Everything you need to know about taking taxis in Rome
Last Updated on October 29, 2024 by admin
In a “Rome travel” Facebook group that I steal blog post ideas from am a member of, I see lots and lots and LOTS of people posting about one thing: taking taxis in Rome.
Most often, these posts are about two things: how they were unable to get a taxi, or how they were scammed by a taxi driver.
Unfortunately, both of these happen regularly, so I think this guide is necessary. In it, I’ll do my best to help you get a taxi, and to help you avoid getting scammed.
All of this information is based on my ten years of living in Rome, and on my experience as a FORMER frequent taxi-taker (I’ve started shying away from them for reasons I’ll cover below).
Here’s my guide to everything you need to know about taking taxis in Rome.
If you have questions about this or anything else Rome related, please join MY Facebook group (not the one I referenced above which is mostly just tourists giving bad advice to other tourists)!
Everything you need to know about taking taxis in Rome
Why is it so hard to get a taxi in Rome?
Like I said above, it’s not always easy to find taxis in Rome. In the above-mentioned Facebook group, lots of people write frustratedly about trying to find taxis to no avail or having their requests ignored.
There’s one confirmed reason for this, but I think there are actually four main contributing reasons.
There’s a shortage of taxi drivers
The first and most significant is well documented – there’s a shortage of taxi drivers. Data from Italian daily Corriere della Sera states that 46.4% – nearly half of requests for taxis – go unanswered per month.
The city government has recently released 1,000 new taxi licenses to try and remedy or at least improve the situation, but what impact these new taxi drivers will have remains to be seen.
Climate change
The second reason, in my opinion, is that increasingly harsh weather conditions (boiling heat in the summer, lots of rain in the spring and fall) are making more people turn to the shelter of a car rather than walking or taking public transport.
Infrastructure works
A series of major upgrades to Rome’s public transportation system have left metro and trams lines closed, and roadworks have caused serious detours for buses, making the city’s slowest method of public transportation even slower. Again, I think this leads more people to reach for a taxi app.
Overtourism
The fourth reason is that Rome has had a massive influx in tourism in the last few years, and frankly, the city can’t cope. More visitors means a higher demand for accommodation, tickets to attractions, and yup – taxis.
For all of these reasons (and a few more that I’ll address below), I recommend avoiding them and taking public transportation instead, but I also recognize that sometimes, you just want to hop in a car to get off your feet and get to where you need to go, so let’s take a look at how to get a taxi in Rome.
Roman taxis 101
What do official taxis in Rome look like?
Taxis in Rome are white. They have the word “TAXI” written clearly on the doors and on the light on top of the car.
If the light is on, that means that taxi is free. If the light is off, it has passengers or has been booked.
If anyone approaches you saying that they have an available taxi and it’s not white and does not say taxi, don’t get in. They’re operating illegally, and they might scam you. They’ll probably drive you around the block a few times, not take you to your destination, and then try to charge you 50 euro (I met a British couple that this happened to).
What are the rates?
Taxi rates recently increased in Rome. You can read the entire list of them here (the information is in English starting on the third page), but I’ll cover the important ones below for ease of reference. All fees are per ride and not per passenger.
Monday through Friday from 6am to 10pm, the base fare is €3.50.
On Saturday, Sunday and public holidays, the base fare is €5.
At night (from 10pm to 6am), the base fare is €7.50.
The fare increases at different rates based on time and speed.
Note that the minimum fee for a ride is €9, so that’s what you’ll pay even for a very short journey.
From Fiumicino airport to any point within the Aurelian Walls (and vice versa), the fee is €55.
From Ciampino airport to any point within the Aurelian Walls (and vice versa), the fee is €40.
Note that there are some other fixed fares (available in the PDF linked to above), but generally, if your accommodation is outside of the Aurelian Walls, the driver should use the meter.
The first piece of luggage is free. Additional pieces incur a fee of €1.
If you are in a large group (more than four) and require an extra-large taxi, the driver may add an additional fee of €5 per person, starting with the fifth passenger.
How to get a taxi in Rome
Alright, let’s dive in. As I said above, owing to the massive taxi shortage, overcrowding, changing weather patterns, and extensive work on roads and public transportation, getting a taxi is not easy. Luckily, there are several options you can try.
