800 drivers (ATA). It is a model, not a count: the gap between the expected supply of drivers and ATA’s estimate of demand. It covers only drivers of Class 8 tractor-trailers, and ATA says most of the shortage is in over-the-road, for-hire truckload carriers (ATA).
What else measured it. A March 2019 Monthly Labor Review article by Burks and Monaco, published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, used occupational employment and Current Population Survey data and found that, as a whole, the market for truck drivers appears to work as well as any other blue-collar labor market and imposes no constraints on entry (BLS Monthly Labor Review, archived). It found the problems the industry describes concentrated in long-distance truckload freight, which holds between one-sixth and one-fourth of all heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers (BLS Monthly Labor Review, archived).
What to use instead. Call it the ATA’s estimate for its own industry, with its year, and say it is concentrated in long-haul truckload carriers, where turnover is high; BLS’s researchers did not find a market-wide shortage.
We started from the questions people search for about driving school video statistics and looked for the organization that actually produced each answer. Every figure on this page sits in an evidence ledger with its source, the exact table or paragraph it came from, the measurement period, the population measured, and the date we checked it. This edition holds 512 figures from 64 publishers.
On November 9, 2026, each sourced figure on this page was re-fetched with the fetch cache cleared and matched against the recorded wording: BLS occupation wage estimates and the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (through the BLS data API and data files) and Employment Projections, the Standard Occupational Classification and the Monthly Labor Review (through Internet Archive copies, because bls.gov refuses automated requests; its robots file names no AI agent); Census County Business Patterns, Nonemployer Statistics, the 2022 Economic Census and the Annual Integrated Economic Survey (through the Census data API) and the NAICS Manual; NHTSA Traffic Safety Facts on crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov; FHWA Highway Statistics tables; Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles reports and lists; FMCSA’s Training Provider Registry and CDC’s teen driver pages through Internet Archive copies; IIHS, GHSA, AAA Foundation and American Trucking Associations pages; the Florida Statutes, Laws of Florida, the Florida Administrative Code, Michigan and Illinois statutes and California DMV pages; eCFR and the Federal Register; YouTube Help pages; SEC filings on EDGAR; and journal abstracts (PubMed records re-read through NCBI’s E-utilities, because the pages answer scripts with a bot check). Our YouTube figures come from the YouTube Data API, our filing counts from EDGAR full-text search, and our Florida driving school counts from the department’s own published list. We left out sources whose robots rules bar AI agents, among them the Cochrane Library (Cochrane reviews are cited through their PubMed abstracts), sciencedirect.com and the Ohio, Washington and Virginia code sites; we could not read nhtsa.gov, fmcsa.dot.gov or transportation.gov (403), the National Safety Council’s Injury Facts (a firewall answers 403), the California, New York and Texas statute sites (browser challenge or JavaScript only) or Minnesota’s franchise filings (403), so there are no franchise disclosure figures. A 2002 insurer release about where crashes happen is left out because the insurer’s own archive bars automated access and we found it only in a reprint. Nothing here is driving, safety or legal advice.
We only cite the producer: government agencies, regulators, company filings and official posts, and the survey owner's own report. We do not cite statistics roundups, Statista-style aggregators, or salary sites without a public method. We did not bypass paywalls or sign-up forms; where a full report was gated, we used only the figures its publisher states publicly.
Figures marked "our calculation" are arithmetic on the cited numbers, and anyone can reproduce them:
This edition contains no Mark Studios customer data.
Limitations
No federal count of driving instructors exists. BLS publishes no occupation for driving instructors. The closest, Self-Enrichment Teachers (SOC 25-3021), is shared with music, art, dance and other teachers, and its definition does not name driving instructors; we print it as the closest shared occupation, not as a count of instructors. Truck and bus driving schools sit in a shared trade-school industry (NAICS 611519), not in 611692.
Small counties are suppressed or tiny. BLS withholds Martin County’s driving school employment and pay, and County Business Patterns and the Economic Census publish no Martin row. Nonemployer Statistics has no driving school line at all, so one-person schools are not counted separately.
Counts of teen license holders differ by source. FHWA’s tables and Florida’s own counts of licensed 16-year-olds differ by more than two to one, most likely because one includes learner’s licenses; neither agency says so, and we print both.
Crash counts depend on the age band and the counter. NHTSA counts drivers aged 15 to 20, IIHS teenagers aged 13 to 19, and Florida drivers aged 15 to 19. NHTSA’s 2024 young-driver fact sheet also misstates the direction of one change on its first page; we print the corrected figure beside the error.
Most training studies measure skills, not crashes. Hazard perception and simulator trials mostly measure where drivers look or how they score on a test, with small samples. The randomised driver education trials are from 1982-84. Nothing here promises that a course, an app or a video makes anyone a safer driver or helps them pass a test.
Our YouTube read follows YouTube’s ranking. The 533 videos are what YouTube’s search returned for three terms (the top 200 results of each, sorted by views, with no country filter) on November 9, 2026. It is not a census of driving video. View counts are lifetime snapshots. Personal uploads, private students and minors are published only as a class and counts, so some shares cannot be recomputed from the public CSV. We read titles and channel text, not the videos themselves.
Filings count words. EDGAR full-text search finds a phrase, not a topic. We read the passage around every hit and sorted it by hand.
Rules are dated. Statutes and rules are reported as we read them on November 9, 2026. This is not legal advice. Every “earliest we found” in the origins section rests on web pages, PubMed and the Internet Archive; newspaper databases were not searched.
