Iceland on a Japanese Licence — Side Switch, IDP & the 4WD-Only F-Roads

Iceland stacks three changes for a Japanese driver, and it’s worth taking them in order. First, the side of the road: Iceland drives on the right, the opposite of home. Your first hour out of Keflavík is the risky one — pulling out of the rental lot, taking a roundabout the wrong way round, glancing the wrong direction at a junction. The empty airport road and open country beyond it are the place to let the new habit settle, not Reykjavík’s streets.

Second, the paperwork, and here the law is specific. Iceland’s driving-licence regulation (830/2011, article 29) says a licence issued outside the EEA must be written in Latin letters or come with a translation into Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish or English — and an international driving permit counts as the licence for this purpose. A Japanese card fails the Latin-letters test, so carry one of the two. Japan’s permit is the 1949 Geneva type and Iceland is a 1949 party, so the permit from a Japanese licensing centre is accepted; arrange it before you leave, because it can’t be issued in Iceland. A non-EEA licence covers you for up to 12 months. Check other combinations with our driving permit checker.

Third, and most consequential, is where you’re actually allowed to drive. Iceland’s interior runs on F-roads — mountain tracks restricted by law to 4WD vehicles. Take a standard hire car onto one and the insurance is void the moment you leave the marked route, and many of these roads ford rivers with no bridge, the classic way a rental is written off. The paved Ring Road is fine for an ordinary car; the highlands need a proper 4WD and a contract that allows it.

There are no motorways here — sealed roads cap at 90 km/h, gravel at 80, and gravel is everywhere. Slow hard at every tarmac-to-gravel seam to keep grip and protect the windscreen. Weather compounds it: wind and whiteouts close roads at short notice even in summer, so check road.is before each leg. Off-road or closed-road driving draws a fine from about ISK 10,000 (around EUR 65).

Alcohol is 0.02, stricter than Japan’s 0.03, and with single-car crashes common, keep it to none. Fuel is steep at roughly $2.15/litre and the emergency number is 112. Read the full rules on our Iceland driving guide before you collect the car.

Sources

• Reglugerð um ökuskírteini nr. 830/2011, article 29 (non-EEA licence valid up to 12 months; must be in Latin letters or accompanied by a translation into Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish or English; an international driving permit counts as a licence): reglugerd.is
• UN Treaty Collection, Convention on Road Traffic, Geneva 1949 (Japan and Iceland parties): treaties.un.org