What does it actually cost to drive for gig apps?

Every offer quotes gross: what the customer paid, never what the mile cost you. Here are the published numbers for that mile, from the tax service, the motoring association and the energy and environment agencies, so you can price your own car instead of guessing.

• The IRS says a business mile costs 76 cents. That is the tax service’s own all-in figure for fuel, tyres, servicing and the car losing value, and it went up twice in 2026.
• Fuel is the small part. AAA put fuel at 13 cents a mile and depreciation at 28.9 cents: the bill you cannot see is more than twice the one at the pump.
• A new vehicle costs 55.87 to 98.54 cents a mile to own and run, depending on what you drive. Deliveries in a half-ton pickup are paid the same as deliveries in a small sedan.

The tax service’s own number

The IRS standard mileage rate is what the tax service reckons a mile of business driving costs, and it moved twice inside 2026: 72.5 cents for the first half of the year, then 76 cents from July. Claim it and you are claiming fuel, servicing, tyres and depreciation in one line, because that is what it is built to cover.

The rate is optional in your tax return. It is not optional in your maths: the miles cost what they cost whether or not you claim them.

What is inside a mile

AAA has been costing the new car since 1950: nine vehicle categories, five top-selling models in each, 15,000 miles a year. Its 2026 study puts the whole thing at $11,577 a year. Split that into the three lines drivers feel least:

Fuel, priced at this week’s pump

AAA’s 13 cents a mile was worked out on $3.151 a gallon. The pumps did not stay there. US regular averaged $4.354 a gallon in the week of 5 October 2026, and an average new vehicle does 27.2 miles to one. Divide the one by the other and fuel alone is about 16 cents a mile today.

That is the cheap half of the story. It is also the only half most drivers ever count, because fuel is the one cost that arrives as a receipt you can see.

Wear and tear is the part you pay later

Deliveries are hard miles: short hops, cold starts, constant stopping, driveways and kerbs. None of that shows up on the day you drive it. It shows up as the set of tyres, the brake job, the suspension, the service interval arriving early, and the moment a buyer asks how many miles are on it.

That is the 28.9 cents AAA measures for depreciation and the 13 cents it allows for fuel together: the two of them come to more than half of what a small sedan costs to run for a mile. The car is not free because the oil change is not due yet.

What to do with the number

Take 76 cents off whatever an offer pays a mile before you decide whether the offer is worth the drive. A job paying $1.20 a mile that takes you 8 miles out and then 8 miles back is not paying $1.20 for those 16 miles, and the miles home pay nothing at all. Check the arithmetic against your own car: your mileage, your fuel price, your repair bills.