Carpooling is the sharing of car journeys so that more than one person travels in a car, and prevents the need for others to have to drive to a location themselves. It is an arrangement among a group of automobile owners by which each owner in turn drives the others or their children to and from a designated place. Carpooling is commonly implemented for commuting but is increasingly popular for longer one-off journeys, with the formality and regularity of arrangements varying between schemes and journeys. Carpooling is not always arranged for the whole length of a journey. Especially on long journeys, it is common for passengers to only join for parts of the journey, and give a contribution based on the distance that they travel. This gives carpooling extra flexibility and enables more people to share journeys and save money.
Carpooling is promoted by organizations such as Greenxc and Carplus, which encourage people to use this form of transportation in order to reduce their own carbon footprint. Carpooling is also referred to as car sharing in British English.
