We are standing in Smíchov, it is eight in the morning, and Daniel is trying to fit into a parking bay that was evidently designed by someone who had never seen an estate car or an SUV. Third attempt. A lady in an electric Fiat waits patiently behind us and pretends not to look. It works in the end, we get out, and I think to myself – this is exactly the moment when you appreciate that you did not leave 1,100 CZK (about €45) in a central garage for the day, but are standing here instead, where tram number nine takes you to the National Theatre in seven minutes.
Parking in Prague has a reputation as a nightmare, and honestly, it partly deserves it. But over the years we have been driving here, we have refined a system that works: where to leave the car, when to reach for a paid garage and when a metro ticket is enough instead, and whether it pays to sleep on the edge of the city or to pay extra for the centre. That is what this article is about – and it is a follow-up to our complete guide to Prague, which is worth going back to if you are also working out what to see in Prague and how to plan your route.
Let’s be honest about it: parking spaces in central Prague are pitifully scarce, and what does exist is either a residential blue zone – as a visitor you can park there for just one hour (in the centre) or three (outside it), and only via the app – there are no ticket machines in the blue zone – or an expensive car park. Anyone who thinks they can circle three blocks and find a free spot on the street near Staroměstské náměstí is more likely to spend the whole morning doing it than to save a few hundred crowns.
A car in central Prague stands still – in the most literal sense of the word – most of the time. It pays to leave it where it is cheap and to handle the rest of the day by tram and metro.
Our strategy is simple: park on the edge or somewhere with good tram access, and travel into the centre by public transport. It sounds boring, but it works brilliantly and it also saves you hunting for a space in a blue zone, where as a visitor in Prague 1 or Prague 2 you may only stay an hour, and only via the app.
For me, Smíchov is clearly the best compromise between price, accessibility and comfort. From here tram 9 straight into the centre – to Národní divadlo, to shopping centre Máj and to Václavské náměstí it’s just a few stops away, and the journey takes no more than 10–15 minutes. Tram 15 goes a different way, but also into the centre: via Malostranské náměstí all the way to náměstí Republiky, in other words straight to Palladium. No transfers, no wandering through the metro with suitcases.
OC Nový Smíchov (Kartouzská 233/9, Prague 5) Open in Google Maps has one of the best parking deals in all of Prague, if you know how to use it. On weekdays the first hour of parking is free, and at weekends and on public holidays you get three hours free. Once the free time runs out, every additional hour started costs 70 CZK (about €2.9).
CAREFUL: the free time counts only once per visit – the system tracks the number plate and free parking can only be used again more than 2 hours after leaving the car park. So you cannot drive out and straight back in to “extend” your free hour. But you can leave the car park and come back within the free hour (or three) free of charge if you have not used it all up. Daniel and I sometimes do exactly that when we want to nip somewhere briefly and then come back to the car park.
The car park is open daily from 5.50 to midnight, which has always been enough for us – even after a later dinner in the centre you can get back here comfortably. If you want to leave the car here for the whole weekend, you can use the discounted weekend card from Friday 16:00 to Sunday 18:00 for 590 CZK (about €24) with an unlimited number of entries and exits – handy if you are also planning a trip outside Prague.
When Nový Smíchov is full (which happens mainly on weekend afternoons), we move a few hundred metres further to the garages under the CineStar cinema in the Anděl City complex (Radlická 3227/1f, Prague 5). Open in Google Maps An hour here costs 50 CZK and a full day 1 000 CZK. The hourly rate is lower than at Smíchov (70 CZK), but thanks to the free first hour, Smíchov works out cheaper on weekdays for roughly the first three hours of parking – from four hours on, Anděl already becomes the better deal (200 CZK against 210 CZK). At weekends, when you get a full three hours free at Smíchov, it keeps the edge up to ten hours of parking; from the eleventh hour Anděl is cheaper, and it also has a 1 000 CZK daily cap. Anděl City’s main advantage, though, is different: the car park is open round the clock, seven days a week, so you can get in even late in the evening. Between 02:00 and 05:30, though, you can only drive in with a long-term rental card. Watch out for the maximum permitted vehicle height of 2 metres – with a van, a roof box, or anything taller than an ordinary estate car, you won’t fit in.
