Slovakia is, without doubt, a beautiful country, with a lot of places to visit and many hidden gems waiting to be discovered.
While all kinds of transportation are available in the country, the best way to reach your destinations fast and comfortably is to drive a car or motorcycle. Driving in Slovakia is very similar to driving in any European Union country. However, there are some differences and catches that might surprise you, not necessarily in a good way. I would like to give you all the important information and some tips to prepare for your vacation or road trip to Slovakia.
Entering Slovakia
To enter the country you can use any official border crossing. As Slovakia is part of the European Union and belongs to the Schengen zone you will not encounter any border checks when entering from other Schengen countries.
The border with Ukraine is the outer border of the Schengen zone, therefore a permanent border check is still here.
Entering Slovakia during covid-19
During the pandemic, Slovakia did close some smaller border crossings and reinstate the checks when crossing borders. The situation currently changing from day to day and is hard to predict. As of September 2021, all border crossings are open, but police or military do check Green pass or covid tests. Until the pandemic is over better check the government page for actual conditions: https://korona.gov.sk/en/travelling-to-slovakia-and-covid19/.
Roads in Slovakia
Slovakia has around 38 thousand kilometers of paved roads, plus few thousand unpaved roads.
The roads are divided into motorways (in Slovak: Diaľnica), expressways (in Slovak: Rýchlostna cesta), and I. class roads (in Slovak: Cesta prvej triedy) and local roads.
Several A and B-class European roads cross the country as well.
You can download a full map of Slovakia motorways and expressways from the National Highway company here (pdf file).
Motorways and expressways
As of April 2020, the term "expressways" was removed from traffic rules and old blue signs were replaced with new green for both motorways and expressways. I will therefore use only "Motorways" when talking about R and D roads.Slovakia has only around 622 km of motorways, and except few kilometers (for example motorway in the capital city) are all with payment. The payments are for 10 days, 30 days, 1 year (valid from 31. January to 31. January), and new 365 days (valid from the purchase date). You can buy toll tickets on gas stations (not all. The best are big brands like OMW, or Slovnaft and Shell) or online on https://eznamka.sk (you can switch to English and few other languages). Be aware that you have to have a valid toll ticket before you enter paid section of a motorway! Police do regularly check cars (you can spot police vans on side of the road. They are usually toll police). The current prices are in the picture below:
Most of the motorways are in good condition (many are actually brand new) with two lanes for one direction. The exception is part of D1 from Bratislava to Trnava which is three lanes. The speed limit is 130 km/h with exception of the same part of D1 from Bratislava to Trnava, where the speed limit is limited to 110 km/h during the day (from 5 AM to 7 PM). Inside cities, the speed limit can be limited to 90 km/h. As of 2021 the speed limit on motorways passing cities was removed from traffic laws. I still recommend paying attention to speed signs. To this day in the capital city Bratislava the speed limit is changing according to the traffic conditions (from 120 to 60 km/h !), so look for overhead panels.
You will find gas stations and service stations with restaurants, toilets, and places to sit and for kids to play fairly often, so don't worry about running out of gas.
Motels and overnight hotels are easy to find on motorways and many of I. class roads.
The exits are well marked so you should not have a problem finding the right one even without GPS.
Other roads in Slovakia
The condition of roads, other than motorways varies a lot. Some are brand new with perfect tarmac, some are full of potholes, cracked tarmac, and bad sides. Being a mountainous country, many roads pass hills and mountains and are twisty with sharper turns especially in north and middle regions. Many roads are damaged with deep lines from trucks which can be dangerous especially in rain.
The general speed limit outside of cities is 90 km/h and in cities and villages 50 km/h. Police are quite tolerant if happens, that you pass the limit over for few kilometers outside of the city, but much less tolerant inside the cities. The fines range from 10 euro to 800 (you can read about fines valid for 2021 on www.autoviny.sk. Only in Slovak language, so use google translator.).The gas stations you will find in cities, but also in the countryside on side of the roads. Apart from known brands like OMW, Shell, Slovnaft, you will find also smaller brands like Jurki, OkTan, Benzina. Even some shopping brands like Metro and Hypernova have their own gas stations.
These brands are perfectly safe to buy fuel in terms of quality, but they also tend to be cheaper. On the downside, they might offer only one type of petrol and one diesel and very limited service. Many gas stations also have LPG, or you can find dedicated LPG stations.
In general, the directions are well marked and you can easily navigate with a road map and without GPS.
Summer, especially school holidays (July and August) is the season of road works and we like to dig out and broke all roads at once.
Mountain passes
Road tunnels
Driving an electric car
With the recent boom of electric cars, Slovakia trying to catch up with the rest of the world and building networks of charging stations. You can find a map of charging stations on www.electromaps.com. There are currently five (and one more coming) Tesla superchargers in the country: https://www.tesla.com/findus/list/superchargers/slovakia.
Currently, electric vehicles don't have any special advantages over petrol vehicles, but the government considering allowing EVs to use special lanes like bus lanes.
General traffic rules in Slovakia
Alcohol tolerance
The most important is that Slovakia as one of few European countries has zero-tolerance for alcohol. The police are very strict in this case and penalties are very severe. The country has a lot to offer in the "beverage" sector and beer is cheaper than water (for real), but avoid drinking while driving.
Police will ask you for an alcohol test every time they stop you. If you will refuse to do a test on the spot, you will be forbidden to continue the drive and escorted to a blood test.
Traffic laws enforcement
The police are equipped with modern handheld measuring devices, and they can catch you speeding without spotting them. You can also encounter civil police cars equipped with speed measuring and video recording. These cars are hard to spot as they don't have any visible marking or equipment. Any so-called anti-radars are not effective and highly illegal.
Parking
All the places where is allowed to park are marked with white lines or with a blue sign with the white letter P. Parking spots with payments have additional pictures of parking clocks. Spots marked with blue lines are residential parking and based on the city, different rules and times apply to them.
Watch out for signs which forbid parking or stopping. Police, especially local police like to check this and you can get towed, or find a blocking device on your wheel.
On "Parking forbidden" you can stop for a brief moment, like to pick up a passenger, but on "Stopping forbidden" you are not allowed to stop at all.
Rescue and emergency lane
From 2020 is included in traffic law, that drivers when driving in slow traffic must maintain lane for emergency service. Drivers in the left lane must stick with the left side of the road and drivers in the right lane must stay to the right side of the road.
Lane splitting
Dealing with Slovakia police
All units of traffic, state and also local (in Slovakia: Mestká polícia) police have the right to stop you and enforce traffic rules.
When dealing with police stick with politeness and don't try to deny your offense. They will have video recordings. This way you might escape with a lower fine or just a verbal warning. Be aware that if you are not able to pay a fine on the spot (most of the units will have a card terminal), they will confiscate your driver's license until you pay. You will receive a permit to drive, but is valid only in-country. If you will deny your offense (and you commit one), they will escalate you to the Traffic law inspection office and your fines will increase if you will not be able to prove your innocents.
These days you shouldn't encounter police stopping you for no reason and trying to give you a fine for a made-up offense. But if this happens, always ask for proof and make sure you understand if you need to sign something. Speaking with police officers other than the Slovak language might be tricky sometimes, especially in smaller regions and the countryside, but in general, you should be fine with some level of English or German.
Do not try to bribe police officers! Their encounters are recorded and can get you in serious trouble.
And to not forget, turn on car lights are mandatory during the whole year and the whole day (daylights, if your car has them, are fine during the day and with good visibility). Also, don't use your phone and drive. It's illegal and the police will stop you if they spot you.
Driving in the country
So how is it to drive in Slovakia?