What a Taxi Ride Actually Costs: Real Fare Examples Explained

We've explained Montenegro's metered tariff structure elsewhere in detail. This post skips the theory and just does the math, three real, worked examples so you can see what an actual ride costs rather than just reading a rate table. A quick note before we start: these are illustrative calculations based on the published rate structure, not guaranteed quotes. Your actual fare reflects the exact distance, route, and time your ride takes.

The rates, briefly

Tarifa 1, standard daytime rate: a €1.00 boarding fee, then €2.00 minimum / €1.45 per kilometer within the city, or €5.00 minimum / €1.10 per kilometer in the suburbs. Waiting is free for the first 3 minutes, then €0.20 a minute.

Tarifa 2, night and holiday rate: €1.75 per kilometer within the city, a modest step up from the daytime rate.

Tarifa 3, out-of-town rate: used for trips genuinely leaving Bar for another town, €1.75 per kilometer for the city portion of the route and €1.10 per kilometer once you're on the open road.

If you want the full explanation of why the system works this way, see our main comparison guide, which links out to the full tariff explainer.

Example 1: a 5-kilometer ride within Bar, daytime

Say you're heading from a hotel near the port to somewhere across town, a straightforward 5-kilometer trip in the middle of the day.

• Boarding fee: €1.00
• Distance: 5 km × €1.45/km = €7.25
• Total: roughly €8.25

That's well above the €2.00 city minimum, so the minimum doesn't come into play here, it's only a floor for very short hops. A 1 or 2-kilometer trip across town, for comparison, would land closer to that €2.00 to €4.00 range once the boarding fee and distance are added in.

Example 2: a 20-kilometer ride out to the suburbs, daytime

Now say you're heading further out, to one of the towns along the coast, a 20-kilometer trip that falls into the suburban tier once you're outside the immediate town center.

• Boarding fee: €1.00
• Distance: 20 km × €1.10/km = €22.00
• Total: roughly €23.00

Notice the per-kilometer rate is actually lower once you're in the suburban tier, €1.10 versus €1.45 in the city. Longer trips end up costing less per kilometer than short in-town hops, which is a fairly normal feature of tariff systems built around distance.

If a trip like this genuinely crosses out of Bar municipality entirely, to another town for a day trip, for example, it would instead fall under Tarifa 3, which uses a higher rate for the portion of the route still inside town limits and the same open-road rate once you're clear of it. We cover exactly how that pricing plays out for specific day-trip routes in our day trips guide.

Example 3: the same 5-kilometer ride, but at night

Take the exact same in-town trip from Example 1, but this time it's late evening, after the switch to the night and holiday tariff.

• Boarding fee: €1.00
• Distance: 5 km × €1.75/km = €8.75
• Total: roughly €9.75

Compared to the daytime version of the same ride (€8.25), that's about €1.50 more for a short in-town trip. The night surcharge is real, but it's a modest difference rather than a dramatic one, and it scales with distance the same way the daytime rate does.

What waiting time adds

If your driver ends up waiting on you, say, while you run into a pharmacy or wrap up a meeting, the first 3 minutes are free. After that, it's €0.20 a minute. Ten minutes of waiting works out to 7 billable minutes, or an extra €1.40 on top of the fare. It's a small line item, but worth knowing if you're planning a ride with a stop built in.

Why this matters more than it might seem

Because the fare is calculated from a fixed, published structure rather than a curbside negotiation, you can actually do this math yourself before you ride, or at least sanity-check the number the app shows you. That predictability is worth something on its own, especially if you're budgeting for a longer stay or comparing costs against other ways of getting around.

Comparing this to other options

If you're weighing whether a taxi is worth it against a rental car or the local bus for your specific trip, our comparisons in taxi vs. rental car and taxi vs. local bus go through that tradeoff in more depth. And if you want a broader sense of how far common destinations actually are before working out the cost, our distance and time guide is a good next stop.

Booking

You can book a ride through the Greencar.me Taxi app on Android or the App Store on iPhone, and see a fare estimate before you confirm, as long as your pickup point is inside Bar municipality.