Tax Deductions for Truck Drivers (Owner-Operators)

If you drive a truck for a living, your deductions depend almost entirely on one thing: whether you are an employee or an owner-operator. That single distinction decides whether you can write off your meals, your truck, and your fuel, or none of it. Here is how it breaks down for the 2025 tax year and beyond.

The divide: employee vs owner-operator

A company driver who gets a W-2 generally cannot deduct unreimbursed job expenses at all. The 2017 tax law suspended that write-off for employees, so per diem, gear, and the rest have to come through your employer's reimbursement, not your tax return. An owner-operator, on the other hand, is self-employed and reports income and expenses on Schedule C, then pays the 15.3 percent self-employment tax on the net profit. Everything below assumes you are the owner-operator.

The per diem for meals

Meals on the road are one of the largest deductions, and the per diem method usually beats saving receipts. Drivers subject to the Department of Transportation hours-of-service rules use the special transportation industry rate, which is 80 dollars a day within the continental United States (86 dollars outside it) as of October 1, 2025. Better still, DOT regulated drivers deduct 80 percent of that meal amount instead of the usual 50 percent limit. The days you leave and return are counted at 75 percent. You still need to prove the days you were on the road, but not every meal receipt. Our broader guide to meals and travel deductions covers the general rules.

Writing off the truck

If you own your truck, you recover its cost through depreciation on Form 4562. A tractor is generally three-year property and a trailer five-year property, and you can often accelerate the deduction. Section 179 expensing and 100 percent bonus depreciation, which was made permanent for assets placed in service after January 19, 2025, can let you write off a large share of the cost in year one. If you lease instead, you deduct the lease payments. For the tradeoffs, see Section 179 and bonus depreciation. Note that the standard mileage rate is generally not available for a heavy truck, so big-rig owner-operators use the actual-expense method.

Everything else you can deduct

• Fuel, repairs, maintenance, tires, and oil.
• Truck, cargo, and liability insurance.
• Licenses, permits, IFTA fuel tax, and the heavy highway use tax (Form 2290).
• Your ELD, cell phone, satellite or communications service, and load-board subscriptions.
• Tolls, parking, and scale fees.
• Association dues and accounting or legal fees.

Common mistakes

The most expensive mistake is a company driver assuming they can still write off per diem and gear, which has not been allowed since 2018. After that comes applying the regular 50 percent meal limit instead of the 80 percent DOT rule, and not keeping a log of days on the road, which is what supports the per diem in the first place. If you do local delivery work in a lighter vehicle, our guide on rideshare and delivery driver taxes is the better fit.

How Vuuv helps

Vuuv keeps every fuel stop, repair, permit, and insurance payment categorized so your Schedule C is built as you go, not reconstructed at filing. For drivers who can use the standard mileage rate (lighter local vehicles), the mileage tracker logs business miles automatically. Vuuv does not calculate your DOT per diem for you, that is a tax-prep step, but it keeps the underlying records and days-on-the-road notes that the per diem deduction rests on.

This article is general information, not tax advice. Tax rules change and every situation is different. Confirm the details against current IRS guidance or talk to a qualified tax professional before you file.