Europe > Croatia > Dubrovnik (DBV)
The city by city Car or no Car advice for Dubrovnik can be broken down into three similar questions - do you need a car in Dubrovnik ; is it worth it (based on costs), and ultimately - should you rent one? (a balance of the two).🚆 🚌⛴️ Do we need to rent a car in Dubrovnik ?
These scores are based on the quality of public transport and other travel options. If these are good enough to see the main points of interest, then you don’t need to rent a car.
💰💶💳 Is it worth hiring a car in Dubrovnik?
These scores reflect the practical factors that affect whether renting a car is convenient, good value, and stress-free.
Getting to Dubrovnik 🚍✈️
Dubrovnik Airport (DBV) sits around 20 km southeast of the city. Importantly, there is no rail connection. Instead, most visitors arrive by airport bus or taxi. The Platanus airport bus meets flights and runs directly to Pile Gate and the main bus station, which is perfectly adequate for most travellers.
Cruise and ferry passengers, meanwhile, arrive at Gruž Port and transfer by shuttle bus, making a car entirely redundant for short stays.
Traveller’s hint 💡⛴️
If you are travelling light, consider starting your Dubrovnik visit via Cavtat rather than the city itself. Cavtat is much closer to Dubrovnik Airport than the Old Town, often just a 10–15 minute taxi ride, which can be quicker and calmer than heading straight into Dubrovnik by road during peak season.
From Cavtat, you can then take the regular ferry into Dubrovnik’s Old Harbour. This is not just transport — it is one of the most scenic arrivals you can make. Approaching the walled city from the sea gives you a dramatic first view of the fortifications, far more memorable than arriving by bus.
Once you disembark, the Old Town is compact and fully walkable. In most cases, you can walk directly to your accommodation or take a short luggage-friendly stroll to nearby districts. As a result, this route neatly avoids traffic congestion, reduces stress, and turns your arrival into part of the experience rather than a chore 🌊🏰
Dubrovnik without a car 🚶♂️🏰
The Old Town is a pedestrian masterpiece. You can walk the city walls, explore Rector’s Palace, climb Mount Srđ by cable car, and visit filming locations from Game of Thrones — all without wheels.
Moreover, local buses are frequent and inexpensive, connecting Lapad, Gruž, Babin Kuk and the Old Town efficiently. Traffic congestion is heavy in peak season, so buses often outperform cars for short hops.
Dubrovnik’s city walls: access, fees, and what you’re paying for 🏰
One of Dubrovnik’s defining features is its perfectly preserved medieval city walls, which completely encircle the Old Town. Walking the full circuit along the ramparts is one of the city’s standout experiences, offering elevated views over the terracotta rooftops on one side and the Adriatic Sea on the other. However, unlike simply wandering the streets below, access to the walls is not free. Visitors must purchase a ticket to enter the ramparts, and at up to €40 per person in high season, the fee is significant by European standards.
It is important to be clear about what this charge represents. The fee applies only to walking on top of the walls, not to entering the Old Town itself. Dubrovnik remains completely free to access at street level, and you can spend hours exploring its squares, alleys, churches, cafés, and harbour without paying anything at all. In this sense, Dubrovnik is very different from Venice, where a broader day-visitor charge has been introduced to manage over-tourism. Dubrovnik’s approach is far more targeted: you pay for a specific attraction, not for the right to be there.
Walkability and car restrictions inside the Old Town 🚶♂️
Cars are strictly restricted within the Old Town, which is both inevitable and entirely sensible given its narrow streets and historic fabric. This means that Dubrovnik’s historic core is, by definition, a pedestrian-only environment. Whether or not you choose to walk the walls, you will explore the Old Town entirely on foot, and distances are short enough that this rarely feels like a limitation. For most visitors, the lack of traffic is part of the appeal, not an inconvenience.
