Switzerland vignette 2026

The Swiss vignette costs €42.99 (CHF 40) for a car up to 3.5 t; the displayed euro equivalent follows the exchange rate. There is no daily, weekly or monthly rate: the product is annual, even for a short transit.

Driving on a Swiss motorway without a valid vignette leads to a real fine, not a warning or a later settlement offer.

Customs officers, cantonal police and roadside checks enforce the rule. Switzerland can also verify e-vignette registrations against the vehicle plate.

No — and the federal law is unusually blunt about it. The National Roads Charge Act (NSAG, SR 741.71) requires the sticker to be affixed, or the plate registered, before the first use of a class 1 or class 2 national road in the charging period (Art. 7(2) and Art. 7a(1)). There is no grace period, no substitute-toll offer as in Austria, and no compensatory charge as in Bulgaria. If you are checked without a valid vignette, you are fined.

Three further points are worth knowing before you rely on goodwill:

The one genuine piece of leeway is the validity window. Art. 8(2) NSAG makes the charge valid from 1 December of the previous year to 31 January of the following year — fourteen months, not twelve. A January trip is still covered by the previous year's vignette. The flip side of Art. 8(1) is that the charge is levied per calendar year and is never refunded: buying in December for a single crossing costs the same €42.99 (CHF 40) as buying in January.

Roads requiring the vignette

The Swiss vignette applies to all national motorways and expressways — both 1st-class Nationalstraßen (motorways, green signs) and 2nd-class Nationalstraßen (semi-motorways and expressways). This covers the entire federal high-speed road network managed by ASTRA (Federal Roads Office), approximately 1,870 km of roads across the country. The main transit axes are the A1 (Geneva–Zurich–St. Gallen), the A2 (Basel–Lucerne–Bellinzona–Chiasso) and the A3 (Basel–Zurich–Sargans).

Free roads — no vignette needed

All cantonal roads (Kantonsstraßen), communal roads and urban streets are completely free. This includes non-motorway through routes, valley roads, mountain passes not upgraded to expressway standard, and any road not part of the federal motorway network. Drivers can traverse Switzerland using cantonal roads without a vignette — but most cross-country journeys will use at least one national road section. Switzerland offers no short-term vignette for a single day, so any motorway use — even a brief entry — requires the annual €42.99 (CHF 40) product.

Driving through more than one country on this trip? The Europe vignette route planner works out, country by country, which vignettes your whole route needs.