First-time nomad driving to Spain/Portugal: Is having a car in cities a massive mistake?

Комментарии

• u/alefeusch·3·1 авг. 2026 г., 13:10

  For me, unless you are touring very sparse areas like small towns and villages of Asturias or Galicia, a car is absolutely a drawback over a benefit. Weekend trips from any decent sized city in Spain are exceptionally easy via train or bus. Parking in any large city is no fun at all and traffic coming in and out of large cities, as well as within larger cities, can be a nightmare at certain times. All three cities you mentioned (Valencia, Malaga & Alicante) are very well connected by train and bus and it's super easy to book tickets same day using the Renfe app, Alsa app, etc... and head out on a day trip/weekend trip. I spend a few months a year in Spain and have rented a car one time, for 2 days, and that was to explore the more rural areas of Asturias. Other than that, I've never even considered it.

  • u/AugustoPinochet420·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 13:12

    Thank you for sharing your experience :)

  • u/Mystic_Wunder·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 15:08

    There is also BlaBla car for between cities.

• u/PibeauTheConqueror·3·1 авг. 2026 г., 13:12

  Drove a renral car around Spain from madrid, through the alps, down to sevilla, cadiz, granada. Wasn't an issue for us, though you have to look for good parking spaces or associated with Airbnb or hotel

• u/[deleted]·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 13:15

  [removed]

• u/Patchali·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 14:04

  dont bring a car or try van life maybe something for you?..car is like chains ..its not like going on holidays what do you do if you want to go to other continents? the less you own the easier it gets

• u/el_david·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 14:21

  You'll need a sticker to drive in City Centre for all major cities. I wouldn't take the car.

  • u/christianbro·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 16:51

    In Malaga our politicians are so shitty they dont even know how to ban foreign cars, Spanish license plate car gets a fine if not meeting the sticker, foreign one not.

    • u/el_david·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 16:59·1 ответ

  • u/moreidlethanwild·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 17:13

    I was looking for this! OP, without the sticker in the window for emissions you will get fined taking a car into many city centres, Madrid for example. It’s a hard no. You’ll get €100 find for each infraction.

• u/Ambitious-Bad-6779·3·1 авг. 2026 г., 14:33

  Absolutely no. car is a terrible idea for this type of travel, you cant be living in shared/co-living places in the city and renting a car. These places are best for backpackers and light travelers. If you wanna rent a car, book your own private place/house with assigned parking, 10-20mins away from city centers.

• u/christianbro·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 17:00

  I can speak of Malaga. In the city you dont need a car, you can bring one in, try to park it somewhere in the outskirts where people actually live but you will find no parking in the center, just like any other city in the world. You can rent a garage for a reasonable amount, I used to rent one monthly for 55€, probably a bit more expensive now. Daily garage is probably 20€, but just leave it on the street. However anywhere you want to go you shall expect buses that are so shitty that take double or three times your driving time because of stops, the only well connected area is where the Cercanias go. And of course, there are even more remote places you cannot go without car. Everyone I know who has moved here from abroad ended buying one sooner or later. This is full of foreign cars, I see daily multiple French, German, Dutch, no problem. If they manage, so can you. But I am saying this from a perspective who has gone digital nomad on a car and I love driving. Some cities make it shittier than others but park in the outskirts, forget about car, want to go somewhere, take it.

• u/comments83820·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 17:28

  take the train or bus

• u/dougaddiction·1·1 авг. 2026 г., 18:34

  The parking numbers already in this thread are the key inputs - worth running them out to a monthly total instead of a daily rate, since that's what actually decides this. At €20-30/day for a garage, a month of that is €600-900, versus the ~€55/month rate someone mentioned below for a fixed monthly rental in Malaga. That's an enormous spread (roughly €55 to €900/month) depending entirely on whether you find a monthly rate or end up paying daily - easy to get wrong in your first week if you haven't arranged it before you arrive. Compare that to what the weekend trips you're bringing the car for would cost by train instead: a return ticket between most major Spanish cities runs roughly €20-60 depending on distance and how far ahead you book. So even 2-3 weekend trips a month by train is often cheaper than the parking alone, before you count fuel, tolls, insurance, or the emissions-sticker fines mentioned elsewhere in this thread. The case where the math flips is if you're actually stopping in smaller towns off the rail network - then a car earns its cost back fast. But for Valencia/Malaga/Alicante specifically, which are all on decent rail lines, the car is very likely to be the more expensive option once you total a full month rather than looking at it trip by trip.