Ferry, or Round the Bay?
What the trip west to Herceg Novi actually costs — the Kamenari–Lepetane ferry against the road through Perast and Risan, worked out on this week's fuel price and your own car. From Kotor the shortcut is not the cheaper way.
What each way costs over a year
- Round the bay, through Perast and RisanCheapest2.398 € a year
10,43 € a day · Straight out along the north shore: Dobrota, Perast, Risan, Morinj, then Kamenari and on to Herceg Novi. 42,8 km each way.
No fare, no queue, no timetable — and from Kotor, the cheaper way.
About 68 minutes each way with the road clear. It is single carriageway the whole way and slows through Perast in summer, so treat that as the best case, not a promise.
- Across the Verige strait on the Kamenari–Lepetane ferry2.836 € a year
12,33 € a day · Kotor to the Lepetane ramp is 14,9 km through Tivat; from Kamenari on the far shore it is 14,3 km on to Herceg Novi. The crossing takes 15 minutes and boats run about every 15 minutes, day and night.
13,6 km and about twelve minutes shorter — on a day with no queue.
Monthly pass — the cheaper way at your days.
5,00 € for a car each way at the booth, all year round — so 10,00 € there and back. There is no return ticket: you pay each way. Motorbikes are 2,50 €, and foot passengers, cyclists and disabled passengers cross free. The 100 € monthly card used in the figures above covers up to 50 crossings, which is enough for a five-day week.
Fuel worked out at 7 l/100 km and 1,74 € a litre, over 46 commuting weeks a year. Change the days — or your own car — above.
These are running costs only — fuel, parking and fares. They leave out the fixed cost of keeping a car (insurance, tax, servicing, wear), which you pay whether you drive in or not.
Fuel is worked out at 7,0 l/100 km and eurosuper 95 at 1,74 € a litre — the maximum retail price the Ministry of Energy and Mining set for 1–7 September 2026 (eurodiesel was 1,87 €). Montenegro recalculates that price every week, so if it has moved, put today's figure in the box above. The 7,0 l/100 km is our own assumption for a mid-size petrol car, not a published number — your car's own figure is the one that matters, and the table follows whatever you type.
There are two ways west out of Kotor, and most people assume the ferry is the shortcut. Set how often you make the trip and, if you like, your own car — the table works out what each way actually costs. Nothing you type is saved or sent.
The short answer, at today's prices: going round the bay is the cheaper way from Kotor, by a wide margin. The ferry saves 13,6 km of driving, which is about 1,60 € of petrol, and charges 5,00 € a car each way to do it. What it buys you is roughly twelve minutes — and only on a day when you don't queue.
Your ways to Herceg Novi
| Way | You drive | Cost a day |
|---|---|---|
| Round the bay, through Perast and Risan | 85,6 km | 10,43 € |
| Across the Verige strait on the Kamenari–Lepetane ferry | 58,4 km | 17,11 € |
- Round the bay, through Perast and Risan: Straight out along the north shore: Dobrota, Perast, Risan, Morinj, then Kamenari and on to Herceg Novi. 42,8 km each way.
- Across the Verige strait on the Kamenari–Lepetane ferry: Kotor to the Lepetane ramp is 14,9 km through Tivat; from Kamenari on the far shore it is 14,3 km on to Herceg Novi. The crossing takes 15 minutes and boats run about every 15 minutes, day and night.
Worth knowing
Why the shortcut costs money
The ferry saves 13,6 km of driving on the round trip from Kotor — 42,8 km each way round the bay against 29,2 km of road via the ferry. At 1,74 € a litre that is about 1,60 € of petrol saved, against a 5,00 € fare. A car would have to burn roughly 21 litres per 100 km before the crossing paid for itself in fuel alone.
So the honest way to read this page is that the ferry buys time, not money. It is worth the fare if twelve minutes is worth 5,00 € to you that day, and it stops being worth it the moment there is a queue.
This is a Kotor answer, not a Boka answer
You will often hear that the ferry saves half an hour and thirty kilometres. That is true — from Tivat. Measured on the road, Tivat to Herceg Novi is 54,7 km round the bay against 19,3 km via the ferry, so the crossing saves 35 km and the fare is obviously worth paying.
Kotor sits at the head of the bay, so both routes run west together as far as the strait before they split, and the saving is a third of Tivat's. Same ferry, same fare, different answer.
The queue is the part we cannot put a number on
In July and August the wait at Kamenari and Lepetane is the whole question, and we could not find a published 2026 figure for it. The accounts we could find are from 2023, when fewer vessels were running, and describe waits from about forty minutes to a couple of hours at the worst times.
The arithmetic is simple enough to do in your head at the ramp: the ferry route is about twelve minutes quicker when it is moving, so from roughly ten minutes of queueing onwards, the road round the bay is both cheaper and faster.
The tickets, and who can buy which
There is no return ticket. The operator sells eight products and every one of them is a single crossing, so a day out is two tickets.
The 5,00 € car fare is the price at the booth in both seasons. Out of season — the government's decision defines that as 1 October to 30 April — a car crossing bought online is 4,00 € instead. That gap is deliberate: it is there to move people out of the booth queue. If you see 4,00 € printed as an off-season price on paper, that price list has been superseded.
The 100 € monthly card is sold to individuals rather than companies and covers up to 50 crossings a month. It carries no residence condition — which is worth saying, because the 3,00 € fare on the same price list carries a very clear one: that fare is for residents of Herceg Novi and Tivat, and a Kotor address does not qualify. What the operator does not publish is whether the card's month runs from the day you buy it or with the calendar, and whether unused crossings carry over. Ask at the booth before you count on it.
On foot or on a bike, the crossing is free
The operator's price list charges nothing for foot passengers, cyclists, disabled passengers or emergency vehicles. If you are being picked up on the far side, walking on costs nothing at all.
Neither route has a toll
There is no toll on either route. Montenegro's toll list covers only the Bar–Boljare motorway and the Sozina tunnel; the Vrmac tunnel between Kotor and Tivat is free. If you find a page announcing a 1 € toll on Vrmac, check its date — the one still circulating is from 1 April 2018.
Check the live fares
- Ferry Kamenari–Lepetane — fares and timetableThe operator's own price list, the crossing times, and the online ticket shop. The last word on what a crossing costs.
- Ministarstvo energetike i rudarstva — fuel pricesMontenegro sets a maximum retail price for petrol and diesel and republishes it every week. Use it to update the fuel figure above.
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