The IRS sets a IRS standard mileage rate for business use each year, and as a self-employed delivery driver working for platforms like DoorDash, Uber Eats, Instacart, Amazon Flex, or Grubhub, you can deduct that rate for every business mile driven — including active deliveries, repositioning drives, supply pickups, and vehicle maintenance trips. The rate applies to sole proprietors filing Schedule C and to single-member LLCs treated as sole proprietorships. This is one of the most valuable and commonly overlooked deductions available to gig delivery drivers, and using it correctly can reduce your taxable income by thousands of dollars each year.

Yes. Miles driven from the moment you accept an order to the moment you complete the customer drop-off are fully deductible at the current IRS standard mileage rate. This includes driving from your current location to the restaurant or store, and then from the pickup point to the customer's address. Batched orders, multi-stop deliveries, and same-day surge shifts all qualify. The IRS requires a contemporaneous mileage log documenting the date, destination, business purpose, and miles driven for each trip. A GPS tracking app like Everlance handles all of this automatically.

Yes. Miles driven while repositioning between orders, driving toward a surge zone, or traveling to a better-performing delivery area are considered ordinary and necessary business expenses and qualify for the standard mileage deduction. These are sometimes called deadhead miles or gap miles. As long as the primary purpose of the drive is business-related movement in service of your delivery operation, those miles are deductible at the current IRS standard mileage rate. Log the trip with a note such as "driving to downtown surge zone for Uber Eats" and you're covered.

The average full-time food delivery driver logs between 20,000 and 35,000 business miles per year, depending on the platform, delivery frequency, and market geography. At the current IRS mileage rate, that translates to a significant total deduction depending on miles driven. At a 22% federal tax rate, the federal tax savings alone can be significant, plus any applicable state tax savings. Multi-platform drivers who work for DoorDash, Uber Eats, and Instacart simultaneously tend to accumulate mileage at the higher end of this range. Part-time or single-platform drivers typically fall at the lower end. Every mile you fail to track is money you're handing back to the IRS.

Yes. Driving to purchase or return delivery supplies — insulated bags, phone mounts, portable chargers, car organizers, or any equipment that supports your delivery operation — qualifies as deductible business mileage. This includes trips to big-box stores, wholesale suppliers, or online order pickup locations when the purchase is for your delivery work. Keep a log noting the date, the store or vendor you visited, the purpose (e.g., "supply purchase for Instacart deliveries"), and the miles driven. Everlance auto-captures all of this via GPS and lets you add a note to each trip in seconds directly from your phone — no spreadsheets required.

Commuting from your home to a fixed commercial warehouse, fulfillment center, or staging area you report to regularly does not qualify as deductible mileage — the IRS treats this as a personal commute, the same as any employee driving to a fixed workplace. Personal errands run during a business trip also do not qualify for the portion of the drive that is personal. If you have a legitimate home office that qualifies under IRS rules, however, travel from your home directly to a pickup location or customer drop-off is generally deductible. It's also worth noting that meals and entertainment expenses are separate deductions subject to different rules and limits, and should not be included in your mileage log.

Yes, absolutely. The IRS requires contemporaneous records for mileage deductions. This means you must log each trip at or near the time it happens — not reconstruct them weeks or months later at tax time. Your log must include the date, starting and ending location, business purpose, and total miles for every trip. Without these records, your entire mileage deduction can be disallowed in an audit, even if the trips were 100% legitimate. A mileage tracking app like Everlance automatically captures all of this data using GPS the moment your vehicle starts moving. At year-end, you can generate a complete IRS-compliant mileage report in PDF or Excel format — ready to hand directly to your accountant or attach to your tax return.

Most food delivery drivers benefit more from the standard mileage rate because it requires significantly less record-keeping and typically produces a larger deduction than tracking actual gas, insurance, depreciation, and maintenance costs individually. The actual expense method can sometimes yield a higher deduction for drivers who use an expensive vehicle with high operating costs, but the administrative burden is considerably greater. There is one critical rule to know: you must choose the standard mileage method in the first year you use a vehicle for business. If you choose actual expenses first, you generally cannot switch back to the standard mileage rate for that vehicle in future years. When in doubt, consult your tax professional in the first year to choose the method that makes the most sense for your situation.