Because of this, the question around Dubrovnik is not whether you can drive into the centre — you cannot — but whether you should rent a car after you have explored it. The walls themselves reinforce this distinction. They are a paid, time-limited experience, often best enjoyed early in the morning or later in the day, while the Old Town below remains open, accessible, and free at all times.
A targeted charge, not a city-wide toll 💡
In practical terms, Dubrovnik’s wall ticket functions much like an entrance fee to a major museum or heritage site. It helps fund preservation and crowd management without turning the entire city into a gated attraction. Visitors who choose not to pay still enjoy one of Europe’s most atmospheric historic centres, while those who do pay gain access to one of the most dramatic urban walks anywhere in the world.
This distinction matters. Dubrovnik’s model charges for impact-intensive experiences rather than penalising casual exploration. As a result, it preserves both the city’s accessibility and its character — and it keeps the focus firmly on walking, not driving, within the historic core.
Day trips without driving 🚤🚌
Several excellent excursions work well without a rental car:
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Lokrum Island by boat
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Cavtat by bus or ferry
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Elafiti Islands via organised boat trips
As a result, many visitors can fill three or four days easily using public transport and boats alone.
When a rental car becomes useful 🚗🌄
A car starts to make sense if you want more freedom. For example:
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Driving north along the Dalmatian coast
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Visiting Ston and its walls
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Exploring inland villages at your own pace
However, parking near the Old Town is scarce and expensive, so it often makes sense to rent a car for part of your stay only, ideally picking it up at the airport or in Gruž.
Krka and Plitvice Lakes: iconic, but not exactly next door 🌊🌲
Two of Croatia’s most spectacular natural attractions are Krka National Park and Plitvice Lakes National Park, and it’s very common for visitors arriving in Dubrovnik to ask whether either can be visited as a day trip. The short answer is yes, but with important caveats. Dubrovnik may be Croatia’s most famous city and a major international gateway, yet it sits a long way south, close to the border with Montenegro, while both parks are located much further north.
Krka National Park, known for its waterfalls and wooden walkways, lies inland from Šibenik, roughly north of Split. From Dubrovnik, the drive takes around 4 to 5 hours each way, depending on traffic and stops. That makes it a very long day trip, and in practice it only really makes sense if you are prepared for an early start, a late return, and limited time on site. Plitvice Lakes, even more famous and more dramatic, is further still. It sits closer to Zadar and the interior of Croatia, and from Dubrovnik you are realistically looking at 6 hours or more each way by road.
Car, tour, or a change of base? 🚗🚌
Because of these distances, visiting Krka or Plitvice directly from Dubrovnik highlights where a rental car starts to make sense, but also where it may not be the best solution. Driving does give you flexibility and avoids rigid tour schedules, but it also turns what should be a relaxed nature experience into an endurance exercise. For many visitors, an organised tour from Dubrovnik is the more practical option if they insist on doing it as a single-day excursion, even though it limits time and freedom.
However, the more balanced approach is to treat Dubrovnik as one part of a wider Croatian itinerary. Both Krka and Plitvice are far more comfortably visited if you reposition yourself to Split, Šibenik, or Zadar, either by car or by bus. In that context, a rental car becomes genuinely useful, not just for reaching the parks but for exploring smaller towns, coastlines, and inland villages along the way.
Setting expectations from Dubrovnik 🧭
The key point is that while Dubrovnik is an outstanding destination in its own right, it is not the ideal base for exploring all of Croatia’s natural highlights. Krka and Plitvice are absolutely worth seeing, but they reward visitors who plan their route logically rather than trying to bolt them onto a Dubrovnik-only stay.
In other words, Dubrovnik works best as a car-free or low-car destination focused on history, walking, and the coast. A rental car becomes far more valuable once you start moving north through Dalmatia — where Croatia’s landscapes really open up, and where those famous lakes and waterfalls finally feel close rather than distant.
Conclusion: should you rent a car in Dubrovnik?
For most visitors, no car is needed for Dubrovnik itself. Walking, buses and boats cover the essentials beautifully.
