Supervised Drive: A Practical Tool for Better Practice Drives
Passing the knowledge test is one step toward becoming a safe driver. Building good driving habits takes practice on real roads, with a qualified supervisor providing guidance and feedback.
Supervised Drive is a built-in feature of DriveReady™ that helps organize those practice sessions. Select specific skills to observe, record observations during the drive, and review the results with the student afterward. Over time, saved sessions can help identify improving skills and areas that need more practice.
Supervised Drive is included with the applicable one-time provincial app purchase. There is no separate subscription for this feature.
Self-assessment is an important part of learning. Before reviewing the supervisor’s observations, ask the student: “How do you think that went?”
This gives the student an opportunity to reflect on their own driving before hearing someone else’s assessment. Comparing the two perspectives can help identify what went well, what needs work, and what to focus on during the next drive.
What Supervised Drive Does
Think of Supervised Drive as a practice log for the person in the passenger seat, usually a parent or another qualified supervising driver.
Before the drive, select a few skills to observe. During the drive, record how the student performs. Afterward, the student assesses their own drive, and both of you review the results and discuss what to work on next.
Supervised Drive is not a driving simulator, and it cannot determine whether someone is ready for a road test. It provides structure for practice sessions alongside appropriate supervision or professional instruction.
If you’re new to supervising a learner, see our guide to teaching a new driver for information about supervision requirements and the passenger-seat role.
Using It Safely
Your attention belongs on the road and the student. The app comes second. Record an observation only when it is safe to do so. If the moment is not right, skip it.
The app displays a reminder that it is for the coach or parent and should only be checked when safe.
Setting Up a Drive
The Setup screen takes only a few minutes.
Enter the Student’s Name (Optional)
The name appears in the session summary and exported drive log. Leave it blank if you prefer.
Confirm the Pre-Drive Inspection
This step is required before the Start Drive button becomes available. Complete the vehicle inspection, including:
- Walking around the vehicle to check for obstacles or visible damage.
- Checking the tires.
- Adjusting the mirrors and clearing the windows.
- Confirming that seatbelts are fastened.
- Checking the headlights, signals and brake lights.
The app asks you to confirm that you have completed the inspection. It does not inspect the vehicle or verify that these checks have been performed.
Choose Whether to Enable GPS
GPS tracking is optional. When enabled, it provides live speed information and estimates of distance and other driving measurements.
Your device will request location permission. If you decline, you can still use the checklist, self-assessment and debrief without GPS.
After a tracked drive you can review your route. The optional street map is off by default and is explained under Viewing the Route below.
Select Four to Six Skills to Observe
Choose the skills you want to focus on during the drive. Options include:
- Following distance and full stops.
- Shoulder checks and observation.
- Signalling and lane changes.
- Roundabouts.
- Parking manoeuvres.
The app can also suggest skills that need attention based on previous drives and relevant weaknesses identified in recent practice quizzes. This helps make each session more focused on the student’s current learning needs.
During the Drive
Each selected skill has two buttons: a checkmark for Good and a warning symbol for Needs Work. Each tap adds to that skill’s count, allowing you to record multiple observations of the same skill during one drive.
With GPS Enabled
The app can record or estimate:
- Live speed during the drive.
- Distance travelled, average speed and peak speed.
- Hard-braking and rapid-acceleration events.
- The route, which can be reviewed after the drive.
With GPS Disabled
- The app does not record your location for that drive.
- The checklist and self-assessment still work.
- The debrief and progress features remain available.
This is a suitable option for short drives or whenever you prefer not to use location tracking.
Automatic Session Safeguard
To help prevent forgotten sessions from continuing unnecessarily, the app checks for inactivity.
After 30 minutes without a tap, it asks whether you are still on the drive and starts a 60-second countdown. If you do not confirm, the session ends. Selecting Continue resets the inactivity timer.
The 30-minute period is measured from the last recorded app activity, not from the start of the drive.
Self-Assessment and Debrief
When a drive ends, the student is asked one question before seeing the supervisor’s results: “How do you think that went?”
Three response options range from feeling confident about the drive to recognizing that it was challenging and there is still more to learn.
Drives shorter than five minutes skip this question and are excluded from skill-pattern calculations.
What the Debrief Shows
The debrief screen brings together the information recorded during the session:
- The student’s self-assessment and an indication of whether it aligns with the supervisor’s observations.
- Each tracked skill, grouped by area, with a status based on recent qualifying drives.
- GPS information, when available, including distance, average and peak speed, braking and acceleration counts, and a route-view option.
- A link to a relevant practice-quiz weakness, when a tracked skill matches one.
Differences between the student’s assessment and the supervisor’s observations can provide a useful starting point for discussion. Neither agreement nor disagreement proves that an assessment is correct.
Some skills, including following distance and right-of-way decisions, are relevant to both practical driving and knowledge-test preparation. A weakness in one area may be worth discussing in the other.
Understanding the GPS Estimates
GPS measurements are estimates, not precise assessments of driving performance. Their accuracy depends on the device and the quality of the GPS signal. The app indicates when the signal is weak.
Hard-braking and rapid-acceleration events are estimated from changes in speed. GPS cannot determine whether the driver completed a shoulder check, signalled correctly, encountered a road hazard or complied with the posted speed limit.
Use these figures to support a discussion, not as a definitive score of the student’s driving ability.
Viewing the Route
The route view is generated on your device from saved route data. The drawn route does not require a network request. Speed-related colours and markers identify locations where hard braking or rapid acceleration was detected.
You can open the route from the debrief after the drive.
An optional street map can be enabled for additional geographic context. It is off by default and requires confirmation before activation. See the data section below for details about map requests.
Tracking Progress Over Time
One drive provides limited information about a student’s development. Supervised Drive therefore uses observations from multiple sessions to help identify patterns.
A skill needs at least two tracked drives of five minutes or longer before a status is displayed. Based on the student’s recent qualifying drives, the skill is then classified as Strong or Needs Practice, according to how often the supervisor recorded that it needed work.
The Driving Progress screen also displays totals such as driving hours, number of drives and GPS-related measurements. Braking and acceleration trends appear after four GPS-tracked drives of at least two kilometres each.
These indicators are intended to support learning, not guarantee competence. Strong means the skill has been recorded positively in recent drives; it does not mean the skill has been mastered. Trends do not predict whether a student will pass a road test.
The app retains the 20 most recent drives for each province. Progress totals reflect the drives saved in the app.
Exporting a Drive Log
You can export a PDF drive log generated on your device and save or share it as needed. If you share the file, it is sent through the method you choose.
What Happens to the Data?
Optional Street Map
The street map is off by default and asks for your confirmation before it is turned on. If you turn it on, map images for the area being viewed are requested from OpenStreetMap. The OpenStreetMap service can receive your device’s IP address and information about the map area requested.
Your saved GPS points, speeds and drive records are not included in these map-image requests. You can turn the street map off at any time. If a network connection is unavailable, the app can display the drawn route without the street map.
For further information, see the OpenStreetMap Foundation Privacy Policy and the DriveReady™ Privacy Policy.
Sharing a PDF
Sharing is your choice. If you export or share a drive log PDF, the file goes wherever you send it. How it is subsequently stored or used depends on the recipient and the service you use to share it.
The one-time app purchase is verified through Google Play or the Apple App Store. No name, email, location or drive data is part of that check, and the verification process is separate from your saved driving records.
For more information, read the DriveReady™ Privacy Policy.
Bring structure to your next practice drive
Supervised Drive is built into the DriveReady app for your province. Choose your province to see what’s included, or try a free practice test first.
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