Passing steps — Alaska Permit Test
Passing steps on the Alaska permit test — 5 rules, each with the reason behind it and a question on it while it is fresh.
The rules
Before passing, stay well back from the vehicle ahead for better sight distance and check your mirror.
Hanging back gives you a view past the vehicle ahead, so you can see what is coming.
Stay well back from vehicle ahead for better sight distance.
Before passing, check well ahead for a no passing zone and oncoming vehicles, and do not swing out across the center line for a look.
Poking your car across the center line puts it in the lane of oncoming traffic.
Do not swing out across center line for a look.
Sound your horn to warn the driver ahead that you intend to pass.
A driver who knows you are passing will not drift left or turn into you.
Sound your horn to warn the driver ahead of your intention to pass.
When passing, pass on the left at a safe distance and do not return to the right lane until you are safely clear of the vehicle you passed.
Cutting back in too soon clips the front of the car you just passed.
Pass on left at a safe distance and do not return to right lane until safely clear of overtaken vehicle.
After passing, signal right to return to the right lane and be sure to cancel the signal.
Your signal tells the driver you passed what you are doing, and a signal left on misleads everyone after.
Signal right turn to return to right lane. Be sure to cancel signal light.
On the test
Before you pass, why should you stay well back from the vehicle ahead?
For better sight distance. Hanging back gives you a view past the vehicle ahead, so you can see what is coming. Alaska Driver Manual, p.41: “Stay well back from vehicle ahead for better sight distance.”
How this works
Most practice tests hand you a bank of questions and leave the manual somewhere else. This one puts them together.
You read one law and the reason behind it, then answer a question on that law while it is still fresh. Get it right and you move on; get it wrong and you have found the gap while it is cheap to fix, not on the morning of the exam.
Learning one rule at a time, and proving it immediately, is what turns a manual you skimmed into something you actually know — and it makes studying feel like getting somewhere rather than like waiting to find out.
What it costs
- One payment, once — not a subscription. Nothing renews and there is nothing to cancel, for an exam you sit one time.
- Free to start: a 10-question test and the first section of cards. No sign-up and no account.
- Paying opens the rest of the cards, unlimited full-length practice tests, and retests built from exactly the questions you got wrong.
- Every level up to Prepared — 3 tests passed in a row.
- Do the work, fail the real exam, and we refund you.
Where these come from
Every rule here is checked against Alaska Driver Manual, published by the Alaska Department of Administration, and against the state code itself. Last checked 2026-10-04.
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/AK.pdf (Alaska Driver Manual, REV.10/2025, Alaska Division of Motor Vehicles, retrieved 2026-09-14 and re-checked 2026-10-04; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/AK.pages.txt (the plain pdftotext fixture every citation here was cut from and verified against; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- https://dmv.alaska.gov/credential-services/drivermanual/ (read 2026-10-04; links the manual)
- https://dmv.alaska.gov/credential-services/instruction-permit/ (read 2026-10-04; states no count or mark)
- https://dmv.alaska.gov/credential-services/your-first-alaska-drivers-license/ (read 2026-10-04; states no count or mark)
- https://www.akleg.gov/basis/aac.asp?media=print&secStart=2.90.010&secEnd=2.90.990 (2 AAC 90, read 2026-10-04; 2 AAC 90.420(h)(2) sets the knowledge test's retest wait and no figure)