Our tip: If you are planning on the cinema, CineStar visitors park here for the first 5 hours free – you just need to have your ticket validated at the multiplex box office.
When we really need to be in the heart of Prague – for dinner around the Old Town Square, say, or for a visitor who cannot walk that far – we take the car straight to OC Palladium (náměstí Republiky 1, Prague 1). Open in Google Maps It is the largest underground garage in Prague 1, with 700 parking spaces on three underground levels. Daniel always drives straight down one level below the entrance; there are far more spaces there every time. Because we have a compact SUV (hello to our Toyota Corolla Cross!), we find it easier to manoeuvre on the lower levels. There are plenty of spaces everywhere, though, and you fit nicely around the bends.
The hourly rate is 65 CZK (about €2.7), the same on a weekday as at the weekend – Palladium does not distinguish tariffs by day of the week, which is a pleasant simplification compared with other garages. All-day parking comes to 1,100 CZK for 24 hours.
Our tip: If you come to Prague regularly, it pays to buy a pack of 20 hourly coupons for 1,000 CZK – an hour then works out at 50 CZK instead of the usual 65 CZK. You can get the pack at the reception of the office part of the building, but only on working days.
Palladium is the only car park of our three where there is no point working out whether you are coming on a weekday or at the weekend – the price is always the same
Palladium is not the only option. When it is full, or when you are heading somewhere other than náměstí Republiky, two more guarded underground garages work reliably:
If you need to stand in the centre for a genuinely whole day, the hourly rate adds up to an unpleasant number – at Palladium that is 1,100 CZK for 24 hours. There is a cheaper way, though: Mr. Parkit rents out free spaces in private garages and courtyards right in the centre, in Panská street for example. You reserve the space in advance through the app and pay significantly less than in an ordinary parking house. For a whole day in the centre it is, in our view, the cheapest sensible option.
Our tip: Book well in advance. In December, when the whole country descends on the centre for the Christmas markets, the spaces sell out several days ahead.
Emergency option: the Wilsonova car park by the main railway station. It is not the cheapest and it is nothing pretty, but it is close to the centre and there tends to be a space even when the surrounding garages are full.
If you are arriving in Prague from the north (from the D8 motorway, say) or you simply want to leave the car as cheaply as possible for the whole day, P+R Letňany (by the Letňany metro station on line C) is the obvious choice. An open, unguarded car park directly on metro line C with almost 700 spaces, and above all – the price is 50 CZK for the first 24 hours and only 10 CZK for every additional hour, with no limit on how long you stay. It is clearly the cheapest “big” car park in Prague that we have found.
From Letňany it’s somewhat further by metro into the centre than from Smíchov (the metro runs from Letňany to Muzeum, i.e. to the top end of Václavák, in 18 minutes), so we’d recommend Letňany more as the first stop after arriving in Prague – you leave the car here for the whole stay and move around by metro, or as parking when you are heading for the PVA Letňany exhibition grounds – the Harry Potter exhibition is running there at the moment, for instance – or to the Letňany shopping centre.
CAREFUL: The purple (mixed) zones right along the streets around Letňany are chargeable 24 hours a day, seven days a week – even at weekends. On weekdays you’ll pay 20 CZK/h there, and at weekends 5 CZK/h – so weekends aren’t a big deal, but during the week P+R at 50 CZK for the whole day is incomparably cheaper. Don’t rely on “you don’t pay overnight in a purple zone” – unfortunately, that’s not true in Letňany.
Letňany is not the only good park-and-ride in Prague – depending on where you are coming from, it pays to choose a different one. All of those below are run directly by the city (TSK, a.s.) or by the public transport company, so the prices are just as transparent as at Letňany – 50 CZK for the first 24 hours, 10 CZK for every additional hour, with no limit on the total parking time. The exception is Zahradní Město – that one is free, but it only has 31 spaces and a maximum of 12 hours.
For me the great thing is that practically wherever you arrive in Prague from, there is a park-and-ride within 10–15 minutes’ drive for a few tens of crowns a day. Just bear in mind that spaces cannot be reserved in advance – in the morning peak it happens that they are full. And if you are planning to head out of Prague by car instead, we have a separate rundown of day trips from Prague.
