Good parallel parking must achieve three things
1) The car should not touch the kerb during the reverse maneuver. No “feeling the bump” or scraping.
2) You should not have to move forward to adjust the positioning.
3) The car should be not more 6–8 inches away from the kerb once parked.

So, how to achieve this? Follow this step-by-step process. (Needless to say, you need to practice this at least 20 times before you can master it.)

1. Find an empty space that’s at least 1.5X your car’s length. A common rookie mistake is to choose a spot that’s shorter than this, which means neither can you park easily, nor the other cars can pull out without scraping yours.
2. Switch on your hazard lights. This will indicate to the car behind that you are planning some sort of maneuver and that they should hang back and give you the space.
3. In some countries like India, the drivers behind you may get impatient and put pressure from behind. To discourage them, slow down well in advance of the spot you have to stop at.
4. Don’t rush anything. That is the enemy of good parallel parking.
5. Stop parallel to the car in front of your chosen space. Give no more than 2 feet between the two cars. I have found the ideal position is when your back wheel is side-by-side with their boot.
6. Engage full-lock on your steering wheel. (Left if you drive on the left side of the road, right for right)
7. Do a 360-degree check very quickly to ensure nobody is on your reversing path.
8. Start backing up, holding the full-lock. Don’t adjust the steering wheel while you move. SLOWLY
9. Now concentrate on the driver’s side mirror.
10. Look for the number plate of the car right behind your chosen spot. Soon it will come into the view of your mirror.
11. Continue to move until 3/4th of the number plate comes into view. Stop once it does.
12. Now straighten the steering wheel. You are roughly diagonal to the space at this point.
13. Back up straight. Don’t turn the wheel yet or your bonnet will end up hitting the boot of the car ahead.
14. Now look at both side mirrors alternatively. Look into the driver’s side mirror to see if your backwheel has gone deep enough to be in line with the car behind. Look into the passenger side mirror to get a sense of how close you are close to the kerb. You can lower the passenger side mirror to show your wheel if you want. (But remember to set it back to usual once you are done).
15. If watching both mirrors becomes stressful, then focus only on the driver’s mirror. Since the car behind has already parked, you will be OK as long as your backwheel doesn’t overshoot.
16. Once your backwheel is at the same level as the driver-side edge of the car behind, stop.
17. Now, put the steering wheel on the opposite lock. Turn fully to the right (if you drive on the left side of the road) and hold it.
18. Move slowly. the front of the car will swing into position.
19. As soon as your car is on the same axis as the car in front, stop. You have completed the parallel parking.
20. One caveat: Be careful about using the cars in front and behind to judge your own position. If they had parked perfectly parallel to the kerb, then you are fine. But if they had parked in a haphazard manner, you will be thrown off line. So quickly judge the correctness of their own parking before using them as a guide. If they have strayed off line, remember than and make finer adjustments to your own measurements.
    
    Good luck!

What are some tips for parallel parking?

Practice, Practice Practice.

1. Learn how to judge where the front, back, and corners are from the drivers seat. Have a friend help you by standing at each of these positions while you are in the drivers seat. If you have a pole or broomstick have the friend hold it right at the bumper in each location and note where they are. This is to help you gauge how much clearance you have when parking because your bumpers stick out where you can’t see them.
2. Get to know your car and understand how turning the wheels makes it move, both forward and backward.
3. Watch this gif. It is one of the best visual aids I have come across showing the mechanics of parallel parking:
   
   Parallel Parking
4. Pull up and stop next to the spot you wish to park in. Turn on your turn signal. This will stop the driver behind you and tell them that you are about to parallel park. They will (hopefully) wait there while you park, stopping additional traffic that may come along until you are done.
5. Pull forward, until your rear wheels are about in line with the bumper of the car on your right that you will be parking behind. You should be about 3 feet away from this car.
6. Put the car into reverse, and turn your steering wheel all the way to the right (clockwise) until it stops. SLOWLY begin to back up. The rear of your car will turn into the parking stall while the front will move a little bit to the left.
7. When your right front wheel is in line with the bumper of the other car, you should be at about a 45° angle to the road. Turn your wheel all the way to the left (counter-clockwise) and continue slowly backing up. Now the front of the car will be sliding into the parking stall, while the car straightens out. Keep a close watch on the cars around you, to make sure you do not hit the. This is the reason for steps 1 & 2. Use your mirrors to make sure you are not too close to the car behind you.
8. Adjust your position so you are centered in the stall and withing 12″ of the curb. Some places will issue you a parking ticket if you are too far away from the curb.
9. Practice these steps over and over again until you can do them easily. Always watch the corners of your car and the cars around you. Move your car forward and backwards slowly. Be patient, and practice, practice, practice.

