Buyer's guide
Driving instructor diary apps compared
Ignore the feature lists for a moment. A diary app earns its keep on five things: whether pupils can book themselves, whether it catches double bookings, whether it reaches your phone, how fast you can fill a cancellation, and what it takes from your lesson money. Here is how the UK apps compare on exactly those.
The short answer
Passly is the strongest all-round diary for most UK instructors at £14.99 a month: recurring lessons, working hours, conflict detection, a calendar feed to your phone, one-tap gap filling and self-service booking from your real availability, with none of it held back for a higher tier.
One clear exception. Total Drive is the only UK instructor app with a genuine offline mode. If you teach where the signal drops, that beats everything else on this page, and you should buy it instead. Passly is a cloud diary: changes save instantly and your pupils always see the current version, but you need a connection to make them.
Diary features, compared
The right-hand column summarises the rest of the UK market and names the specific product wherever they differ from each other.
| Feature | Passly | Other UK diary apps |
|---|---|---|
| The diary itself | ||
| Cloud diary on web and mobile | Yes | Yes |
| Recurring lessons (weekly / fortnightly) | Yes | Yes |
| Working hours and unavailability | Yes | Yes |
| Double-booking and conflict detection | Yes | Varies, rarely advertised |
| Pick-up and drop-off locations per lesson | Yes | Common |
| Works with no internet connection | — | Total Drive only |
| Keeping the diary full | ||
| Pupils book themselves from real availability | Yes, on every plan | Total Drive: upper tiers only |
| Offer a cancelled slot to your pupils in one tap | Yes | Total Drive (higher tiers), GoRoadie |
| Embeddable booking widget for your own site | Yes | Rare |
| Free marketplace listing that sends you enquiries | Yes | GoRoadie charges per pupil |
| Getting the diary onto your phone | ||
| Calendar feed to Google and Apple Calendar | Yes | Yes |
| Two-way sync with an external calendar | One-way feed | Total Drive, MyDriveTime |
| Native iOS app | In App Store review | Yes |
| Automatic lesson reminders included free | Email, in-app and push | Varies, some charge per SMS |
| SMS text reminders | — | Total Drive 4p each, GoRoadie free |
| What the diary costs | ||
| Monthly price for one instructor | £14.99, everything included | Free to £26 |
| Free trial | 14 days | 30 to 60 days |
| Fee on lesson payments | 1.5% flat, published | 0% to 25%, often unpublished |
| Self-serve CSV export at any time | Yes | Varies, check before signing |
Passly publishes this table and sells one of the products in it. Compiled from each vendor's published feature and pricing pages, checked 26 July 2026.
The feature that actually saves you time
Every app on this list will store a lesson. The difference is whether you have to be the one to enter it. Self-service booking, where a pupil picks from your real availability and the lesson appears in your diary already conflict-checked, is what removes the evening texts and the Sunday night rescheduling. In Passly it is on every plan. In Total Drive it arrives on the upper tiers, which changes the real price comparison considerably.
Read more on how online booking works, including the booking rules you can set so pupils cannot book at 6am on a Sunday.
Cancellations are where a diary pays for itself
A cancelled hour is money gone unless something fills it fast. Passly lets you offer the slot to your pupils in one tap: they get a push notification and the first to claim it takes it. Total Drive has a comparable tool on its higher tiers and GoRoadie has a fill-nearby feature. One recovered lesson a month at £38 more than covers a £14.99 subscription, which makes this the highest-return feature on the page for most instructors.
Feed or sync: a real difference worth checking
Passly publishes a one-way calendar feed you subscribe to in Google or Apple Calendar, so your lessons appear on your phone alongside everything else. Total Drive and MyDriveTime offer two-way sync, where changes made in your external calendar flow back into the diary. If you keep personal commitments in Google Calendar and expect them to block out lesson slots automatically, two-way sync is the better fit and Passly does not do it today.
Driving instructor diary questions
What is the best driving instructor diary app?
For a diary you never have to think about, Passly at £14.99 a month: recurring lessons, working hours, conflict detection across the whole school, a calendar feed to your phone, one-tap gap filling and pupils booking themselves from your real availability, all included with no tier to upgrade to. Total Drive is the better diary if you regularly teach where there is no signal, because it is the only one here that works fully offline.
Which driving instructor diary works offline?
Total Drive is the only mainstream UK instructor app with a genuine offline mode: it stores the diary locally and syncs when you reconnect. Passly, MyDriveTime and GoRoadie are cloud diaries, which means every change is saved instantly and your pupils always see the current version, but you need a connection to make changes. If you teach in rural areas with patchy coverage, this is the single most important difference on this page.
Can pupils book into my diary themselves?
In Passly, yes, on every plan: pupils see your real availability, book, and the lesson lands in your diary with conflict checking applied. In Total Drive, online booking sits on the upper tiers rather than the entry plan, so budget for the tier that includes it. Check this specifically, because self-service booking is the feature that removes most of the evening admin and it is frequently the one held back for an upsell.
Do driving instructor diaries sync with Google Calendar?
Most offer some form of calendar integration, but there is an important difference between a feed and a sync. Passly publishes a one-way calendar feed you subscribe to in Google or Apple Calendar, so lessons appear on your phone automatically. Total Drive and MyDriveTime offer two-way sync, meaning changes made in your external calendar flow back. If you manage personal commitments in Google Calendar and want them to block your lesson diary, two-way sync is worth having.
How do I fill a cancelled driving lesson?
Passly lets you advertise the empty slot to your pupils in one tap: they get a push notification and the first to claim it books it. Total Drive has a comparable tool on its higher tiers, and GoRoadie has a fill-nearby-slots feature. If your cancellation rate is meaningful, this feature pays for a subscription on its own: one recovered £38 lesson a month more than covers a £14.99 plan.
Sources and how we checked
This page compares the diary specifically, rather than whole platforms: how lessons are scheduled, how the diary stays full, how it reaches your phone, and what it costs. The competitor column summarises the UK market (Total Drive, MyDriveTime, GoRoadie Pro and ADI Network) and names the individual product wherever they differ, because a single merged column would hide the differences that matter. For a product-by-product breakdown, read the full driving instructor apps guide.
- Total Drive diary features and pricing checked
- MyDriveTime calendar sync and pricing checked
- GoRoadie Pro diary features, reminders and fees checked
- ADI Network free diary app checked
- Passly lesson calendar and diary checked
Passly publishes this comparison and sells one of the products in it. Prices and features change: if you spot something out of date, tell us and we will correct it.
Try it yourself
A diary that fills itself
Pupils book from your real availability, cancellations get offered out in one tap, and the whole week lands on your phone. £14.99 a month, 14 days free.