Definitely yes, and here is the maths. A 30-minute ticket in the PID Lítačka app costs 36 CZK (about €1.5) and a 90-minute one 46 CZK – that is cheaper than one extra hour in a central garage, where the rate ranges between 50 and 70 CZK. (This does not apply at park-and-ride sites, where every additional hour costs only 10 CZK – there it pays to leave the car standing.) The best approach, though, is to count the whole day at once: a P+R for 50 CZK plus a 24-hour ticket for 140 CZK comes to 190 CZK and covers unlimited journeys by metro, tram and bus. All-day parking at Palladium costs 1,100 CZK. That is a difference that pays for dinner for two.
So is it actually true that cheaper accommodation on the edge of Prague saves money in the end, once you have to add tickets on top? Yes – even with public transport tickets it is practically always cheaper to sleep outside Prague 1 and commute than to pay the premium for a location in the very centre. The difference in the room price tends to be considerably higher than a few tens of crowns for a ticket.
| Validity | Standard ticket | Ticket in the PID Lítačka app | Valid on the Petřín funicular |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 minutes | 39 CZK / €1.6 | 36 CZK / €1.5 | No |
| 90 minutes | 50 CZK / €2.1 | 46 CZK / €1.9 | No |
| 24 hours | 150 CZK / €6.2 | 140 CZK / €5.8 | Yes |
| 72 hours | 350 CZK / €14 | 340 CZK / €14 | Yes |
You can buy a ticket from a machine at the stop, in the PID Lítačka app, at sales points, or by tapping a contactless payment card on the self-service validator in the vehicle or at the stop. The shorter 30 and 90-minute tickets are not valid on the Petřín funicular – you need at least a 24-hour one.
Our tip: Before you take advice from someone in the street or from a “hop-on hop-off” seller, download the PID Lítačka (App Store / Google Play) or Google Maps – the app will recommend the cheapest ticket straight away and show current tram and metro connections more accurately than any ticket seller.
Hotels outside Prague 1 almost always have their own car park or garage – something only a handful of luxury addresses in the centre can afford. We have picked four tried and tested options in Prague 8, 9 and 4, all with good metro access to the centre.
Chosen from our own experience
If you want to be closer to the centre on foot and only rarely mind a tram ride, this pair in Smíchov is the ideal compromise for me – and it is in exactly the area where we park ourselves.
And if the side closer to the Old Town and Palladium appeals to you more, this pair in Karlín fits exactly:
Counting on “a free space in the centre”. In our first year Daniel and I drove around Malá Strana for almost an hour looking for a space that simply did not exist. Now we know – as a visitor in Prague 1 you cannot park legally almost anywhere. Either there are no spaces, or the price is too high, or there is a time limit (max 1 hour, for example).
Paying cash where you cannot. Not every car park takes cards and not every garage takes cash – check in advance so that you are not standing at the barrier with an empty wallet. Shopping centres take cards practically always.
Ignoring the purple zones outside the centre. We thought that “an outlying zone means cheaper or free at the weekend”. In Letňany that is only partly true – the zones are charged non-stop.
If you are coming to Prague for just one day without luggage and want to be as close to the centre as possible regardless of price, you may prefer to park straight at Palladium and not move anywhere. And if you are travelling with small children and a pushchair, bear in mind that changing to a tram from Smíchov means a little more handling than a hotel right in Prague 1.
It does not always pay to head straight for a garage. If you only need to stop in the centre for a moment – to deal with something at an office, pick up a parcel or just nip out for a coffee – go ahead and park directly in a blue, purple or orange zone. In that situation the most convenient app for me is Citymove. It handles parking payments in all Prague zones including the blue ones, and the main thing – you can save any number of number plates in it, so if you alternate between two cars (or borrow your parents’ one, say), you do not have to rewrite anything. On top of that, directly in the map you see in colour where each zone begins and ends, so it cannot happen that you accidentally stand a little further along in a more expensive band.
The biggest advantage over a classic parking machine is this one, though: you can end the parking early at any time. So you really only pay for the time you spend there – no rounding up to whole hours in advance as with a paper ticket. The app also warns you before your time runs out, and extending it takes one click straight from your phone, with no running back to the machine.
You will find the app free of charge on the App Store and on Google Play.