Apps
Using an app is the most straightforward way of getting a taxi, especially if you don’t speak Italian. There are four taxi apps in Rome.
Note that the meter starts from when the ride is accepted. If your driver is coming from a long way away, there might be a significant amount of money owed by the time they get to you.
FreeNow
FreeNow is user-friendly, and it has multiple ride options. Note that it has a booking fee of €3, which will be added into the price.
When you open the app, it will pinpoint your location (double check to make sure it’s right).
Enter your destination, and multiple options will pop up.
The first option is a regular taxi with an estimated price.
The second option is Taxi Go, which works more like Uber in that the price you see is the price you’ll pay. If you’re traveling at a busy time and might end up sitting in traffic, selecting Taxi Go can be a smart move.
You can also select an XL taxi, a hybrid or electric taxi, or a wheelchair accessible taxi.
Once you make your choice, the app will put out a call. On a Friday or Saturday night, be prepared to wait. During the summer months (high season for tourists), be prepared to wait. If it’s raining, be prepared to wait. If there’s a public transportation strike, be prepared to wait.
Once the ride is accepted, the app will tell you the driver’s name, license plate and the make and model of the car, as well as their ETA.
itTaxi
itTaxi is also user-friendly, but it doesn’t come with all of the options that FreeNow does. You simply enter your destination and the request goes out. If you’re in a group of less than four and you’re prepared to pay whatever is on the taximeter, use itTaxi.
I’m having trouble confirming the booking fee for itTaxi, but I believe it’s €2.50.
WeTaxi
I just found out about Wetaxi, and I haven’t had the chance to use it yet.
What sets WeTaxi apart is that the default setting is the maximum price, similar to the “Taxi Go” option with FreeNow.
You can toggle this option to off and choose to pay what’s on the meter. You can also select the number of passengers and indicate a few other things to the driver, including whether or not you’re traveling with a pet.
Uber
Lots of people think Uber is illegal in Rome – and that’s because it was for a time. It’s not anymore, and its popularity is growing.
When you open your Uber app in Rome, you’ll notice a few things. The first is that you can book a taxi through the app. The other is that there are only three Uber options – Black, XL and Lux. That’s because to be an Uber driver in Rome, you have to have an NCC license, which stands for “Noleggio con Conducente” (rental with driver). These drivers are typically employed by car services for private transfers.
If you take an Uber in Rome, expect a nice ride, and very often, a driver in a suit.
After getting scammed one too many times by taxi drivers (more below), I started to take Ubers instead. Once I started and thanks to some sort of glitch, I repeatedly got 20 and 30% off coupons – for like, several months. Once those dried up, so did my use of Uber.
Calling a taxi
There are multiple cab companies in Rome – a few of the larger ones are RadioTaxi and Samarcanda – but you can also call one single line that will request the rides from the taxis closest to you. That number is 060609. Note that you’ll have to pronounce you destination address clearly in Italian, so if you aren’t sure of how to say it, use an app. Otherwise you might find yourself in the completely wrong area of town.
Taxi stands
There are several taxi stands in the city center. They are marked with a large orange sign that says “taxi”. They’ll be particularly swamped at certain times, but taxis should generally appear from time to time.
Here are the primary ones (links to locations included).
Largo di Torre Argentina
If you’re in the vicinity of Campo de’ Fiori, Piazza Navona, and the Pantheon this taxi stand is a good bet. It’s a really busy part of town and a transportation hub, so you might have to wait, but in my experience, there are generally lots of taxis that wait there.
Piazza Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli (Trastevere)
It can be tricky to get a taxi here, especially on a Friday or Saturday night, given the busy nightlife scene in Trastevere.
Piazza Mastai (Trastevere)
If Piazza Belli is swamped, try Piazza Mastai, a bit further down Viale di Trastevere.
Piazzale Ostiense
If you’re in Ostiense, Testaccio, San Saba, or the southern end of the Aventino area, grab a taxi at Piazzale Ostiense, which is in front of the Piramide metro stop.
Piazza San Silvestro and Largo Chigi
These are good stands if you’re near the Trevi Fountain.