You really need to know where the other side of the car is exactly. Park about 6 inches from the curb. Sit in the driver's seat and study the view of the passenger side. Where is the curb in relation to landmarks on your car? Where does the curb appear on your fender. Put some tall cardboard boxes or plastic trashcans as corners of imaginary cars and practise backing into the space. That is the most important starting point. If you turn in too early or too late the attempt will not go well. Look at the rear passenger side corner and the rear driver corner of the “car” that you are trying to pull in behind. Adjust the timing from early to late to see what the effect is of the action. You should be going in at about a 45 degree angle. The over hang of the rear of your car needs to overhang the curb to a certain degree. Once you get to that point you need to decide if you will clear the rear corner of the front car if you tightly turn the front wheels toward the center of the street. If you clear that front car you are home free. Your attention now has to be the curb and the rear car. If your timing was just right you have parallel parked. Practice until you can do this consistently. You are now in the minority of people that can parallel park. Be proud of your accomplishment!

Start by practicing. You practice enough, it becomes second nature. Start in an empty parking lots with painted lines & then slowly work yourself into quiet neighborhoods. Get a friend or family member to bring another car for you to practice parking behind.

Lets assume you drive on the right.

-Pull up next to the car you are parking behind. Should be about 1 foot between you. Park & get out & look.

-Now back straight until your rear axle is even with the rear bumper of the car you’re parking behind. Use your mirror & get to know your mirror. Your mirror is your best friend! (Park & get out & look.). Your rear axle is your pivot point.

-turn your steering wheel hard over clockwise. Back it off a tiny bit so you don’t hear that straining noise. Back your car slowly until you are at 45 degree angle. Straighten your front wheels. (Park & get out & look.)

-Back until you think your front bumper clears the rear bumper of the car in front of you. (Park. Get out & look.). If your 45 degree angle is messed up, this will be messed up. This is where practice really comes into play. This is the key point to parallel parking.

-When you clear the back bumper of the car in front of you, turn your steering wheel hard over counterclockwise. Back off a tiny bit so you don’t hear nasty straining noise. Back slowly until parallel behind car in front of you. Straighten your wheel, or curb it if you are on a hill).

Park & get out & look. How did you do?

With practice, you won’t need to get out & look at every step of the way. With practice it will all fall together.

Repeat over & over until you don’t have to think about it anymore. Practice = skill. Nobody gets it right the first time out unless amazing teacher is paired with amazing student! Good luck & hope this helps! 😊

https://i.imgur.com/2g5Bzi9.gif

1. Seek out a space you feel comfortable that you can safely get your car into without crunching into another car. Drive around the block until you find a larger gap if you need to; you will need a space that's several feet longer than your car.
2. Check your rearview mirror and driver-side mirror as you approach the space to ensure another car is not riding on your tail. Signal toward the space as you approach it, slow down, and stop. If another motorist rides up on your rear, simply maintain your position and keep signaling. You might even need to roll down your window and wave the other driver around; they might not have realized you're trying to park.
3. Line up your vehicle with the parked vehicle directly in front of your desired spot. Don't get too close on the side, or you might scrape the other car when you make your move. But you also don't want to be too far away―two or three feet will suffice. Position your vehicle parallel to the parked car, aligning your bumpers.
4. Check your surroundings. Use all your mirrors and check your blind spots for cars, bicyclists and pedestrians BEFORE you begin to reverse your car.
5. Put your vehicle in reverse. Look over your other shoulder at the space to assess the gap.
6. Release the brakes and slowly begin backing into the turn.
7. Turn the steering wheel when you see the front car's back bumper. When your back axel is aligned with the front car's bumper, turn your steering wheel all the way to the right (assuming you're parking on the right-hand side of the road).
8. Reverse until your car is at a 45-degree angle. Then, turn your steering wheel in the opposite direction. Imagine your car is creating an S-shape as you are maneuvering into the spot.
9. Keep backing up until your car is in the spot. Be sure to take a few quick glances at the front of your car to make sure you don't hit the vehicle in front of your spot.
10. Pull forward to straighten out. Once you're in the spot, you can turn the steering wheel so your tires are parallel to the curb.

