The free driving instructor app: diary, bookings and payments in one place

This is how one day runs with Orbit on your phone.

1. The day before. Each pupil booked for tomorrow gets an email reminder 24 hours ahead, and a second one 2 hours before the lesson, plus a push notification if they allow them.
2. Between lessons. You open the diary and see the day colour-coded by status: paid up, owes, completed or still needing an outcome. Moving a lesson is a drag, and the pupil's record follows.
3. A late cancellation. A pupil drops tomorrow's 9am inside your notice period. Orbit charges your cancellation fee to their saved card, and you post the freed hour as a gap slot and email your waiting list about it.
4. After the last lesson. You photograph the fuel receipt and log the day's miles against the lessons already in the diary.
5. That evening. A new learner opens your booking page, picks a slot and pays by card. The lesson lands in your diary and the money goes to your own Stripe account.

You get day, week and month views, drag-and-drop to move lessons, and recurring working hours with days blocked off for holidays. Your booking page only offers slots inside those hours, so pupils can't book you at 6am on a Sunday.

Lesson types are yours to set: a name, a length and a price for each, such as a 2-hour standard lesson, a test-day lesson or a block of ten. Block credit comes off lesson by lesson, so you can see what each pupil has left.

Reminders go by email 24 hours and 2 hours before each lesson, and you pick which to send. Pupils who switch on notifications get a push as well. There is no SMS. If you live in Google Calendar or Apple Calendar, subscribe to your private Orbit feed and your lessons show there too. More on the driving instructor diary and calendar.

Each instructor gets a booking page to share. Pupils pick an open slot and pay by card at checkout, and the payment goes to your own Stripe account, not a pooled one. Online bookings switch on once Stripe is connected and you have set a lesson price. Cash and bank transfer payments can still be recorded by hand.

Learners use the same app from their side. In the pupil portal they see upcoming lessons, book your free slots, pay a balance, follow their progress against the DVSA syllabus and keep a reflective log, which makes Orbit a driving lessons app for your pupils as well as a diary for you.

See how online booking for driving instructors and card payments work in detail, or read our guide to taking driving lesson bookings online.

You set the notice period in hours and the fee. If a pupil cancels inside it, Orbit charges the fee to their saved card, so you are not the one asking for the money. With no saved card, the fee shows as outstanding for you to collect or waive. Our article on whether ADI cancellation fees are enforceable covers how to word the policy so it stands up.

When the diary is full, new enquiries can join your waiting list from the booking page. If a pupil cancels through their portal, the first person on the list is emailed that a slot has opened.

For any free time, post a gap slot. It shows on your booking page and in your pupils' portals, you can email the whole waiting list about it, and the first learner to claim it gets the lesson.

Card payments are recorded as income the moment they are made. Expenses go in with a photo of the receipt, under categories built for instructors: fuel, insurance, dual controls, maintenance, phone and CPD. Mileage can be logged against the lessons in your diary, so business miles tie back to the lessons you taught. Through the year you can watch an estimate of your tax bill build, and pull a tax-year summary of income, expenses and mileage whenever you need one. Our list of driving instructor expenses you can claim goes through the categories.

Making Tax Digital for Income Tax is already here for some instructors. According to HMRC's guidance, sole traders with qualifying income over £50,000 in 2024 to 2025 should have started from 6 April 2026. The threshold drops to £30,000 (2025 to 2026 income) from 6 April 2027 and £20,000 (2026 to 2027 income) from 6 April 2028.

Where Orbit stands today: it is built on HMRC's MTD for Income Tax API and is completing HMRC's software recognition process; live submissions open once HMRC approves it. If you are already in MTD, use software from HMRC's list of compatible software for your submissions until then. More on Making Tax Digital in Orbit and in our MTD guide for driving instructors.

It is one account and one diary on all of them. Add a lesson on the laptop at home and it is on your phone when you get in the car.

Orbit makes its money from a booking fee that learners pay when they book or pay online by card. It is the greater of £2.99 or 4% of the payment, added on top of your price, so it never comes out of your payout.

• A £40 lesson paid online: the learner pays £42.99 (4% would be £1.60, so the £2.99 minimum applies).
• A £350 block of ten paid online: the learner pays £364 (4% is £14).
• No fee on cash or bank transfers you record, on lessons taken from block credit already paid for, or on cancellation fees.

One optional extra: if you switch on your profile in Orbit's instructor search and a new pupil books you through it, a one-off £30 introduction fee comes out of their first payment. Nothing on their later lessons and nothing on pupils you bring yourself.

For comparison, as of October 2026 Total Drive's pricing page lists its Basic plan at £18 a month including VAT for one instructor (£14 a month paid annually), with online booking in the £23 Ultimate plan. Our Orbit and Total Drive comparison goes feature by feature, and our roundup of the best ADI software in the UK for 2026 covers the rest of the market. Running more than one car? Driving schools are on per-seat pricing.