Berlin 🇩🇪

Not as a ticket — nothing in Berlin lets you tap a bank card and ride on it — but your card is how you pay for a ticket, and on a bus it is the only thing that works.

There is no reader to tap on the U-Bahn, the S-Bahn, a tram, a regional train or a ferry, and no gates either. Berlin runs on proof of payment: you buy a ticket, stamp it in one of the orange Entwerter boxes if it is paper, and show it when an inspector asks. A bank card is a way of paying for that ticket and never the ticket itself.

Where the card does pay, it is worth knowing which machine reads a tap. On board a BVG bus the small card machine beside the driver takes a contactless card or a phone wallet and nothing else — BVG's own phrase is Nur kontaktlose Kartenzahlung, contactless card payment only — so no coins, no notes, and no card pushed into a slot for a PIN. BVG's stationary machines at stations and its Kundenzentren, the customer centres, take a tap as well, alongside coins and cards. On board a tram the machine takes coins and nothing else. S-Bahn Berlin is the one to arrive prepared for: its ticket page lists cards taken in the slot with a PIN — Mastercard, Visa, Girocard, Maestro and V Pay — while its own news announcement says a ticket can now be bought at those machines without cash and without entering a PIN. The two S-Bahn pages do not say the same thing, so go to an S-Bahn machine knowing your PIN and treat a tap that works as a bonus.

So carry one tappable card for the bus, and buy your tram and U-Bahn tickets at a BVG station machine, a BVG customer centre or in the BVG app before you board.

No. There is no reader on a U-Bahn platform that takes a bank card as a fare and no gate to open with one. Berlin is a proof-of-payment city: you carry a ticket and show it when an inspector asks, and a card is only ever how you bought it.

Buying it is easy enough on the platform. BVG's stationary ticket machines take a contactless tap, a card with a PIN and coins, and banknotes at some of them; a BVG Kundenzentrum, one of its customer centres, takes all of those without qualification; and the BVG Ticket-App sells the same tickets against Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal or a credit card. A paper ticket then has to be stamped in the orange Entwerter on the platform before you go down to the train — buying it is not validating it — while an app ticket is live from the moment you buy it.

Travelling on an unstamped or missing ticket is a €60 penalty, and an inspector will not be interested in the money having left your bank. Buy at the machine, stamp it beside the machine, then take the train.

Not as a ticket — a Berlin bus has no fare reader that turns a tapped bank card into a fare, so you cannot tap your way aboard. But as a way of paying it is the only thing that works. The driver sells you the ticket, and BVG's rule for paying for it is Nur kontaktlose Kartenzahlung — contactless card payment only. Hold a card or a phone wallet to the small card machine beside the driver. Coins, notes and a card pushed into a slot for a PIN are all refused.

What you get is the ordinary ticket: the same zones at the same price, with nothing added for buying it on board, and the usual 120 minutes of onward travel on it.

If your card will not tap, buy before you board. A stationary machine at a station takes coins, and a BVG Kundenzentrum — one of its customer centres — takes coins and notes; that ticket is valid on the bus, and you stamp it in the Entwerter box inside the vehicle as you get on, or show it to the driver on routes where everyone boards at the front door. Travelling with nothing valid is a €60 penalty. Otherwise it is simple: get on at the front, tap the card machine, take the ticket.

€60, and it is the same €60 whoever you are riding with: BVG, S-Bahn Berlin and Deutsche Bahn's regional trains all charge it. Berlin has no ticket gates and no touching in, so nothing stops you boarding — the check comes later, when an inspector asks, and by then it is too late to buy anything.

The commonest way a visitor earns it is not fare-dodging at all. A paper ticket bought in advance is not valid until it is stamped. Put it into the yellow or red box on the U-Bahn or S-Bahn platform before you go down to the train, or into the box inside the bus or the tram as you board. An unstamped ticket in your pocket counts as no ticket, and the full €60 applies.

There is one reduction and it is narrow: if you did hold a valid personal season ticket at the time and simply could not produce it, the charge drops to €7, and only if you prove it within 7 days of the check. Having no ticket at all, or an unstamped one, does not qualify for it. So stamp a paper ticket before you step on board; a ticket bought in the BVG app needs no stamp.

FEX (Flughafen-Express), the airport express train, reaches central Berlin in about 23 minutes and charges an ordinary fare: a Berlin ABC single is €5.00, or €3.50 at the reduced rate. There is no airport supplement on it of any kind. The S9 and S85 S-Bahn trains and the RE20, which shares the FEX's fast corridor, cost exactly the same; the RB22, RB24 and RB32 charge the same fare again but run to outer interchanges rather than into the centre.

The trap here is the zone, not the price. The airport sits in tariff zone C, and the Berlin AB ticket you would buy for everything else in the city does not reach it. Either buy the ABC ticket outright, or, if you already hold an AB ticket, add an Anschlussfahrausweis for zone C at €2.40, or €1.80 reduced. A whole day across all three zones is €12.90 on a 24-Stunden-Karte, €8.00 reduced. One more thing worth knowing on the platform: the Intercity that calls at the same airport station is a long-distance service, and neither a VBB zone ticket nor the Deutschlandticket is valid on it.

