ROME – Country you go, license you find. One of the important things to know if you are moving abroad is whether your driving license is also valid in the country you have chosen. The rules on the validity of driving licenses for foreigners in fact vary greatly from one country to another. However, there is a sort of hierarchical scale that assigns more or less “power” to the driving license, or more or less restrictions on driving, depending on the country where it was obtained.
It is therefore possible to have licenses that allow you to circulate freely in many countries, others that limit the period of validity to one or two years, or six months, after which the owners can convert it into a local license without other tests, or by supporting a another driving test.
To try to bring order to this mess, Zutobi, an international online training company for drivers, has examined the rules in force in 22 countries, assigning each local license a score based on the levels of driving restrictions it is subjected to in each. single country. To arrive at a comparable numerical result, Zutobi has assigned a score to each individual restriction suffered, which oscillates from 8 to zero in inverse proportion to the severity of the restriction. The sum of the individual scores obtained by crossing all the individual countries together determines the ‘power’ of a driving license.
It turns out that, in a hypothetical ‘top ten’, Italian drivers are among the least penalized when driving abroad. Our country in fact holds an enviable fourth place, preceded by Belgium, France and Germany which, in the ranking drawn up by Zutobi, are the countries with the highest score and the most ‘powerful’ driving licenses, allowing you to drive in most of the countries with the least restrictions. Drivers from these three countries can not only use their licenses without restrictions within the European Union, but they can also drive in countries such as Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa and Switzerland for up to one year. After which they can convert their license into a local one without taking any tests. The same applies to Italy, Spain, Sweden and Finland (all with the same score), whose driving licenses however have a slightly lower ‘power’ as in Japan they are only valid if accompanied by an International Driving Permit (IDP). The ‘top ten’ drawn up by Zutobi continues with Switzerland, Japan and ends with Great Britain whose driving licenses after Brexit, for periods of more than one year, must pass through new tests to be recognized in EU countries . T.
r the countries with less “powerful” driving licenses, however, the primacy goes to Mexico, followed by Russia and China. Mexican drivers – Zutobi specifies – have complex restrictions in many countries and with their licenses they cannot drive at all in Japan or China. The only country surveyed that allows Mexican drivers to convert their driving license without a test after one year is South Africa. Russian drivers are also subject to many restrictions when going abroad. But, unlike Mexicans, they can drive freely for up to two years in neighboring Finland. Licenses issued in China are also not very “powerful”. The only country where Chinese drivers can drive without restrictions is Mexico. But they can convert their license without a test in South Africa and neighboring Hong Kong.
However, China is also the only country among those examined by Zutubi that does not allow drivers from other countries to drive, even for short periods.
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