Practive makes perfect. The key is use the same car eveytime, especially on exam day. Get to know your vehicles turning radius and use reference points. In other words, find a spot on your car when you pull up past the spot to parallel park (I am assuming you are backing in!), i.e., your car’s right rear tire is parallel to the other vehicles left rear tire. Begin turning you and steering the car to get the right angle. Then look forward for reference point on the hood of the car for when to start turning the steering wheel in the opposite direction. Be sure to use your mirrors to see where you are in relation to the curb.This is not a hard and fast rule, but gives you some idea of a techniques to use. With practice, you will figure it out on our own.

The most important thing is don’t have an accident. Make sure you use your turn signal to let others know your intentions and that another driver does not get right up on your rear end of the car or try to take your spot (if they do, block them in! Ha Ha!).

Keep your head on swivel, in other words, constantly be looking in all your mirrors and through each window - Situational awareness!

I practiced with my son and daughter in a public park that lot’s of empty spaces. Good Luck!

Thanks for the A2A on How do you parallel park perfectly every time?

My answer is skill and experience. And also motivation - I still remember (decades ago) not doing it perfect, and those memories haunt me!

Experience is what counts, skill just adds a multiplier to experience, while experience adds to skill.

Experience includes the times you do something for real and the times you practice. That’s the trick that applies to so much of life - practice.

In Little League baseball you don’t just throw on a uniform and run out to place against the other team; you practice first. You practice throwing, practice catching, practice swinging a bat, practice running, etc. You practice the pieces. Then you practice actually playing. Then you play.

Back to parallel parking … hopefully you’ve already had practice with the pieces - turning, going forward, backing up, and especially LOOKING, using your mirrors and your neck. I say neck because you need to turn your head and look.

So how about the next step - “practice playing”, meaning practice parking. This doesn’t mean with cars around you, because that would not be practice, that would be actually “playing the game”.

Find a couple of garbage cans, like the cheap $10 ones from Walmart, and four traffic cones. You don’t have to actually use garbage cans and traffic cones, you can use anything roughly close. And you’ll need something about the size of your hand, like scrap wood, or just about anything; you’ll need 4 of these.

Find some empty space somewhere - huge empty parking lot (or an empty part of a huge lot), a country dirt road, anywhere.

On the edge of the road place two of those small wood scraps (or whatever) 20 to 24 feet apart. Start at 24 to make it easier, shrink it to 20 for harder practice. Place the other to pieces straight towards the center of the road, 8 feet from the first two, to form a “parking space” that is 24 feet by 8 feet.

Take two of the traffic cones, they are the front of one car at the corners, place them where a car would be parked behind you; place the garbage can where windshield would be. Take the other two cones, place them where a car would be parked in front of you, where the back corners of the car would be; put the garbage can where the back window would be of a sedan, or lined up with the cones like an SUV would be.

Then practice parking in that spot. Over and over and over. And over. And over.

YOU decide when you’re close enough to “perfect every time”.

Parallel Parking means you need to park the car in between two cars which are situated parallel to the edge of the road

Step 1 : The distance of the parking should be 1.5x the size of the car

Step 2 : first bring the car at the end of first car

Then bring your car upto when the triangular mirror area of back seat is align to the end of the first car

Then slowly turn the steering wheel to the left so that the car moves to the right

Until when the behind car is seen through the right sided mirror

After that straighten your steering wheel until it’s parked straight

Here’s how it goes

Put it properly in between two cars

Hope that helps you pass your foreign driving test

It will be easier to practice parking with fewer obstacles in your way.

When you are practicing, you will want to do this in a parking lot that isn't crowded.

As you are learning, you might make mistakes.

In an area with no cars, you are unlikely to hit anything as you practice your parking skills.

This isn't just a good idea for people learning how to drive. If you haven't driven in a long time, it is a good idea to practice parking and driving a little bit before going long distances.

You want your vehicle to be in the right spot, away from other cars and the right distance from your spot so you can cut your wheel correctly.

Make sure there is at least 5 or 6 feet between your vehicle and any other parked cars.

If there aren't any cars in the spaces near you, try to judge a 5 or 6 foot distance away from them.

This is so that when you are parking, you can use the rest of the steps for cutting your wheel correctly.

This will let other drivers know you are going to park.

Drive forward slowly until you see the center of the parking space you want to use.

Be aware of other drivers. Don't take a space someone else has been waiting for.

Make sure there is no one trying to back-out of a nearby spot as you are driving forward.

