Navigating the Turkish Tolls
Establishing the driving rules of a new country comes with various challenges, but one of the biggest I have found can be the tolls road requirements! In Türkiye finding information about the toll system seems to be like gold dust, its not mentioned at the border and I could only find basic information online prior to arriving, and once here it was still very hard to find any useful information. (Türkiye is the 20th country I’ve travelled to in my motorhome but has by far the most difficult toll system to navigate!)
What are the Turkish Tolls
Turkey does not operate an electronic or adhesive vignette; it instead has a fast toll system called HGS (Hızlı Geçiş Sistemi) which was developed to allow the traffic to flow more efficiently at the toll booths. It was put into operation by the General Directorate of PTT (an abbreviation for Posta ve Telgraf Teşkilatı (Post and Telegraph Agency), is the national post and telegraph directorate of Turkey) in September 2012.
How to use the HGS System?
To use the toll roads, you must attach a HGS tag to the windscreen, the tag links to your vehicle registration number and vehicle class (Sinif) and has a chip which is read as you pass through the toll booth and the charges deducted from your account. As you pass through a toll booth the light will change to green and the cost of the toll and your vehicle class will be displayed.
Toll roads in Türkiye are calculated based on the distance driven on the toll section and the class of the vehicle. Rates for each toll road/bridge vary.
Vehicles with foreign licence plates must register for HGS before using the toll roads and must have sufficient credit in the account before passing through toll roads.
Where are the toll roads in Turkey?
The toll roads in Turkey are all motorway sections which start with an “O” for Otoban or specific bridges/tunnels that connect the European side of Turkey to the Asian side.
They are signposted on the side of the road on the approach to them.
A photo can say more than a thousand words, so the below map visually shows where the toll roads/bridges are based around the country.
The official map of all toll roads can be found on the website of the General Directorate of Motorways of Turkey: https://www.kgm.gov.tr/SiteCollectionImages/KGMimages/Haritalar/turistik.jpg
This is the most accurate and up to date information. The map is not very user friendly, but you can zoom in and out for more detail, this is the map for the Istanbul area showing the toll sections highlighted in pink:
How much do the tolls cost?
This varies depending on how far you travel on the toll road and what class of vehicle you are in, below are the bridge/tunnel prices as of December 2025 in Turkish Lira.
Bridges/Tunnels:
All details are available on the KGM Website here - https://www.kgm.gov.tr/Sayfalar/KGM/SiteEng/Root/Tolls.aspx
Eurasia Tunnel (Avrasya Tüneli)
The following vehicles are prohibited from using the tunnel: Bicycles, scooters, buses, trucks, towing vehicles, vehicles with more than 2 axles, vehicles over 5000kg, vehicles carrying dangerous goods and vehicles over 2.8 meters.
All details are available on the tunnel website here - https://www.avrasyatuneli.com/
What are the Vehicle Classes?
On bridges and highways, HGS users are charged based on six classes of vehicle fees.
What happens if I don’t pay the toll charges?
If you use a toll road/bridge either without a HGS account or with an insufficient balance, if you open an account within 15 days, or top up your balance within this time, then no penalty will be applied (In theory, but this wasn’t my experience – see below on how to check for unpaid tolls to prevent fines)
If you don’t take the measures to pay the toll, then the fine can be four times the original charge if paid between the 15th- 45th day since the violation. If it’s not paid, then this can increase to up to ten times the original cost!
Turkish Custom Authorities will not allow the vehicles with foreign licence plates to leave the country if they have unpaid toll fines. Therefore, it’s important you check if you have any unpaid toll fees, violation or toll fine and pay the debts before arriving at the border to leave.
How to get a HGS toll tag
It’s best to buy your toll tag just after crossing the border as then you wont miss any tolls, they can be purchased from the PTT (Turkish post office) at booths inside the borders coming in from Bulgaria and Greece, however they are only open during office hours so by the time I had spent 4 hours navigating the border it was past 5pm and the booth had shut. I set the sat nav to avoid the toll roads until I could get to a post office (I still somehow seemed to end up on part of a toll road and I got a fine that I found a month later once I had more information on the toll system!)
Once you find a PTT (post office), you will need to take your passport, your original V5/vehicle registration document and cash to pay for it, they give you a form to fill in so they can process the tag for you, linking it to your vehicle registration number and setting the class. It cost 550 TL in Nov 2025 (11.09 EUR) but I didn’t know at the time that the tag was only 110 TL and I got 440 TL credit on my account for this. They didn’t give me any information on how to use it, where to put it or how to top it up again!
Once you have your tag stick it to the windscreen just under your rear view mirror (make sure its still on the clear part of the glass)
How to top up your account?
You can do this in a PTT branch, however they are not very forthcoming with what is owning on your account, but they can tell you the balance, you can only use cash to add money to your account. (Being a post office there is normally a cash machine outside)
(I’ve added screenshots in Turkish and English as if you are using a mobile and change the language to English, this will revert to Turkish again when you move to the next page)
You can top up online by going to: https://pttbank.ptt.gov.tr and clicking on the HGS button on the left side of the page.
Then fill in either your passport number or HGS tag number, your vehicle registration number and select the box for the amount you want to top up with.
This website can be temperamental so doesn’t always work, if you get an error on the next page you will need to go to a PTT branch to top up or try again later.
How to manage your account online?
Only after being in Türkiye for five weeks, I found out a better way to manage and track my toll usage! Visit: http://hgsmusteri.ptt.gov.tr/
Go to top right corner to “Customer Service Login” and “Become a member”
Enter the information, The Tax number being your passport number as this was the document used to create your HGS account and tick the Captcha box.
The message that comes up looks like it failed it didn’t, they will have sent you an email
The email looks like this, click on the link in the red box to activate your account:
Then you can log into the website with your email address and the password you set:
Once logged in, click on “Accounts” and it shows your current balance:
I’ve noticed that the page times out really quickly so if when you click on the buttons nothing happens try logging out and back in again.
From here you can also view your “Transitions” which shows all your toll crossings and if they have been paid:
If you have any unpaid tolls they will show under the “Violations” button:
The “Balance Transactions” button will show all the credits/deductions on your account, you can only search by one calendar month at a time, or it will give you an error:
Paying violations/overdue tolls online
If you have any violations/overdue tolls, these can be paid online here: https://webihlaltakip.kgm.gov.tr/WebIhlalSorgulama/Sayfalar/Sorgulama
Fill in your vehicle registration number in the top box, and then the capture answer is the sum of the first two numbers, followed by the remaining numbers, and tick the box with the red text before clicking the “Inquire” box.
This will list all of the overdue tolls and give you a link to pay them.
Although the Turkish toll scheme is operated by the PTT, the toll roads, bridges and tunnels are often under different legal entities, so if you have violations under different sections you will need to pay each section separately.
When I found this page I had two unpaid tolls, one from a few days before I opened my HGS account a month before (Which should have then been deducted from my balance as the account was created within 15 days, but wasn’t for some reason so I had to pay the fine which was double the original toll, luckily it was only 90 TL) and there was a toll from a couple of days before which in hindsight I should have left and it would have been deducted from my HGS balance.
Hopefully this information helps you navigate the Turkish toll system more smoothly than I did.
Jodie & Echo