Driving in Netherlands: licence, roads and tolls

Free motorways with a daytime limit of 100 km/h, and a country designed around bicycles rather than cars.

• The motorway limit is 100 km/h between 06:00 and 19:00 and 130 at night, with three motorways exempted from the daytime limit since April 2025. Average-speed cameras cover long stretches and the fines arrive without fail.
• Cyclists have priority and their own infrastructure. Turning across a cycle path, opening a door into one, or stopping on one are the three ways a visitor gets into trouble in Amsterdam or Utrecht.
• The alcohol limit is 0.5 g/l, and 0.2 g/l for drivers in their first five years.
• City parking is expensive and enforced by camera cars that read plates as they drive past. Pay by app or expect a fine within days.
• Amsterdam is a bad place to keep a car. The P+R sites at the ring road are cheap and come with transit tickets into town.