This is the method I use: How to 'Parallel Park' using the 1:2:1 Method

Before I started reading though, I learned via an intuition like method. Basically:

1. Line up the bottom-back most corner of the window, the one facing the side you want to park, to the back of the car or taillight. So if you’re Parking to your right, the back right most corner of the back window should be exposing the taillight or back of the vehicle.
2. Turn your wheel towards the side your parking so you’re turning into the spot. Again, if I’m parking on my right I am turning my wheel to the right and putting the car in reverse.
3. At this point you should be observing the rear and side mirrors. On the side you’re parking, the side mirror should show you being parallel to car. While reversing make sure you reverse just far enough that in your side mirror, you’re cognizant of:
1. A triangle that is forming or is formed by the following sides:
1. The curb
2. The side of your car
3. And the top of the side mirror
2. At the point where a right triangle formed, your gut should be telling you it’s the perfect time to turn your wheel in the opposite direction.
4. Turn the wheel the opposite way and straighten out the car while in reverse.
5. There may be some adjustment required, but with ample space, usually with this method, there is none.

In Paris when you park, leave an automatic car in neutral, not park. In a stick shift, normal here in Europe, put the car in neutral and leave the handbrake off. When you want to get out of the space gently push the cars in front and behind to give yourself some room. Be gentle and don’t be in a hurry.

If you have a smart car like the one in the picture, ask a friend to help you pick it up and move it sideways.

What's your formula for parallel parking?

Good question, Christina!

I can’t offer you a formula, i.e. a process you mindlessly follow. It depends on the geometry of the parking spot (length, depth, curviness, presence or absence of a curb, angle of the spot relative to your starting position), the size of the spot relative to the car, and the length of the hole relative to length of the car (which isn’t the same as the length of the spot relative to the length of the car. However, I can offer you an obvious tip and some rules of thumb that must be adjusted for the factors above.

First, the tip. Become proficient at parallel parking by learning and practicing in a car with a backup camera.

My rules of them are a guide to when to initiate various actions during the parallel parking maneuver. They are:

1. Ensure the parking spot is long enough to contain your car with at least 5 feet extra length
2. In the driving lane, pull beyond the spot parallel to the next spot, leaving 12″ to 18″ between your car and the next spot
3. Start backing up straight back slowly
4. As you back, turn the steering wheel hard over towards the parking spot when the driver is abreast the front edge of the hole
5. Leave the wheel hard over until the car is at a 45 degree angle to the curb/parking spot, then straighten the front wheels and continue to back slowly
6. Turn the wheel hard over to the other side as soon as the front end will clear the car parked in the spot in front and continue backing slowly
7. If you have room without hitting the car behind you, continue backing until your car is parallel to the curb
8. If you do not have room, back as far as you can toward the car behind you without hitting it, then turn the wheel hard the other way and pull forward until the car is parallel to the curb
9. Pull forward or backward as needed to center the car in your parking spot
10. If the parking spot is defined by marks on the road, ensure the car is completely contained within the markings, or check that the car is 6″ to 12″ from the curb or otherwise

Depending on geometry, you’ll need to adjust these factors: the starting distance from the car in front, the steering wheel turn point, the 45 degree angle.

1. Pull your car all the way up parallel to and 3 feet distance from car parked in front of the empty parking spot. Line your tail end of the car with the tail end of the adjacent car.
2. Back up straight and slowly, and when your rear tire passes and is no longer overlapping the rear tire of parked car, stop car.
3. Turn steering wheel to the right - around half to a full turn of the steering wheel.
4. Back up slowly while watching over right shoulder to make sure you don’t hit/scrape the parked car on your right, and straighten steering wheel when you can see in your left side mirror both the left tail of your car AND the complete front side of the rear car.
5. Special Tip Not Often Shared - Stop the car when the left rear tire just passes the line marking the left edge of the parking spot (or left edge of the car parked behind you), or when your right side mirror covers the right tail light of the front car.
6. Turn steering wheel half to full turn left.
7. Slowly back up and watch front right side & corner of your car to avoid hitting the parked car in front. If it looks like you’ll hit the front car, straighten the steering wheel a bit and continue backing up. If you hit the 40 degree angle of approach on the mark, you should be able to back up until your right front wheel hits the curb and you’re done!

Precisely the same way you do a car with an automatic transmission, as far as pulling up, turning, backing, steering, and so forth are concerned.

You do need to be PROFICIENT in gently using the clutch and gas pedal before parallel parking a stick shift car.

And you probably need to be able to heel and toe the brake and gas pedal, using your right foot with the heel on the brake and the toe on the gas. This depends on whether you are smooth enough and quick enough to go from brake to gas and gas to brake without using the heel and toe technique.

I PREFER a stick shift, but let’s leave it at this. If you have trouble parallel parking with an automatic transmission…… stick to automatics, a stick shift will be more than you can deal with parking parallel.