K53 learners test 2026: questions, sections, pass mark, time, cost and validity
By The PassPath Team · Updated
Every fact anybody needs about the K53 learners test, with the instrument or publisher it comes from, in one table. Where a fact is gazetted we state it flat and cite the gazette. Where it is only what testing centres report, we say so. Where it is not published, we say that instead of guessing.
Every source on this page was last re-checked on . For Code 2 (car) learners. Motorbike (Code 1) and heavy vehicle (Code 3) aren't covered yet.
The K53 learners test in one table
| Item | What it is | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Questions | 64 in total: 28 on the rules of the road, 28 on road signs, signals and markings, and 8 on the controls of the vehicle. Why you still see 68 | Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446, section 5.4GAZETTED |
| Sections | Three, and each one is marked on its own. There is no combined score. What each section covers | Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446, section 5.4GAZETTED |
| Pass mark | 22 of 28 for the rules of the road, 23 of 28 for road signs, signals and markings, and 6 of 8 for the controls of the vehicle. All three must be cleared. How many you can get wrong | Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446, section 5.4GAZETTED |
| Overall percentage | There is none. The standard sets three section pass marks and no overall figure, so 61 of 64 can still be a fail. The arithmetic, worked | Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446, section 5.4GAZETTED |
| Time | Testing centres report a 60-minute limit. That figure is not in the regulation that sets the section sizes and the pass marks, so it is what centres report and not a rule we can point you at. How the test is marked | Testing centre and municipal pages, read September 2026. Not found in any national instrument.REPORTED |
| Answer options per question | Not published. The question paper is form TLL, and no version of it is published, so we do not know how many options each question carries or how the items are mixed inside a section. What is not published | Form TLL is referred to in the regulations but is not published. We have not read it, and neither has anybody else outside the system.NOT PUBLISHED |
| Your result | The examiner may give you the result and may not discuss the questions and answers with you. You leave with three section scores and no list of what you got wrong. Reading your three scores | Government Notice R.93 of 2006, section 5.3GAZETTED |
| Minimum age | 17 for a light motor vehicle (Code 2). It is 16 for a motorcycle up to 125cc and 18 for anything else. Booking | National Road Traffic Act 93 of 1996, section 15(1)(a)GAZETTED |
| Application form | Form LL1, completed in person at a driving licence testing centre. Booking | National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 103(1)GAZETTED |
| Photographs | Two identical photographs, 40mm long by 30mm wide, head and shoulders, full face, without headgear (with a stated exception for headgear required by your religion). What to take | National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 103(1)GAZETTED |
| Identification | Acceptable identification, plus a medical certificate on form MC if you are 65 or older. What to take | National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 103(1)GAZETTED |
| Eyesight standard | 6/12 in each eye on the Snellen rating, and a visual field of at least 70 degrees temporal in each eye. You may be tested by your own optometrist at your own expense. The eye test | National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 102(1)(a) and 102(2)(a)GAZETTED |
| Cost | The fee is the one determined by the MEC of your province. There is no national figure, and we print none. Fees | National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 103(1) sets who determines the fee. The amounts themselves are provincial and are not published nationally.GAZETTED |
| When you get the licence | On form LL2, within 2 working days of the examiner telling you it will be issued, on payment of the applicable fee. Afterwards | National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 105(1)GAZETTED |
| Validity | 24 months from the day of the test. A Code 2 learner may only drive under the direct supervision of somebody licensed for that class. Afterwards | SA Learner Driver Manual, Part 1, Rules of the Road, Department of Transport, version 1.00, June 2012, section 5OFFICIAL MANUAL |
| What PassPath covers | Code 2, the light motor vehicle licence. Motorbike (Code 1) and heavy vehicle (Code 3) aren't covered yet. Who it is for | A description of our own product.PASSPATH |
Section sizes and pass marks: Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446, section 5.4. Test format based on official statements as at 4 September 2026.
What is not published about this test
The question paper is form TLL. No version of it is published. We have never read one, and we have not found anybody outside the testing system who has. So we cannot tell you how many answer options a question carries, how the items are mixed inside a section, or how the questions are worded. Every site that states an option count is stating something it cannot source.
The fee and the waiting time are the same kind of gap. The fee is set by each province’s MEC and booking is run centre by centre, so there is no national figure to print, and we print none.
The 60-minute limit belongs in this section too, at half strength. Testing centres report it and it is probably what happens in the room. It is not in Government Notice R.93 of 2006, which is the instrument that sets the section sizes and the pass marks, and we have not found it in any other national instrument. So we never print “64 questions, 60 minutes” as one flat fact.
Questions people ask next
Frequently asked questions
Six in the rules of the road, five in road signs, signals and markings, and two in the controls of the vehicle. Those limits are per section and they do not pool: two wrong in controls is your limit even if you got every other question in the test right.
Yes. The three sections are marked separately and all three must be cleared, so missing one section by a single question fails the whole test however well you did on the other two.
No. Government Notice R.93 of 2006 sets three section pass marks and no overall figure. A score of 61 out of 64, which is 95%, is a fail if those three wrong answers were all in the eight-question controls section.
Testing centres report a 60-minute limit. We have not found that figure in the regulation that sets the section sizes and the pass marks, or in any other national instrument, so treat it as what centres report rather than as a rule anybody can point you at.
The question paper is form TLL and it is not published. We have not read it and we have found nobody outside the testing system who has, so we cannot tell you how many options a question carries or how the items are mixed inside a section. Sites that state a number are stating something they cannot source.
