This year my wife got her driver's license in Maldonado, and being a developer, I decided to dig into how the process actually works. She got it done in a week and passed everything on the first try. So passing isn't the hard part. The hard part is figuring out what to do and in what order.
That's why I built licencia.uy. It walks through the whole process step by step for Maldonado and Montevideo, with prices, documents, road signs and a theory test trainer with English and Russian translations. The site is in English, Spanish and Russian, and if you already hold a foreign license, there's a separate page on exchanging it.
Below is the short version: how it went for us, without the legal fine print. If your experience was different, drop me a line and I'll fix the site.
P.S. Uruguay's category A means a regular passenger car, like category B in Europe.
What you need to start
A passport; a cédula (Uruguayan ID) isn't required. You must be 18 or older. The whole process has to fit within 180 days of the first step, or your file gets closed and you start over. For my wife, everything from the lecture to the exam took a week.
1. Book online
My wife booked an appointment online at gub.uy, using the “Iniciar Trámite en Línea” button on the procedure page. There you pick the day and time to come in with your documents. I've written up where that button is and what to fill in, step by step: booking an appointment (agenda previa).
2. Medical certificate
It's called the constancia de aptitud psicofísica. Any clinic on the official list can issue it, for 870–990 pesos. My wife went to BIOESTE, paid 990 and got the certificate on the spot. No fasting, no blood test. If all you have for now is a passport, check with the clinic beforehand: BIOESTE, for example, asks for a cédula.
3. The lecture
At the office they give you a tirilla, a small slip of paper with the schedule for the mandatory defensive driving lecture (charla de manejo defensivo).
The lecture runs Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 8:30 or 18:30, in the campus grandstand at the corner of Burnett and Suiza. No sign-up needed: you show up and sit through an hour and a half. At the end you get a certificate of attendance, which you take to the office.
The lecture is held in the building by the stadium, with a side entrance up a staircase. It's easy to walk right past it in the evening, so here's a landmark:
The lecture goes into great detail about why you should follow the rules and what happens when you don't. If you're confident and think you're an excellent driver, maybe you should go too. It's quite an experience.
4. Submitting documents and paying
On your appointment day you go to the office with your passport, medical certificate and lecture certificate, hand in the documents and get the payment details. The fee is currently 2,404.30 pesos and covers both exams. You can pay at Abitab or RedPagos, in cash or with a physical card. Once you've paid, you go back to the Licencias de Conducir office, where they set a date for the theory test.
5. Theory test
30 questions on a computer, in the same building, in the room marked SALA TEÓRICOS. Everything is in Spanish.
At the counter my wife was told, quite sternly, to study only from the official guide (the Guía Nacional de Conducción on sucive.gub.uy, with cars and motorcycles all mixed together). You can read it, but my wife prepared on her own with the trainer on licencia.uy. The exam had the same questions as the trainer, and she passed on the first try.
The trainer has 275 questions from the banks driving schools use to prepare students. Each one is in Spanish with English and Russian translations, and after a mistake it explains why the right answer is right. There's also a timed mock exam: 30 questions, just like the real one.
My wife's Spanish is around B1. When a question wasn't clear, she asked the staff member and he explained it. Others were asking too; the atmosphere is relaxed.
6. An instructor before the driving test (optional)
In Maldonado driving school isn't mandatory; you can just show up and take the test on your own. Before the exam my wife went to an instructor to practice the maneuvers on the same course where the test is held. The point is simple: on exam day you already know where the cones are and what's expected of you. The lesson cost 1,600 pesos, in the instructor's car, and the school books the driving test for you.
She went to Academia de Choferes Punta, which has a separate WhatsApp for lessons in English: +598 93 312 019. Thanks, Juan Carlos!
For the driving test you need someone with you who holds a valid Uruguayan license. If you take the test in the school's car, the instructor is that person. If you use your own car, it must have no unpaid fines and valid mandatory insurance (SOA). The instructor's car already has all of that sorted.
7. Driving test
First the course, then the streets. The course is by La Loma park, where almost every driving school practices. Three maneuvers:
- Pull away, shift from first to second, speed up and brake hard when the whistle blows.
- Slalom between cones and reverse in a straight line.
- Parallel parking, with 3 minutes to do it.
I've covered it in detail on the site, with a diagram of the course: the driving test in Maldonado.
Nobody asked about the car's controls or the mirrors. You get in and drive. The examiner has a whole checklist, but it feels like half of it never gets checked.
Then straight out onto the streets, 10–15 minutes with the same examiner: a couple of turns, a yield sign, a roundabout, a traffic light, a PARE sign. Instructions come by voice and gesture: “aquí” and a hand pointing where to go.
8. The license
My wife didn't get her license card (PUNC) on the day of the driving test: there was a long line at the office. She booked a slot on gub.uy for the next day, came in and picked it up. How to collect the card is covered in the step picking up the PUNC.
What it cost
| Medical certificate | 990 pesos |
|---|---|
| Fee (both exams) | ~2,400 pesos |
| Lesson with an instructor on the course | 1,600 pesos |
Without the instructor it came to about 3,400 pesos for us. If you're learning to drive from scratch, most of the money will go to driving school.
If you're in Montevideo
The order is similar, but 15 hours of driving practice are mandatory there, and the fees and addresses are different. The site covers both routes separately: the Montevideo route.