Anyone learn to drive here recently? As a foreigner, do you need your passport to get a driver's license?

[soundofsilver]

To be clear: I have a passport but it runs out in July next year. So, I'd like to renew it, but I've also just joined a driving school in Kanagawa. To renew my passport, I need to send it back to the UK and may be without it for up to three months.

In the sign up process to join the school, all I needed was a photo ID (passport, zairyu card, or MyNumber were all acceptable), but I am just wondering if I will need my passport when I eventually apply for the provisional (仮運転免許) and (hopefully) full driver's license in a few months time.

I will ask at the driving school as well but the staff there seem pretty overworked and a bit dismissive when it comes to questions. I am just curious if anyone could answer based on personal experience. Not sure it makes any difference, but I am from the UK, am employed, and have permanent residence.

Thanks!

[goran]

Got my license earlier this year. （around February/March)
I was not asked for my passport at any stage. Only the residence card.

[captainspoke]

As above, just did my renewal, no passport needed.

BUT, if you are getting an international driver's permit, separately or at the same time as a renewal, you do need your passport.

At my renewal I realized the IDP window was right there, so I asked if I could also get one, and their first question was, "Do you have your passport?"

I didn't, and while they did say that I could fax them a copy of the data pages later, I skipped it and will go back again another time.

[soundofsilver]

Thanks a lot. Good to know!

Also, I just found this link for applying for an IDP in Kanagawa and it says similar to what you said, captainspoke. You need a:

A document that shows you are going abroad (such as a passport, receipt of passport application, sailor's passport, etc.)
https://www.police.pref.kanagawa.jp/eng ... g83008.pdf

[Gareth]

To renew my passport, I need to send it back to the UK and may be without it for up to three months.

Just to add recent U.K. passport renewal experience in case it’s useful, I did mine in September. Got my new passport just under 4 weeks later and my old one back a few days after that. The actual processing time from the old passport arriving at the Passport Office to a new one being sent off was under 2 weeks so if the postage gods are with you, it should be well under 3 months.

All the best with it!

[soundofsilver]

Ah, good to know! Thank you!