17 for a light motor vehicle, which is the Code 2 licence. It is 16 for a motorcycle up to 125cc and 18 for anything else. That is section 15(1)(a) of the National Road Traffic Act 93 of 1996.
Form LL1, two identical photographs 40mm long by 30mm wide, acceptable identification, and the fee your province sets. If you are 65 or older you also need a medical certificate on form MC. The eye test is done at the centre unless you bring a result from your own optometrist.
The fee is determined by the MEC of your province, so it differs by where you write and there is no national figure. No national list is published, so we print no number rather than guess at one.
24 months from the day of the test, per the Department of Transport's own SA Learner Driver Manual. Within that time a Code 2 learner may only drive under the direct supervision of somebody licensed for that class.
You get your three section scores and nothing else: the regulations say the examiner may give you the result and may not discuss the questions and answers with you. You reapply and pay the fee again. Most people fail one section, so the useful next step is to fix that section rather than restudy the whole test.
How we build our questions
Every PassPath K53 question is written from a primary source we hold and have read, and every answer we show carries the part it came from. Here is the whole list, and how it maps onto the three sections of the test.
National Road Traffic Act 93 of 1996
As enacted, Government Gazette 17603, 22 November 1996. The Act behind the rules of the road and the licence itself.
National Road Traffic Regulations 2000
GNR.225, Government Gazette 20963, 17 March 2000, with the amending notices in force. No official free consolidation exists, so ours is assembled notice by notice and dated.
Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446
The testing standard: the section sizes, the pass marks, and what the examiner may and may not tell you.
SA Road Traffic Signs Manual, Volume 1
Department of Transport, digitised May 2012. The definitional authority for every sign, signal and road marking, and the source every one of our sign drawings is drawn from.
SA Learner Driver Manual
Department of Transport, version 1.00, June 2012. The material the state itself tells you to study, in three parts: the rules of the road, road signs, and vehicle controls.
How that maps onto the three sections
- Rules of the road, 28 questions
- The Act and the Regulations first, the learner manual second. Where the manual and the Regulations differ, the Regulations win and we say so on the question.
- Road signs, signals and markings, 28 questions
- The Road Traffic Signs Manual, plus Schedule 1 of the Regulations, which is the legal register of prescribed signs. Every sign in the course is drawn for PassPath from the prescribed design.
- Controls of the vehicle, 8 questions
- Government Notice R.94 of 2006, the K53 volume for light motor vehicles, and the learner manual's controls part. Code 2 only, which is why we do not cover motorbike controls.
Who we are not
PassPath is an independent study tool. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by or accredited by the RTMC, the Department of Transport, or any driving licence testing centre. We hold no inside knowledge of the question bank and we do not claim any. Everything on this page is from documents anybody can read, and we name them so you can.
Where AI is used, and where it is not
We use AI assistance to draft and to cross-check: to search the instruments, to draft explanations, and to check questions against the source they cite. Nothing is published on that basis alone. Every question, explanation and source citation is reviewed by a person before it ships, and the sources above are documents we hold, not summaries an AI produced. Where a fact cannot be traced to one of them, we leave it out and say so.
Where every fact on this page comes from
Each claim, its source, and how strongly we can stand behind it.
64 questions in three sections, section pass marks of 22, 23 and 6, all three to be cleared, and no overall percentage in the standard.
Government Notice R.93 of 2006, Government Gazette 28446, section 5.4, read directly
GAZETTED
The examiner may give you the result and may not discuss the questions and answers with you.
Government Notice R.93 of 2006, section 5.3, read directly
GAZETTED
Age 17 for a light motor vehicle, and the conditions that disqualify an applicant.
National Road Traffic Act 93 of 1996, section 15(1), read directly from the gazetted Act (GG 17603, 22 November 1996)
GAZETTED
Form LL1, two photographs 40mm by 30mm, acceptable identification, form MC at 65 and over, and a fee determined by the provincial MEC.
National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 103(1), read directly
GAZETTED
The 6/12 Snellen standard and the 70 degree temporal visual field, and your right to be tested by your own optometrist.
National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulations 102(1)(a) and 102(2)(a), read directly
GAZETTED
The licence is issued on form LL2 within 2 working days.
National Road Traffic Regulations 2000, regulation 105(1), read directly
GAZETTED
A learner's licence is valid for 24 months, and a Code 2 learner drives only under direct supervision.
OFFICIAL MANUAL
A 60-minute limit on the computerised test.
Stated on testing centre and municipal pages, read September 2026. It is not in Government Notice R.93 of 2006 or in any other national instrument we have read, so it is reported practice and not law.
REPORTED
How many answer options each question carries, and how the items are mixed inside a section.
The question paper is form TLL. No version of it is published, we have never read it, and we have found nobody outside the testing system who has. Every site that states an option count is stating something it cannot source. We print nothing.
NOT PUBLISHED
The fee, and the waiting time for a booking.
Set province by province and centre by centre, with no national publication. We have no source for a national figure, so we print no number.
NOT PUBLISHED
- GAZETTED
- : We read the government notice or regulation itself.
- OFFICIAL MANUAL
- : From the Department of Transport's own learner manuals, the material the state tells you to study. We read them directly.
- REPORTED
- : A government body or a news publisher said it. We have not seen the underlying document.
- NOT PUBLISHED
- : This is not published, so we say so instead of guessing.
Test format based on official statements as at 4 September 2026. These pages cover the K53 learner's licence test for Code 2, a light motor vehicle. PassPath is an independent study tool: it is not affiliated with, endorsed by or accredited by the RTMC, the Department of Transport, or any driving licence testing centre.