Blackburn with Darwen test centre: 46.6% pass rate, £390 to get through it.

Blackburn with Darwen is a high-volume centre, putting 12,205 candidates through the car practical test in 2025/26. 5,688 passed, so the centre finished the year on 46.6% and 243rd of 308 nationally, 23rd of 31 within North West.

That is 3.4 percentage points below the 50.03% national figure, and 2.4 points below the 49.0% average for North West. Low pass rates cluster where test routes carry heavy traffic, multi-lane junctions and frequent bus lanes. The examiners are not stricter; the roads give a candidate more chances to make a serious fault.

Turn 46.6% into money. One divided by the pass rate gives 2.15 expected attempts before a first pass, so the average candidate at Blackburn with Darwen pays the £62 weekday DVSA fee about 2.15 times, or £133. Add 1.15 expected retakes at 7 hours of extra tuition each, charged at the North West rate of £32 an hour, and the extra lessons come to £257. The test cycle at Blackburn with Darwen is therefore about £390. Testing here therefore costs about £42 more than the same candidate would spend at a centre sitting on the 50.03% national average, purely because of the extra attempt the pass rate implies.

Waiting time at Blackburn with Darwen ran to a median 8.6 weeks between booking and test in July 2026, 3.3 weeks below the 11.9-week national median. Across 1.15 expected retakes that is roughly 9.9 weeks of extra queueing before a licence arrives. In the same month DVSA offered 3,003 standard slots inside the booking window here and 4.9% of them were still free to book.

The first-attempt picture is harder here than the headline. 5,073 candidates sat their first test at Blackburn with Darwen and 2,309 passed, 45.5%, which is 1.1 points below the all-attempts rate. 101 of those first tests were passed with no driving faults recorded at all, 1.99% of them. Budget for the second booking from the start rather than treating it as the exception.

The pass rate at Blackburn with Darwen has held flat since 2021/22, moving from 46.1% to 46.6%. Test volume has grown over the same span, from 5,094 to 12,205 tests a year. A stable rate is the useful kind for planning, because it means this year's figure is a fair guide to next year's odds.

Male candidates passed at 48.2% and female candidates at 44.6%, a gap of 3.6 points across 6,726 and 5,479 tests. Automatic tests accounted for 27.5% of the 12,205 tests and passed at 45.7%, close enough to the overall rate that gearbox choice is a comfort decision here, not a pass-rate one. Month to month the rate ran from 44.4% in September 2025 to 49.2% in April 2025, a 4.8-point swing that shows how little a single month proves.

Among centres of a similar size in North West, Bolton (Manchester) runs 5.2 points higher at 51.8%. On the same arithmetic that is roughly £62 of expected difference. Before moving, price the switch: a new instructor or extra travel for route familiarity typically costs £60 to £120 plus two settling-in lessons, which eats most of a gap under about eight points.