The buses cost the same and no more. The X7 and X71 run to U Rudow, where you change onto the U-Bahn; the N7X, N7 and N60 run through the night. A taxi from the airport is charged on its own cross-border tariff with a surcharge covering the taxi holding area, and the fixed-price option available elsewhere in Berlin is not offered on a trip starting here. Which terminal each of these leaves from is set out on the Berlin Airport (BER) page. Buy the ABC ticket at a machine in the terminal and stamp it at the box on the platform before you board.

Under 6, yes, and with no conditions attached. A child under 6 travels free on any VBB-tariff service in Berlin, without a ticket, without being tied to any particular ticket type, and without having to be with an adult.

From 6 to 14 inclusive a child pays the Ermäßigt fare, VBB's reduced tier. A single Einzelfahrausweis for Berlin AB costs €2.50 rather than the adult €4.00, and Berlin ABC €3.50 rather than €5.00; a 24-Stunden-Karte costs €7.40 for Berlin AB rather than €11.20, and €8.00 for Berlin ABC rather than €12.90. The same reduced tier applies to short-trip and 4-trip tickets, and to the Potsdam and Brandenburg-town equivalents.

There is often a way round paying it. Up to three children aged 6 to 14 ride free alongside one adult of 15 or over who is holding a Regeltarif 24-Stunden-Karte for Berlin AB, Berlin ABC or Potsdam AB — the full-price day ticket, not the reduced one — with no separate child ticket needed. The same free carriage rides on a VBB-Umweltkarte, a monthly or season ticket, but only between 20:00 and 03:00 Monday to Friday, and all day on Saturdays, Sundays, public holidays and 24 and 31 December. So before you buy children tickets of their own, price one adult full-fare 24-Stunden-Karte and count how many of your party are between 6 and 14.

Almost everywhere you buy a ticket, and nowhere on a bus. Berlin has no gates, so cash never opens anything: it buys the paper ticket you then stamp and carry.

The outlets differ, and the difference matters if a banknote is all you have. BVG's customer centres take coins and notes without qualification, and sell app tickets as well as paper ones. BVG's stationary ticket machines at stations always take coins, but take banknotes only at selected machines. The machines on board the trams take coins and nothing else — no notes and no card of any kind, so board a tram with change or with a ticket already bought. S-Bahn Berlin's own machines take coins and notes and give change at some of them, though they will not read a contactless tap; a card has to go into the slot for a PIN. Deutsche Bahn's regional machines take coins and notes too.

The bus is the exception and it is absolute: a BVG bus takes no cash whatsoever. BVG's own phrase for it is "Nur kontaktlose Kartenzahlung" — contactless card payment only — and it means what it says, because a card pushed in for a PIN is refused there as well. So keep a tappable card for the bus, and spend your coins at a station machine or a customer centre before you need one.

No — a Berlin bus is the one place in the city where cash buys nothing at all. BVG's own phrase for the rule is "Nur kontaktlose Kartenzahlung": contactless card payment only. Coins and notes are refused outright, and so is a card pushed into a slot for a PIN. It has to be a tap.

The driver does still sell you a ticket. Hold a contactless bank card or a phone wallet to the small card machine beside the driver and you get the ordinary ticket everyone else is carrying — the same zones and the same price, with no surcharge for buying it on board.

If you have no tappable card, buy before you get on. Stationary machines at U-Bahn and S-Bahn stations take coins, and BVG's customer centres take notes as well; that ticket is valid on the bus, and you validate it in the box inside the vehicle as you board.

Yes, and in Berlin it is the easiest way to buy. The BVG Ticket-App and the Fahrinfo-App both sell the whole range — the single Einzelfahrschein, the short-hop Kurzstrecke, the 24-Stunden-Karte, a monthly, and the Berlin WelcomeCard and CityTourCard — paid by Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal or a credit card, and a foreign card works in the app. An app ticket also spares you the stamping step that catches visitors out on paper: it runs from the moment you buy it, and you simply show it when an inspector asks.

Two things to know before you download anything else. For the Deutschlandticket, a flat €63.00 a month, buy it inside the BVG Ticket-App or the Fahrinfo-App, or in Deutsche Bahn's DB Navigator — not through BVG's web shop, which takes only a SEPA direct debit from a German address and which a visitor cannot complete. And Jelbi is BVG's app for hired bikes, scooters, car-share and taxis; whether it sells transit tickets itself is not established, so do not arrive at a platform relying on it.

Install the BVG Ticket-App before you fly, buy the ticket you need while you are standing on the platform, and open it in the app when you are asked to show it.

Fares yes; journey times only for airports. Fares, caps and penalties are printed where an operator publishes them, with the source beside each figure. Journey times appear only on the airport pages, as the rough time from the airport to the centre where one is published; there are no timetables here. For a live departure or a door-to-door route, use the operator's own journey planner.