Piazza Mignanelli
This stand is just off Piazza di Spagna (Spanish Steps).
Piazza dei Cinquecento
This is the taxi stand in front of Roma Termini – the city’s main train station. The line can be lo-o-o-o-oooooong, but taxi drivers generally come frequently because they know the line will always be there.
Note that at Termini, there may be some people who approach the line and claim they have a taxi parked elsewhere – this is not a taxi driver, this is a scammer. Stay in line.
Via Marsala (Termini)
You can also take the Via Marsala exit at Termini and you’ll find another taxi stand.
Piazzale della Stazione Tiburtina
If you happen to take the train to Roma Tiburtina, another large station, you can get a taxi outside.
Piazza Risorgimento
This taxi stand has a reputation for having scammy drivers. I myself was once scammed by one of them (I made him stop after noticing that the taximeter wasn’t on and we got out).
Even if you’re exhausted after visiting the Vatican and need to get back to your accommodation and rest, I urge you to look elsewhere for a cab, or use an app.
I’ll cover this below, but don’t make the same mistake that I did – always, always, always insist that the taximeter is on!
Hailing a taxi
You can hail a taxi in Rome, but it’s not common practice, and not every driver will stop for you.
These days, it’s pretty rare to find empty cabs zipping around anyway, so I wouldn’t rely on this as a tactic for getting them.
That said, if you do manage to hail one, make sure that the correct base fee is on the meter, and, as always, that the meter is ON.
Paying for your ride
Do taxis in Rome take credit/debit cards?
All taxis in Rome are required by law to accept electronic payments. Unfortunately, many drivers prefer cash, and they often try to trick tourists by saying that they either can’t accept a card payment, or that their POS is broken.
I avoid this by saying that I only have a card when I get in. Sometimes, I get someone who grumbles, and other times, there’s no problem whatsoever.
Do I need to tip my taxi driver in Rome?
The short answer is no. Tipping is not expected or required, but it is appreciated.
If you want, you can leave a tip through the taxi apps, or you can leave a coin or two or just round up if you pay with cash.
Why I avoid taking taxis in Rome
Because traffic
Owing to the roadworks and closures of public transportation options that have been abundant lately, everyone and their brother who has a car uses it. I cannot believe the number of cars on the road here. This means that while jumping in a cab can seem like a faster option, it sometimes isn’t.
Use Google to check how many red and orange areas there are on your route – if it looks like there’s lots of traffic, look for other options.
Because I’ve been scammed
Alright, now that you know how to get a taxi in Rome, lets talk about the ugly reasons why I try to avoid taking them.
I’ve lived in Rome for a decade, I speak Italian, and I have still been scammed by taxi drivers on a few occasions.
I’ve said this before in other posts – I hate to generalize like this because not all taxi drivers are bad. That said, getting scammed is a crappy feeling, and the easiest way to avoid it is to just not take taxis unless I absolutely have to.
Again, I’m sure there are many more honest taxi drivers than there are scammers, but a few bad apples and all that.
I hope you don’t have to deal with being scammed in a taxi in Rome, but just in case you do, let’s talk about the ways you can be scammed and the ways to avoid being scammed.
Common scams in Roman taxis
The driver charges the maximum amount indicated in the app, rather than what’s on the meter
The advent of taxi apps in Rome has made things better (you don’t have to worry about making a phone call and speaking Italian, you know when the driver is going to arrive, etc.) and worse (they’ve created new ways for people to be ripped off).
One of the most common scams, which is what has happened to me twice, is that the driver delays putting the payment through until you’re either getting out of the car or out of the car, and then they charge you for the highest estimated fare that was indicated to you when you booked the taxi – not the actual price on the taximeter.
Let me tell you, getting out of a cab, seeing it speed away and getting a higher charge is the pits.
Yes, I suppose it’s partially my fault for assuming that people have common decency and getting out of the cab before the charge came through, but the scammer is the real problem here.
The driver tells you a flat fee or tries to negotiate a price
If you tell a driver where you need to go and they give you a price, walk away. This is not legal, and participating in these antics only perpetuates the behavior.
