Hawick is a market town in the Scottish Borders, known for its rolling hills, river valleys, and tight-knit town centre. The roads here reflect its setting — a mix of narrow streets, older buildings, and quieter residential areas transitioning into more open country lanes. For learner drivers, Hawick offers a balanced testing ground of both town driving and rural stretches. During your driving test in Hawick, the route will often start in residential zones, where you’ll deal with parked cars, junctions, and narrow roads that demand careful observation and precise control. As you progress, the examiner may take you through the town centre, where crossings, junctions, and potentially busier streets test your decision-making, signalling, and positioning. Later in the route, you might be taken out toward the countryside, navigating bends, varying road widths, and less‑trafficked lanes where anticipation and smooth speed control are key. You’ll be asked to perform one of the standard manoeuvres—bay parking (forwards or reverse), parallel parking, or pulling up on the right, reversing, then rejoining traffic. These are typically placed in quieter parts of the route so you can demonstrate accuracy, mirror checks, and safe control. On more open parts of the drive, the examiner will watch how you merge, maintain speed appropriate for the road, judge gaps, and adapt to changing road conditions. Passing your driving test in Hawick shows you’re capable of handling both tight urban streets and rural lanes with confidence. With regular practice, good awareness of your surroundings, and a calm mindset on test day, you’ll be in excellent shape to earn your licence and enjoy exploring both the town and the scenic Borders beyond.
Burnfoot Community Hub 89 Brunfoot Road Hawick Scottish Borders TD9 8EJ
Male only toilets available
Car, ADI part 3
Arrangements will be made at this test centre if you have a disability
Please park in the bays dedicated for driving test candidates then wait in Reception.
0300 200 1122
Check out the gov.uk – ‘book your driving test’ service for availability.
You can download test routes for your mobile device or Sat Nav. Our test routes are available in .GPX file format and are compatible with popular navigation apps such as TomTom Go App, available for both iPhone and Android, as well as TomTom, Garmin, Navigon, and CoPilot Live SatNav systems, Download Driving Test Routes. The most cost-effective option is to use the TomTom Go App on your mobile phone with a phone holder. Our guide on how to use the TomTom Go App makes it easy to navigate the test routes and ace your driving test. Check out our guide on how to use TomTom Go App
This is the day and finally you are ready to take your practical driving test! Of course you will be feeling a little nervous? you don’t need to be, the examiner is just going to be observing you driving safely, and the test is very straight forward and shouldn’t be anything new to you.
On the day of the test you just need to be at a Hawick Test Centre 10 mins before your test, making sure you have your Provisional Driving License with you. The test will be as follows.
20 minutes of general driving, where you’ll be following instructions from the driving test examiner, and will also need to perform one of the following manoeuvres
One “show me” questions covering vehicle controls, this will be asked while you are driving along. (click here)
Once you get back to Hawick driving test centre, you’ll find out if all of your hard work has paid off. The examiner will tell you the result and give you some feedback which will contain any faults you might have accumulated. If you pass, the examiner will also give you a test pass certificate and the opportunity to send off for your new licence then and there. The full test report will be sent to you via the email that you provided when you booked your driving test.
More details can be found Here
If you’re to be a qualified driver in the a test area, be prepared to face a variety of difficult traffic conditions and road types. Whilst the driving examiner isn’t looking to fail you, their job is to make sure that you are actually ready to remove the L plates. As such, they’ll take you through a thorough test to see if you can handle safely all of the challenges Hawick has to offer. With a variety of dual carriageways, residential roads, and congested areas, you’ll also need to be at ease with responding to different speed limits, it is worth practising this well as there are a lot of narrow streets. The test centre is based on an industrial estate area but with many test routes that take you out onto the dual carriageways and these are definitely worth practising. Also, it is worth practising some of the larger roundabouts around the test centre.
Want to be more familiar with Hawick? here are some useful links below.
Having local knowledge of the test area will give you a great advantage when it comes to taking your driving test. The DVSA does not make test routes public however, The test routes available on our site are the knowledge gained from local driving instructors who are able to either sit in on lessons or can track their cars whilst they are out on test. They are all current routes that can be used by the DVSA examiners. Downloading the test routes yourself if you have someone else that you can practise driving with will be a huge advantage and potentially save you a considerable amount of money and possibly speed up the time it will take to pass your test.
We are so confident in the quality of our test routes we always offer a free sample of one of the routes for you to take look at and practice before buying the full pack of routes – click HERE for a FREE Hawick Driving Test Route
It can be very upsetting to not pass your driving test, but as you can see from the figures above that quite a few people do not pass their driving test immediately, it may take them several attempts. Don’t be disheartened by this and take the time to do further practise and seek professional advice from an instructor if you feel it is nessasary.
Once you feel ready to take your test you can re-book through the gov.uk – ‘book your driving test’ service additionally, you can use various websites/apps to find earlier cancellation appointments the one we recommend is below.
If you need a new driving instructor try searching for one at Drive Academy – one of the UK’s leading directories of driving instructors