Greece's new traffic code: what it means for a road trip in a rental car

For years, Greece has posted one of the highest road fatality rates in Western Europe, well above the EU average. The new Traffic Code (Kodikas Odikis Kikloforias, KOK), published in the Government Gazette on 13 June 2025 (Law 5209/2025) and in force since 13 September 2025, targets the behaviours most linked to crashes: phone use behind the wheel, speeding, drink-driving, and not wearing a seatbelt. Its main innovation is a recidivism mechanism: committing the same offence a second or third time within five years pushes the fine and licence suspension up almost automatically, leaving little discretion to the officer issuing the ticket.

Another change that matters for visitors: since September 2025, a network of automated enforcement cameras covers the greater Athens area (the Attica region) and reports offences electronically through the government's gov.gr portal. In practice, a speeding violation or a red light can now be fined without a stop, including in a rental car — the rental company then receives the notice and passes it on to the driver, usually weeks after the trip ends.

Before the reform, holding a phone while driving cost €100. Under the new code, the fine has risen to €350, with a 30-day licence suspension on the first recorded offence. A repeat offence within five years pushes the penalty to €1,000 and 180 days' suspension, then €2,000 and a full year's suspension on the third offence. Hands-free kits remain allowed, but holding the device — even while stopped at a red light — now falls squarely within the new law.

The crackdown isn't arbitrary: a study by Salam Ajlouni and coauthors, published in 2023 in the Journal of Radiation Research and Applied Sciences (available on Google Scholar: scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Ajlouni+effects+of+mobile+phone+using+on+driving+behavior+and+risk+of+traffic+accidents), measured how much phone use — even hands-free — degrades reaction time and attentiveness to lights and stop signs, substantially raising crash risk. That's precisely the risk the new Greek law is now pricing in more heavily than before.

Speeding carries the heaviest penalties in the new code, with a clear split between 'ordinary' speeding and extreme speeds treated as street racing. A landmark synthesis by Rune Elvik, published in 2005 in Transportation Research Record (available on Google Scholar: scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Elvik+Speed+and+Road+Safety+Synthesis+of+Evidence+from+Evaluation+Studies) and cited ever since in European road safety policy, drew on nearly a hundred studies to show that even a modest rise in average speed produces a disproportionate increase in the number and severity of crashes — the so-called 'power model' that underpins the growing severity of fine schedules across Europe, Greece included.

In practice, the resulting figures can surprise drivers used to French or Belgian scales, especially past 200 km/h — a threshold that mostly concerns motorways such as the Athens–Thessaloniki route, rarely the mountain or island roads where most road trips actually happen.

The legal alcohol limit stays at 0.5 g/L of blood for experienced drivers, lowered to 0.2 g/L for new licence holders and professional drivers. The new scale grades the fine from €200 to €1,200 depending on the measured level, with a licence suspension of at least 90 days and, in the most serious cases or on repeat offences, possible criminal court proceedings — Greece no longer treats high readings as a simple administrative matter.

Another change that often surprises visitors concerns seatbelts. A passenger not wearing one now faces a €150 fine, and the driver is fined €150 as well — even if the driver was properly belted in. The new code explicitly makes the driver responsible for the safety of everyone in the vehicle, children and adults alike.

On single-carriageway national roads — most of Greece's secondary network, from the Meteora to the Peloponnese to Crete's mountain roads — a long-standing local habit has slower drivers move half onto the hard shoulder to let the car behind overtake without crossing the centre line. It appears in no article of the traffic code: it's an unwritten but widely practised convention, and it remains, strictly speaking, illegal — the shoulder is legally reserved for emergency stops.

For a foreign driver, the real surprise usually comes from the other direction: being overtaken on the right, sometimes at close range, is common on these roads and shouldn't be read as an aggressive move. The safest approach is never to feel obliged to pull onto the shoulder if visibility or road surface don't allow it, to check mirrors before pulling back in, and to remember that a Greek hard shoulder can genuinely contain a broken-down car, a herd of goats, or loose gravel — the same hazards already flagged in our guide to Crete.

The first thing to do when signing the contract is ask how the agency handles fines received after the car is returned (Athens's automated cameras, roadside checks). Most pass on the fine amount plus an administrative fee — typically €20 to €50 — charged directly to the card used for the deposit, sometimes weeks after the trip. No insurance or excess ever covers a fine: it's strictly a personal cost for the driver, unlike vehicle damage.

The second is to allow for speed limits that are often poorly signposted or that change abruptly (through villages, roadworks), especially now that the margin before hitting the €700 bracket is narrower. An up-to-date GPS or offline map app, combined with cautious driving on rural stretches, avoids most bad surprises. Our article on renting a car in Greece covers the other classic pitfalls of local rental agencies, insurance and excess included.

Our 'Greece on Your Own' guide folds these new rules into its practical driving chapter: where to expect heavier enforcement (around Athens, the main roads of Thessaly), how to handle the hard shoulder custom without putting yourself at risk, and which secondary roads call for the most caution across the Peloponnese, Epirus, and Crete. Enough to take the wheel with confidence, with no bad surprise on your card statement once you're home.