Driving from Germany to Croatia: every vignette you need

On the classic route from Germany to the Croatian coast you need two vignettes, one for Austria and one for Slovenia, plus two Austrian tunnel tolls and the Croatian barrier tolls at the end. Germany itself costs you nothing. That is the whole list. The rest of this page is about the details that turn a smooth drive into a queue at a toll booth, or worse, a letter from ASFINAG six weeks after you get home.

How many vignettes do you need from Germany to Croatia?

A drive from Germany to Croatia through Salzburg, Villach and Ljubljana needs exactly two vignettes: the Austrian one and the Slovenian e-vinjeta. Both are digital, both are tied to your licence plate, and both can be sorted from your kitchen table the evening before. Croatia does not sell a vignette at all. It charges by distance.

What catches people is not the vignettes. It is the two Austrian tunnels on this route that the vignette does not cover, and the Slovenian 7-day window that runs out halfway through a two-week holiday. Both are covered below.

Do you pay anything on German motorways?

German Autobahns are free for cars in 2026, and there is no German vignette to buy. Germany's toll applies to heavy goods vehicles, not to a family car or a motorhome under 3.5 tonnes. The plan for a car toll was dropped in 2019, and nobody has seriously tried again since. So your spending starts at the Austrian border, usually at Salzburg or Kufstein.

One tip while you are still on German soil. Austria still sells a paper sticker at petrol stations near the border, and queuing for one on a Saturday in July is nobody's idea of a holiday. Buy the digital version at home.

What do you need for Austria on the way to Croatia?

Austria needs a vignette for its motorways, and on the Croatia route it also charges two separate tunnel tolls the vignette does not include. The 10-day digital vignette for a car costs €12.80 at the official 2026 ASFINAG rate, and the ASFINAG toll shop confirms that the 1-day and 10-day vignettes can be bought with immediate validity. The longer versions have a waiting period for consumers, which the Austria vignette page explains along with the full price list.

Then the tunnels. ASFINAG lists the 2026 single-trip car toll at €15.00 for the A10 Tauern and Katschberg route and €9.00 for the A11 Karawanken tunnel into Slovenia. Both prices include VAT and have applied since 1 January 2026. You pay them at a barrier or buy a digital section toll in advance. Either way, count them twice, because you will drive them home as well.

What do you need for Slovenia, and how long does it last?

Slovenia needs an e-vinjeta for its motorways and expressways, and for a normal car the weekly one costs €16.00 in 2026 according to DARS, the Slovenian motorway company. The stretch from the Karawanken tunnel past Ljubljana to the Croatian border is short. It is not optional. Cameras read plates here too.

Now the trap. DARS says a weekly e-vinjeta is valid for seven consecutive days, and the start date always counts as day one. Start it on a Saturday and it expires at midnight the following Friday. If your holiday runs longer than that, the vignette you bought on the way down will not cover the way back. You can either buy a second weekly one for the return (€16.00 again) or buy the monthly one at €32.00, which costs exactly the same and saves you remembering. DARS lets you set the start date up to 30 days ahead. Tall vans and campers can land in a dearer class, which the Slovenia vignette page covers.

What does the whole trip cost in fixed fees?

The fixed road charges for a one-way car trip from Germany to the Croatian border via Salzburg, Villach and Ljubljana add up to €52.80 in 2026, before any Croatian tolls. Here is where that figure comes from.

Official ASFINAG and DARS prices, checked September 2026, car up to 3.5 t. A return trip within the vignette periods adds another €24.00 of tunnel tolls.

For a two-week holiday, the cheapest cover is usually two 10-day Austrian vignettes (€25.60, one per leg) rather than the €32.00 two-month version, plus either two weekly Slovenian e-vinjetas or one monthly. If you want to see how vignettes and distance tolls differ in principle, our guide to vignette versus toll roads breaks it down.

Do you need a vignette for Croatia?

Croatia has no vignette for cars, so there is nothing to buy in advance. Croatian motorways charge by distance: you take a ticket on the way in and pay at the barrier on the way out, by card or cash, or drive through with an ENC electronic tag. Hrvatske autoceste runs most of the network, with concession companies on some sections such as the Istrian roads.

That is about to change, slowly. At its session on 20 November 2025 the Croatian Government set 1 March 2027 as the start of a free-flow system across the whole motorway network, with cameras reading plates and no stopping at booths. For a 2026 or early 2027 trip, bring a card and a little patience on summer Saturdays.

Is the route through Hungary any different?

Driving to Croatia through Vienna and Hungary swaps the Slovenian e-vinjeta for a Hungarian e-matrica, and it skips the Tauern and Karawanken tunnels. Drivers from eastern Germany heading to Zagreb or Slavonia sometimes prefer it. For Istria and the Kvarner coast it is a detour, and I would not bother. Hungarian categories and current prices are on the Hungary vignette page, and our overview of which European countries need a vignette shows every other combination.

How do you sort it all before you leave?

Buy the Austrian and Slovenian vignettes before you set off, check the plate on each confirmation, and keep the tunnel tolls and Croatian barriers in the budget. You can buy each one directly from ASFINAG and DARS at the state fee. Or do it in one go: order your official digital vignettes for Austria and Slovenia here, with the state fee and our service fee shown separately before you pay, registered against your plate and confirmed by email. If the car is a hire car, read our guide to vignettes for a rental car first, because the plate is the whole point.

Germany to Croatia vignette FAQ