Mileage is one of the easiest deductions to claim and one of the most commonly underclaimed. Freelancers drive for work constantly — client meetings, site visits, supply runs, professional events — and most of those miles are deductible.

At the 2026 standard mileage rate of 72.5 cents per mile, even 5,000 business miles is a $3,625 deduction. Here’s how to track them correctly.

What Qualifies as a Business Mile

Not every trip in your car is deductible. The IRS allows deductions for miles driven for legitimate business purposes:

Deductible:

• Driving to meet a client or prospect
• Traveling between work sites or job locations on the same day
• Going to a bank, post office, or supply store for business reasons
• Attending a business conference, networking event, or professional training
• Visiting a co-working space or rented office (if it’s not your principal place of business)

Not deductible:

• Commuting from home to a regular fixed workplace (even your own office)
• Personal errands, even on a day you also did business driving
• Trips that are primarily personal with a small business component

Important exception: If your home office qualifies as your principal place of business, then driving from home to a client site or meeting is deductible — because your business location is home, not a fixed external office. This is why having a qualifying home office is valuable beyond just the home office deduction itself.

The Two Methods for Deducting Vehicle Costs

Standard mileage rate: Multiply your total business miles by the IRS rate (72.5 cents/mile in 2026). This is the simpler approach and works well for most freelancers.

Actual expense method: Track your real vehicle costs — gas, oil, insurance, registration, maintenance, repairs, and depreciation — and deduct the business-use percentage. More recordkeeping, potentially higher deduction if you have an expensive or high-maintenance vehicle.

You must choose a method in the first year you use the vehicle for business. If you start with the standard mileage rate, you can switch to actual expenses later (with some limitations). If you start with actual expenses and use MACRS depreciation, you cannot switch to the standard rate.

For most freelancers, the standard mileage rate is the right call. It’s simpler, requires less documentation, and eliminates the need to track every fuel and repair receipt.

What the IRS Requires: The Mileage Log

Regardless of which method you use, the IRS requires a contemporaneous mileage log — meaning you record trips as they happen, not reconstructed from memory at year-end.

Your mileage log must capture, for each business trip:

• Date of the trip
• Destination (or starting and ending locations)
• Business purpose (e.g., “client meeting with Acme Co.” or “picked up printer supplies”)
• Odometer readings or total miles for the trip

The IRS is clear that reconstruction from memory is not acceptable. A mileage log written in December for the whole year is a red flag in an audit.

How to Actually Track Your Miles

Dedicated mileage tracking app (recommended): Apps that use your phone’s GPS to automatically detect and log drives are the gold standard. They capture start/end points, calculate mileage, and let you swipe to classify trips as business or personal. The log is always current and the output is IRS-ready.

Spreadsheet or notebook: The manual approach. Record each trip when it happens: date, destination, purpose, odometer start and end. Works fine if you do it consistently — the discipline is the hard part.

Odometer photos: Some freelancers photograph their odometer at the start and end of each year as a backup verification of total annual mileage. This doesn’t replace a trip-by-trip log but adds a layer of corroboration.

Calendar + GPS reconstruction (limited): If you missed logging some trips, you can partially reconstruct from your calendar appointments and phone location history. But this is a workaround, not a system — and it won’t hold up if your records are consistently reconstructed.

Don’t Forget These Easily Missed Miles

• Driving to the bank to deposit a client check
• A trip to a coffee shop for a client meeting
• Driving to a FedEx or UPS store to ship work materials
• Commuting to a temporary job site (different from your regular workplace)
• Driving to pick up office supplies

Small trips add up. A few miles here and there across 52 weeks can easily be 500–1,000 miles you’d otherwise miss.

Keeping Records for Audit Protection

Keep your mileage log for at least three years after filing (six to be conservative). Digital logs in an app are easy to export and store. If you use a paper log, photograph or scan it.

If you’re audited on vehicle expenses, the IRS will ask for your mileage log. An accurate, contemporaneous log is your best defense.

numlr tracks your business mileage automatically, logging drives in the background so you never have to remember to open an app. Every trip is timestamped and stored, your log is always current, and your deduction is always accurate. Try numlr free.