You can deduct business mileage on your taxes using the IRS standard mileage rate, which is 72.5 cents per mile for 2026. This deduction is available primarily to self-employed workers, freelancers, and independent contractors. If you drive your personal vehicle for business purposes, the deduction can add up to thousands of dollars in tax savings each year.
Who Qualifies for the Mileage Deduction
The mileage deduction is mainly a self-employment benefit. If you work as a freelancer, gig worker, independent contractor, or sole proprietor, you can deduct business miles on Schedule C when you file your tax return. Farmers report the deduction on Schedule F.
If you’re a W-2 employee, you generally cannot deduct mileage on your federal return. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act suspended the employee business expense deduction through 2025, and that suspension has been extended. There are narrow exceptions: Armed Forces reservists, qualified performing artists, and fee-basis state or local government officials can still claim vehicle expenses using Form 2106.
Beyond business driving, you may also deduct mileage for charitable work at 14 cents per mile and for medical travel at 20.5 cents per mile for 2026. Medical mileage only counts if you itemize deductions and your total medical expenses exceed the adjusted gross income threshold. Active-duty military members (and certain intelligence community members) can deduct moving-related mileage at 20.5 cents per mile.
Which Miles Count as Business Miles
The IRS draws a firm line between commuting and business driving. Your daily trip from home to your regular workplace is commuting, and commuting is never deductible, no matter how far you drive or whether you take calls during the ride.
Business miles include driving from one work location to another during the day, traveling to meet clients or customers, going to a business meeting away from your usual workspace, and driving from home to a temporary work location when you have a regular office elsewhere. If you work at two different locations in a single day, the miles between them are deductible.
For self-employed people who work from a home office, the rules work in your favor. When your home is your principal place of business, trips from home to meet clients or visit job sites are business miles from the first mile. If you have no regular office but typically work within your metro area, you can deduct transportation to temporary work sites outside that metro area.
Standard Mileage Rate vs. Actual Expenses
You have two options for calculating your vehicle deduction: the standard mileage rate or actual expenses. You pick one method per vehicle for the tax year.
The standard mileage rate is simpler. For 2026, you multiply your business miles by 72.5 cents. If you drove 15,000 business miles, your deduction would be $10,875. This rate is designed to cover gas, insurance, depreciation, maintenance, and general wear on the vehicle. You can still deduct parking fees and tolls on top of the standard rate.
The actual expense method requires you to track every cost related to operating your vehicle: gas, oil changes, tires, repairs, insurance, registration, lease payments or depreciation, and any other operating costs. You then calculate what percentage of your total miles were for business and apply that percentage to your total expenses. If 60% of your driving was for business and your total vehicle costs were $12,000, your deduction would be $7,200.
The standard mileage rate tends to work better for people who drive a fuel-efficient or lower-cost vehicle, since the per-mile rate may exceed their real costs. Actual expenses often produce a larger deduction for people who drive expensive vehicles or have high operating costs. There’s one important restriction: if you want to use the standard mileage rate for a vehicle you own, you must choose it in the first year you use that car for business. You can switch to actual expenses in a later year, but you can’t start with actual expenses and switch to the standard rate later.
How to Keep a Mileage Log
The IRS requires “adequate records” to support your mileage deduction, and in practice that means a contemporaneous log, one you keep as you go rather than reconstructing at year-end. For each trip, record four things: the date, the destination (or business purpose), the miles driven, and the business reason for the trip. An entry might look like: “March 12, drove to client meeting at Smith & Co., 24 miles round trip, project consultation.”
You can keep this log in a notebook, a spreadsheet, or a mileage tracking app. Apps that use your phone’s GPS to automatically record trips are the easiest way to stay consistent. Many of them let you swipe to categorize each trip as business or personal at the end of the day. Whatever method you choose, the key is doing it regularly. If you’re ever audited, a detailed log created throughout the year is far more credible than a summary you put together in April.
Record your vehicle’s odometer reading on January 1 and December 31 of each tax year. This gives you total miles for the year, which you’ll need to calculate your business-use percentage. Keep receipts for tolls and parking as well, since those are deductible in addition to your mileage.
Where to Report the Deduction
Self-employed taxpayers report vehicle expenses on Schedule C (Profit or Loss From Business), which flows into your Form 1040. Part IV of Schedule C asks for vehicle information: when you started using the vehicle for business, total miles driven, business miles driven, and whether you have written evidence to support your claim.
If you use the standard mileage rate, the math is straightforward: business miles multiplied by the rate. If you use actual expenses, you’ll need to calculate depreciation separately and may need to file Form 4562 for depreciation and amortization.
The deduction reduces your net self-employment income, which lowers both your income tax and your self-employment tax (the 15.3% tax covering Social Security and Medicare). A $10,000 mileage deduction doesn’t just save you money on income tax. It also reduces the self-employment tax you owe, which makes the effective savings larger than most people expect.
Maximizing Your Deduction
The biggest mistake people make is failing to track miles consistently. A freelance photographer who drives 20,000 business miles in a year could claim a $14,500 deduction at the 2026 rate, but only if the records are there. Even missing a few weeks of logging can cost you hundreds of dollars in lost deductions.
If you use one vehicle for both business and personal driving, keep the categories clean. Personal errands on the way home from a client meeting don’t turn the whole trip into a business drive, and a stop at the grocery store doesn’t disqualify the business portion. Just log the business miles accurately and separately.
Run the numbers both ways each year if you’re using the standard rate. Compare your standard mileage deduction to what your actual expenses would have been. If your car is getting older and repair bills are climbing, actual expenses might produce a bigger write-off. If you’re leasing a new vehicle, the standard rate might come out ahead. Whichever method saves you more is the right one, as long as you’re eligible to use it for that vehicle.