How to cite this page
For a single figure, cite the original publisher named next to it, and link here if the verification trail is useful to your readers. Each figure has its own anchor, so you can link straight to it, for example https://www.markstudios.com/research/driving-school-video-statistics#DRV-241. To cite the page as a whole:
Mark Studios. "Driving School Video Statistics." Last verified Nov 9, 2026. https://www.markstudios.com/research/driving-school-video-statistics
APA
Mark Studios. (2026, November 9). Driving school video statistics. https://www.markstudios.com/research/driving-school-video-statistics
MLA
“Driving School Video Statistics.” Mark Studios, 9 Nov. 2026, www.markstudios.com/research/driving-school-video-statistics.
Chicago
Mark Studios. “Driving School Video Statistics.” Last modified November 9, 2026. https://www.markstudios.com/research/driving-school-video-statistics.
BibTeX
@misc{markstudios_driving_school_video_statistics_2026,
author = {{Mark Studios}},
title = {{Driving School Video Statistics}},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
url = {https://www.markstudios.com/research/driving-school-video-statistics},
note = {Last verified 2026-11-09}
}
Our calculations and the evidence table are free to reuse with attribution and a link to this page. Each underlying figure remains the claim of its original publisher, and some publishers ask for a link when their figures are reused.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Risk Factors for Teen Drivers (Teen Drivers) (2025-08-04). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (Florida Administrative Code via FLRules), Fla. Admin. Code R. 15A-11.002 General Regulations (2010-09-20 (rule effective date)). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (National Center for Injury Prevention and Control), Risk Factors for Teen Drivers (2026-10-02). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (funded by auto insurers), Fatality Facts: Teenagers (2006-06-02). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (funded by auto insurers), Fatality Facts 2010: Teenagers (2012-04-13). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (National Center for Injury Prevention and Control), Teen Drivers: Fact Sheet (2013-01-16). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (National Center for Injury Prevention and Control), Teen Drivers: Fact Sheet (2015-01-03). Accessed 2026-11-09.
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (funded by auto insurers), Fatality Facts 2020: Teenagers (2022-05). Accessed 2026-11-09.
EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), EyeView - The new "Conversion" game (2008-12-04). Accessed 2026-11-09.
EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), Another video conversion success story (2009-11-10). Accessed 2026-11-09.
We re-verify every figure quarterly and when a major source publishes a new edition. The next scheduled review is February 2027. Corrections go to contact@markstudios.com.
Nov 9, 2026: First published with 512 figures from 64 publishers, each checked against its original source.
Frequently asked questions
How many driving schools are there in the United States?
BLS counted an annual average of 2,790 private automobile driving school establishments (NAICS 611692) in 2025, up from 2,519 in 2019. County Business Patterns counted 2,648 with paid employees in 2023, and the 2022 Economic Census 2,593 establishments run by 2,396 firms. Truck and bus driving schools are counted elsewhere, in NAICS 611519.
How much do driving instructors earn?
No federal series counts driving instructors alone. Average annual pay at private U.S. driving schools was $30,261 in 2025, per BLS, and $42,473 in Florida. The closest shared occupation, Self-Enrichment Teachers (SOC 25-3021), whose definition does not name driving instructors, had a median annual wage of $46,800 in May 2025.
How many driving schools are in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties?
BLS counted 8 private driving school establishments in Palm Beach County, 21 in Broward and 1 in Martin in 2025. Florida’s own list of commercial driving schools that teach behind the wheel had 25 entries under Palm Beach, 48 under Broward and 2 under Martin in November 2026; entries are listings, not separate businesses.
What share of teenagers have a driver’s license?
In 2024, 26.2% of U.S. 16-year-olds, 44.4% of 17-year-olds, 60.4% of 18-year-olds and 68.8% of 19-year-olds held a driver’s license, per FHWA. In 2000 the shares were 37.0%, 57.6%, 70.1% and 74.6%.
How many teen drivers die in crashes each year?
NHTSA counted 2,162 drivers aged 15 to 20 killed in U.S. traffic crashes in 2024, against 3,474 in 2005. Counting every road user, 2,662 teens aged 15 to 19 were killed in 2024, and IIHS counts 2,899 deaths at ages 13 to 19. In Florida, the state counted 100 drivers aged 15 to 19 killed in 2024.
Does driver’s education reduce crashes?
The randomised evidence does not show it: a Cochrane review of three trials run in 1982-84 with 17,965 students found no evidence that school driver education reduces crash involvement. The widely repeated Nebraska figures (teens without driver’s education 75 percent more likely to get a ticket and 24 percent more likely to be in a fatal or injury crash in their first year) come from a 2015 study of 151,880 teens in which families chose whether to take the course, so they show a difference between groups, not an effect of the course.
Who makes the most-viewed driving lesson videos on YouTube?
In our November 9, 2026 read of YouTube’s most-viewed ‘driving lessons’, ‘road test’ and ‘how to parallel park’ results, driving-tips creators with no school or instructor credential drew 44.0% of on-topic views, individual driving instructors 18.0%, general media 16.8%, motoring media 10.3% and driving schools 5.9%. Clearview Driving, a UK instructor, drew 12.4% on its own; U.S.-placed schools and instructors drew 1.0%.
What does federal law require of CDL training schools?
Since February 7, 2022, a first-time Class A or Class B CDL applicant must complete entry-level training from a provider listed on FMCSA’s Training Provider Registry. The rule sets no minimum number of hours, and a trainee must score at least 80 percent on the theory assessment. The registry listed 18,278 active providers on October 13, 2026.
