Year-End Mileage Checklist: Close Out Your Log Before January 1

A mileage log is easiest to finish while the year is still fresh: the calendar still makes sense, the unclassified drives are weeks old rather than months, and the receipts have not gone anywhere. December is the cheapest moment to close out the year — and the only moment to capture one number the IRS asks for.

1. Classify every drive

An unclassified drive is a deduction you have not claimed. Work through the backlog while you still remember which Tuesday was the client visit. In Mile, swipe through them on the phone, or open Mile on the web and clear a month at a time with the keyboard (B for business, P for personal).

2. Bring in the drives from before you started

If you started tracking partway through the year, the months before still count — they just need a record. Two sources usually cover most of the gap:

• A CSV from your previous mileage app. Mile recognizes exports from MileIQ, Everlance and Driversnote, and maps a spreadsheet's columns for anything else. Every row is previewed before it is added, and duplicates are skipped.
• Google Maps Timeline. If Timeline was on, your phone may remember drives you never logged. Pick the business ones and Mile adds them with the distance worked out.

Anything else can be reconstructed from real evidence — calendars, invoices and delivery history — and typed in by hand.

3. Check the drives that are easy to get wrong

• Commutes. Home to your regular workplace is personal. Here is where the line falls.
• Tolls and parking on business trips are deductible on top of the mileage rate. Add them to the drive.
• Medical and charity miles have their own rates and their own rules — who can claim them.

4. Write down the odometer on January 1

Schedule C asks for the total miles each vehicle drove in the year, split into business, commuting and other. The simplest way to answer is two odometer readings: one on January 1 and one on the next. Take a photo of the dashboard on New Year's Day and add the reading to the vehicle in Mile. It takes ten seconds, and it is the one number you cannot reconstruct later.

5. Save the year report

Once the year is complete, save Mile's year report: every business drive with its date, purpose, miles and rate, with totals by purpose and vehicle. Export it as a PDF or CSV (Premium), or have Mile email it to you or your preparer. 2026 is a split year — drives are valued at 72.5 cents through June 30 and 76 cents from July 1 — and the report applies the right rate to each drive automatically.

6. Set up next year so it logs itself

The best year-end checklist is a short one. With automatic tracking on and a work-hours rule set, most drives arrive classified, and next December is a five-minute review.

This article is general information, not tax advice. Your tax professional has the final word on your return.