Instacart mileage deduction in 2026

What Instacart reports, and what it leaves out

Instacart batches show a distance estimate for the delivery portion of the batch. Shopping time is not driving, but the drive to the store is, and it typically isn't in the batch figure. Nor is the drive between a delivery and the next store.

None of this is Instacart doing anything wrong — it reports the miles relevant to paying you. Those are not the same as the miles relevant to your taxes. Publication 463 asks you to substantiate business miles with your own records, and the platform's summary is not that record.

The 2026 split rate, applied

Say you drove 14,000 business miles — 6,000 in the first half of the year and 8,000 in the second:

Applying 72.5¢ to all 14,000 would give $10,150, understating by $280. Run your own numbers.

The rates come from Notice 2026-10 (announced in IR-2025-128) and Announcement 2026-11 (in IRB 2026-29), which applies the revised rate to expenses paid or incurred on or after July 1, 2026.

Which of your miles are deductible

Here is where we decline to give you a confident answer, because the IRS has not published gig-specific guidance and most sites that sound certain are stating an interpretation as if it were a rule.

Not disputed: miles with a passenger or order in the car, and miles from one job to the next you have accepted.

Genuinely contested: miles while online and available with nothing accepted; the drive from home before going online; the drive home at the end. Whether these are business miles or commuting is fact-dependent — it can turn on whether you have a qualifying home office and how you actually operate. Bring it to a tax professional with your log in hand. Fuller discussion on which gig miles count.

What to record

Publication 463 asks for four things per trip: the date, the miles, the destination, and the business purpose — kept at or near the time of the trip. No specific app or format is required; a notebook works. See log requirements.

On your return, car and truck expenses go on Schedule C, Line 9, with vehicle detail in Part IV if you claim the standard rate. Part IV asks you to separate business, commuting and other miles — see reporting on Schedule C.

If you multi-app

Most Instacart shoppers run more than one platform. You keep one mileage log across all of them — the IRS cares about business miles driven, not which app paid for them. Trying to reconcile several platform summaries into a deduction is both harder and less accurate than keeping your own record once.

What the deduction is actually worth

Not 76¢ a mile in cash. A deduction reduces taxable income; its value is roughly your marginal rate plus self-employment tax at 15.3% on 92.35% of net earnings. For most drivers that lands somewhere near 18–29¢ per mile. Still large — on 14,000 miles it is thousands of dollars — but budget for the real number. See why a deduction is not a refund.