General tax education, not tax advice. A preparer can only deduct miles they can substantiate. Publication 463 and Treas. Reg. 1.274-5T want contemporaneous trip records, not a year-end screenshot. Confirm Schedule C Part IV / Form 4562 instructions for the year you file. This page is what to hand a tax professional, not a substitute for one.
Most January emails to a CPA look like this: a DoorDash PDF, an Uber tax summary, and a text that says “about 22,000 miles.” That packet is missing the document the return actually needs — a trip-dated log for the car, with total miles and a 2026 split at June 30.
This is the how-to for assembling that packet. The weekly habit that makes the export boring is how to keep an IRS-ready mileage log. If tracking already lapsed, reconstruction is a different, weaker job: reconstruct a mileage log after the fact. Do not dress a reconstruction up as a contemporaneous export.
The short version: your CPA needs the five IRS fields on each trip, total miles on the vehicle, the business / commuting / other split, and — in 2026 — business miles through June 30 at 72.5¢ and from July 1 at 76¢. Send CSV for the rows and PDF for the file. One physical mile, once, even on multi-app days. A same-year export from a log you kept as you drove is stronger than a February rebuild.
Step 1: Export the five IRS fields on every trip, not a year total
Publication 463’s substantiation list is short. An export that cannot produce these columns is a dashboard, not a log:
- Date of the drive (required in 2026 because the rate flips on July 1)
- Destination or route (first pickup, station, airport lot, client, last drop)
- Business purpose (Uber shift, Flex block, DoorDash, parts for the work car — not just “work”)
- Miles for that trip
- The vehicle those miles belong to (year, make, model; two cars means two logs)
The fifth field is the one app screenshots drop. Schedule C asks which car. If you sold a car in March and bought another in April, the CPA needs two exports and two odometer stories, not one blended year. The field-by-field standard is also in IRS mileage log requirements.
“18,412 business miles” in a notes app is a claim. A CSV with 400 dated rows that add to 18,412 is a log. Examiners and software both start from the rows. Your preparer cannot ethically type a round number onto Part IV because the platform said you were “productive.”
Step 2: Add total vehicle miles and the business, commuting, and other split
Schedule C Part IV (Information on Your Vehicle) and, when required, Form 4562 Part V want more than business miles:
| Box the form asks for | What the export should show | Where the number comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Total miles driven | Year-end odometer minus year-start odometer (or a mid-year sale/purchase pair) | Dated odometer photos, inspection, or repair invoices — not an app guess |
| Business miles | Sum of classified business trips | The log, after commuting and personal are pulled out |
| Commuting miles | Home-to-regular-workplace bookends you did not treat as business | The same log, honestly labeled |
| Other miles | Personal, errands, vacations | Total minus business minus commuting; should not be zero on a mixed-use car |
Business + commuting + other must equal total. If the log claims 16,000 business miles and the odometer only moved 15,200, the export is wrong. Fix it before the CPA sees it. How to keep the bookend photos is the odometer photo log. Where those boxes live on the form is Schedule C car expenses for gig drivers.
Commuting is not a dirty word on the export. A column that shows 1,800 commuting miles and 900 other miles makes the business figure more believable, not less. A file that is 100% business on a family SUV is the file that gets extra questions.
Step 3: Split 2026 at June 30 so 72.5¢ and 76¢ attach to trip dates
Notice 2026-10 and Announcement 2026-11 set two business rates for 2026. The export should make the split obvious:
- Business miles with trip dates January 1–June 30 × 72.5¢
- Business miles with trip dates July 1–December 31 × 76¢
- A Line 9 total that is the sum of those two products, not one blended rate
If your app only prints one annual total, add a two-line cover sheet yourself: first-half miles, second-half miles, each times the matching rate. Do not average 72.5 and 76 and multiply. Do not apply 76¢ to a March trip because you exported in January 2027. The rate follows the road date. The mid-year walkthrough is the July 1 rate increase.
Illustration only, not a promise: 3,200 business miles through June 30 and 4,100 from July 1 is $2,320 + $3,116 = $5,436. Hand the CPA those two counts and the rows. Let them key Line 9. Your job is the split they can trace.
