Long story short: I’m (24M) American, and I’m visiting my long-distance Romanian boyfriend for the first time soon. In Romania, most cars are manual - including all the ones owned by my boyfriend’s family (I’ll be staying with them). I’ve never driven a manual before. His dad told me he can give me a quick lesson, and that I’m welcome to use their cars if I want; otherwise, I can rent an automatic. I don’t have access to any manual cars here in the U.S. to practice on, so I’m not sure what to do.
Are you sure you will be allowed to drive a manual car in Romania with your American license if you didn’t take the test with a manual car? I live in a different European country and here if you take the test with an automatic car, you are only allowed to drive automatic cars. You should research this.
It’s definitely different from an automatic car and requires more concentration. Once you get used to it, it’s not difficult. I was older than you are now when I learned to drive at all (which I did on a manual car) and managed it anyway.
Generally you are allowed to drive whatever you could at home. Since US licenses allow you to drive a manual you can drive a manual even if you never had. By contrast if you are from a country that makes the distinction you can’t drive a manual even if you have been practicing (how?) and just need to do the final test to drive a manual. (I’m not sure how someone without a manual endorsement would go about getting it in such countries, but whatever that process is)
I don’t really think there’s any “generally” here: It differs quite a bit between countries. I believe in some countries they won’t allow you to drive a manual unless your license specifies it (i.e. an American license isn’t valid for a manual).
The US doesn’t have licenses differentiated for automatic or manual, well, none of the 8 states I’ve lived in anyway, so there’s no way for Romania to know.
No it’s pretty general. Check out the following international treaties:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Convention_on_Road_Traffic
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Vienna_Convention_on_Road_Traffic
As a benefit of these treaties, if I so chose (and we’re rich) I could even ship my car to Europe and just drive it around (up to 6 months) without really doing anything! It doesn’t need to meet most any of the EU car rules either.
Now if I tried to permanently import it, I’d have to make modifications like light colors and such to make it legal.
But really for visitors the rules are pretty lax. You need an international driving permit which is really just a translated license.
I have my US (state) driver’s license & my IDP, neither which specify manual/automatic, so there’s nothing stopping me from driving a manual legally. In Romania, from what my bf told me, if you pass your test on an automatic you can de jure only drive automatic as you have a marker on your license, but de facto you can drive whatever as there are no actual legal penalties mentioned in the law for driving a manual with a marked license.
You might want to check the details here: I know that in some European countries, you’ll have trouble renting a car at all with an American license unless you pass a driving test in a European country first to get certified. In fact, in several countries I don’t think an American license is valid at all until you pass a test. It’s probably worth checking out the details for Romania.
When I was in Romania last year the rental company (enterprise) wouldn’t accept my US driver license…not sure if it is Romanian law or company policy though.
You also need an IDP: “U.S. citizens who wish to drive in Romania must have an International Driving Permit (IDP) in addition to the valid U.S. state drivers’ license (DL).” https://ro.usembassy.gov/u-s-citizen-services/additional-resources-for-u-s-citizens/driving-in-romania/
Ah missed you said you have your international drivers permit. You’re good then, and there’s a lot of country roads in Romania to learn on…I say give learning manual a shot :)
US licenses don’t differentiate. There’s no way to tell by the license which transmission you used on the test. Shouldn’t be a problem.
For that exact reason some countries (my country included) don’t accept an American license unless you do a test here first.
Though IIRC, that applies for both manuals and automatics, because American drivers education isn’t really trusted here.
With the Geneva convention on Road Traffic they must recognize it, at least for visitors. However you are probably right if OP tried to move there and get a local license, they’d need to retest.