CAREFUL: Citymove charges a service fee on top of the parking price – max. 15 % of the parking price, but at least 2 CZK. You always see the exact amount before paying, right in the app, so there are no unpleasant surprises. Even with the fee, for short stops of a few tens of minutes you still come out better than with a paper ticket, where you pay for a whole hour in advance.
Our tip: We recommend this option more for short stops of a few tens of minutes up to a couple of hours. For a whole day in the centre a garage with a fixed all-day rate is still better, because the hourly rate in the streets of central Prague 1 can climb quite high.
If you do not fancy paying an extra service fee, there is one more way – the app PID Lítačka, which you will have on your phone anyway for public transport tickets. It can also pay for parking directly in all paid parking zones across Prague, with one click by card, Apple Pay or Google Pay. Just as with Citymove, you can save your car’s number plate, extend the parking easily, and see an overview of the zones and the P+R car parks with their current capacity in the map.
The main difference from Citymove: on top of the parking price, PID Lítačka charges no service fee, so you pay exactly what the parking itself costs. The drawback tends to be a somewhat plainer interface specifically for parking – Citymove has a more polished map of colour-coded zones and handles several vehicles at once more smoothly. For me it is more a matter of personal preference, though; both apps work reliably and both are free to download.
You will find the PID Lítačka app on the App Store and on Google Play.
Practically nowhere in the centre. The closest you get to “free” is the OC Nový Smíchov car park, where you have the first hour free on a weekday and three hours free at the weekend. The free time counts only once per visit, though; the system tracks the number plate and you can only use it again more than two hours after leaving. For a whole day the cheapest option is a P+R park-and-ride at 50 CZK for the first 24 hours.
At OC Palladium, the largest underground garage in Prague 1, an hour costs 65 CZK on a weekday and at the weekend alike, and the all-day rate comes to 1,100 CZK. If you come to Prague regularly, a pack of 20 hourly coupons for 1,000 CZK is worth it, bringing an hour down to 50 CZK. For a whole day in the centre, though, a space reserved through Mr. Parkit works out cheaper than the all-day rate in a garage.
Practically not. The blue zones in Prague 1 are intended primarily for residents and as a visitor you are not entitled to park there at a reduced price. The only real options are paid underground garages such as Palladium, or a short stay in a zone paid through the Citymove or PID Lítačka app.
Park-and-ride car parks cost 50 CZK for the first 24 hours and 10 CZK for every additional hour. A public transport ticket is not included; you buy it separately – in the PID Lítačka app 30 minutes comes to 36 CZK, 90 minutes to 46 CZK and a whole day to 140 CZK.
Yes. The car park is unguarded but open non-stop and there is no limit on how long you stay. For the first 24 hours you pay 50 CZK and 10 CZK for every additional hour, a fraction of what an hour in a central garage costs.
The most sensible choice is one of the P+R park-and-ride car parks – Letňany, Chodov, Zličín or Skalka depending on which direction you arrive from. There is no limit on the length of stay. Bear in mind, though, that after the first 24 hours you are charged 10 CZK for every additional hour rather than a flat daily rate, so for a longer stay it is better to work the total out or check the current tariff on site.
It depends on the zone. In the purple residential zones in the outlying districts, in Letňany for instance, you pay 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, so do not count on “free at the weekend”. You can see the current validity of a particular zone in colour, right in the map of the Citymove app.
No. Coupon packs, at Palladium for example, only pay off with repeat visits. For a single weekend it is enough to use the discounted weekend card at Nový Smíchov for 590 CZK from Friday 16:00 to Sunday 18:00 with unlimited entries, or the standard hourly rate.
Our combination: park in Smíchov or Letňany, sleep in a hotel with its own parking outside Prague 1, and handle the rest of the stay by tram and metro. You will save tens of per cent compared with what you would pay for parking and accommodation right in the heart of the city – and believe us, after a day on your feet in the centre you will also appreciate returning to the hotel by tram rather than on foot across half of Prague. If you are continuing further south after Prague, we have exactly the same rundown of parking and accommodation for Český Krumlov by car. And if you’re still choosing a neighbourhood, we’ve written a separate guide to where to stay in Prague – it covers the parking situation and the time into the centre for every part of the city.
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