Step 4: Send CSV for the rows, PDF for the packet, plus a year-end checklist
Format is not a religious war. Preparers live in spreadsheets. Clients think in PDFs. Send both when the app allows it.
| File | What it is for | What it is not for |
|---|---|---|
| CSV or .xlsx | Filter by date, purpose, car; pivot the June 30 split; agree to Part IV | A pretty attachment. Keep column headers in row 1. |
| PDF of the same log | Workpapers, client copy, something that still looks like a log if the CSV is opened wrong | The only file, if it is 80 pages of map screenshots with no totals |
| Platform tax summaries (Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Flex) | Gross income and a floor on on-trip miles | A second mileage deduction. Do not add them to the GPS total. |
| Odometer photos (Jan 1 / sale / Dec 31) | The total-miles box | Proof of purpose. Photos do not classify trips. |
Year-end checklist to put in the same email (or portal upload):
- Vehicle year, make, model, and date placed in service
- Standard mileage or actual expenses — one method, named
- Jan 1 and Dec 31 odometer (or in/out readings if you sold or bought mid-year)
- Business / commuting / other miles that add to total
- First-half and second-half business miles for the 2026 rates
- Parking and tolls on work trips, if you are deducting them on top of the rate
- Whether any months were reconstructed instead of logged live
- Whether more than one app ran on the same days (so they do not add platform PDFs)
Do not send a phone screenshot of a pie chart. Do not send five CSVs with overlapping dates and expect the CPA to dedupe them for free. One car, one dated log, extras as supporting files. If you use TaxMiles: Mileage Tracker, export the year from the app rather than retyping. Soft detail: the free plan is 40 trips a month; a full-year gig log usually needs Pro ($5.99/month, $39.99/year, or $79.99 lifetime) so the export is complete.
Step 5: Strip double-counted multi-app miles; do not substitute a reconstruction
If you ran Uber and DoorDash on the same afternoon, the physical mile under the tires is still one mile. Adding Uber’s on-trip total to DoorDash’s on-trip total to Flex “miles offered” is how a 14,000-mile car becomes a 19,000-mile deduction. The CPA will not catch that unless you say you multi-app. The cleanup is how to track mileage across apps without double-counting.
Reconcile this way: GPS log is the deduction. Platform PDFs are income and a reasonableness check. If DoorDash says 6,000 on-trip miles and your business log for those days is 7,200, the extra 1,200 should be deadhead and staging you can describe — not a mystery plug. If the platforms sum to more than the log, you probably double-counted; cut the platforms, not the odometer.
A contemporaneous export (trips classified at or near the drive, then exported in January) is the record Publication 463 is describing. A reconstruction (platform history + Timeline + calendar, assembled after the season ended) is weaker. Both can be honest. They are not the same strength. If part of the year is reconstructed, write that on the cover sheet. Do not relabel a February spreadsheet as a live log. The honest rebuild steps are reconstruct a mileage log after the fact. Cars are listed property; a Cohan-style guess is not an export.
Export rows your CPA can total, not a vibe
TaxMiles: Mileage Tracker timestamps trips and lets you classify them the same day so a year-end CSV still has dates, purpose, and the June 30 split. Not MileIQ. Not Everlance. Not Mileage Tracker for Taxes (id 6758426140). Free plan is 40 trips a month; Pro is $5.99/month, $39.99/year, or $79.99 lifetime.
Download TaxMiles FreeFrequently Asked Questions
What does a CPA need in a mileage log export?
Trip rows with date, route, purpose, and miles; total miles on the car; business / commuting / other; and the 2026 June 30 split. The weekly habit that produces those rows is the IRS-ready log.
Should I send my CPA a CSV or a PDF?
Both. CSV for math, PDF for the file. One vehicle per export. Platform summaries go in the same packet as income support, not as a second mileage number.
How do I show the 2026 mid-year mileage-rate change on the export?
Two business-mile subtotals: through June 30 at 72.5¢, from July 1 at 76¢. Walkthrough: the July rate increase.
What if I also drive Uber, Lyft, or DoorDash?
One GPS log. Do not stack platform mile totals. See multi-app tracking without double-counting.
Is a reconstructed log as good as a year-end export from an app I used all year?
No. Contemporaneous is stronger. Reconstruction is a fallback. If you have to rebuild, follow the reconstruction guide and tell the CPA which months are rebuilt.
Related reading: IRS-ready mileage log, mileage log requirements, odometer photo log, reconstruct after the fact, what counts as a business mile, Schedule C car expenses, multi-app without double-counting, and TaxMiles on the web.
This article is general tax education for U.S. federal Schedule C filers, not legal, tax, or accounting advice and not a guarantee of any deduction. Publication 463, Treas. Reg. 1.274-5T, Schedule C / Form 4562 instructions, and IRS mileage rates can change; read the current IRS forms (Publication 463, Notice 2026-10, and Announcement 2026-11) or work with a licensed professional. TaxMiles: Mileage Tracker (App Store id 6758579463, seller Gigabyte LLC) is not affiliated with the IRS, and is not MileIQ, Everlance, or Mileage Tracker for Taxes (id 6758426140).