Passing law — Delaware Permit Test
Passing law on the Delaware permit test — 2 rules, each with the reason behind it and a question on it while it is fresh.
The rules
Delaware law says a vehicle may pass another on the left only at a safe distance, and may return to the right only when safely clear.
A driver who cuts back in too soon clips the front bumper of the car just passed.
Delaware law states that vehicles shall overtake other vehicles on the left only when at a safe distance and then only shall return to the right when safely clear.
In Delaware a vehicle being passed must keep to the right and must not speed up until the other vehicle has fully passed.
A driver who speeds up while being passed traps the other car in the oncoming lane.
Vehicles being overtaken shall give way to the right and not increase their speed until fully overtaken.
On the test
Under Delaware law, when may a passing driver move back to the right?
When safely clear of the passed car. A driver who cuts back in too soon clips the front bumper of the car just passed. Delaware Driver Manual, p.81: “Delaware law states that vehicles shall overtake other vehicles on the left only when at a safe distance and then only shall return to the right when safely clear.”
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 Delaware Driver Manual, published by the Delaware Division of Motor Vehicles, and against the state code itself. Last checked 2026-10-05.
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/DE.pdf (Delaware Driver Manual, July 2026, Delaware Division of Motor Vehicles, retrieved 2026-09-14; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/DE.pages.txt (scripts/de-text.sh: plain pdftotext cropped to keep the section tab out, physical 47 under -layout; the fixture every citation here was cut from and verified against; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/DE-exam.html (Delaware Division of Motor Vehicles, Driver's License Exam, https://dmv.de.gov/DriverServices/drivers_license/index.shtml?dc=dr_lic_written, read 2026-10-05; states both exam figures; sha256 pinned under examSource)
- https://dmv.de.gov/menu/forms_manuals.shtml (read 2026-10-05; links the manual)
- https://dmv.de.gov/DriverServices/faqs/index.shtml?dc=dr_faq_general (read 2026-10-05; its 30 and 24 are the exam page's figures before 2024-12, per the Internet Archive)