Whenever I see tourists advising other tourists to negotiate a price ahead of time on social media, it makes me want to tear my hair out. This is wrong, wrong, wrong.
The meter isn’t on
If you get in a cab and the driver doesn’t turn on the meter, ask them to immediately. If they refuse, tell them to stop and get out. And while you’re at it, take down their identification number (it’s on a metal plate inside the doors) so you can make a complaint (more on making complaints below).
The driver tells you you owe more than the maximum fee
This happened to a friend of mine just last week. She selected the “Taxi Go” option in FreeNow, which is the one that tells you the price up front. This is the MAXIMUM charge you can incur.
As they approached her destination, the driver asked her how she planned to pay for “the rest of the charge.” After she asked what he meant, he tried to say that she was going to owe more than the maximum fare indicated by the app. Luckily she knew how the system works and she speaks Italian, so he relented.
If you select Taxi Go in FreeNow or use the maximum fare option in WeTaxi, don’t pay a penny more than the amount you were quoted.
The driver assumes you don’t know the flat fees to/from the airport
When you get in a taxi at the airport, feel free to confirm the fare with the driver. This shows that you know exactly how much it should cost.
The driver at the airport says he’ll only take groups of passengers going to multiple different destinations
I’ve seen this happen at Ciampino airport – the driver will say he can take four people who are going four different places and then charge each one the fee, or perhaps just an arbitrary amount if he’s feeling whimsical. To that I say, yeah, no. If a driver is trying to do this, pass on the ride.
This is extremely hypocritical of me to advise, because I’ve had to accept rides from these shysters in desperate times (i.e. after flight delays and waiting literal hours after midnight for a taxi at Ciampino). But still, don’t do it.
The driver invents a supplementary or “after hours” fee
Once I was coming home late from Ciampino, and the driver tried to tell me when I arrived at home that there was a fee because of the time. This is a lie; the fees to/from Fiumicino (€55) and to/from Ciampino (€40) are applicable 24 hours a day.
How to avoid getting scammed by taxi drivers in Rome
The best ways to avoid getting scammed by taxi drivers in Rome are to know what the common scams are (above), know the norms surrounding the service, and to avoid putting your card into any of the apps (if you can help it).
Know the norms
Don’t negotiate a price before you get in.
The taximeter must be on.
If you use an app, stay in the cab until the charge comes through.
Know the fixed fares from the airports to any point within the Aurelian Walls and vice versa (€55 to/from Fiumicino, €40 to/from Ciampino).
All taxis are required to accept credit card payments, and there is no surcharge for paying with a card.
If you select the Taxi Go option in FreeNow or the maximum fare option in WeTaxi, that’s what you owe, not un centesimo more.
Get a receipt
If you think you’ve been scammed and you don’t want to confront the taxi driver, which is completely understandable, ask for a receipt for the ride (la ricevuta – ree-chay-VOO-tuh). That way, you’ll have all the information you need to make a complaint (more below).
Don’t put your card into the apps (if you can help it)
When you download a taxi app, it will ask you to save a preferred payment method. My advice is this: don’t. Some of them won’t allow you to progress unless you have a card in the system, but FreeNow doesn’t require a card – you can select “Pay driver directly.”
The problem with setting up autopay is that the driver can insert an erroneous charge and it will go through instantly.
I’ve removed my card from FreeNow for just this reason. Lots of drivers question me about it, and generally, I tell them without hesitation that it’s because I’ve been scammed. Generally they come up with an angry reply about how I probably didn’t understand the applicable charges, which I refute, and then we have a lovely, silent ride to my destination.
What to do if you get scammed
Unfortunately, it’s not easy to report general complaints about incidents that happen (you have to go to a city office in person or write a certified email from a special account known as a PEC)
This is another instance where the apps come in handy – you should be able to report problems within the apps directly, or you can access complaint forms on the app company’s websites.
If you get scammed in a taxi you booked through itTaxi, you can make a complaint here. I can’t promise that anything will come out of it, but you can try.
Complain about an incident with FreeNow here. Note that I have made complaints to FreeNow, and they’re condescending in their replies, but I was able to recoup some of the money I had been scammed out of on one occasion.
Use the Uber app to make a complaint about a bad experience with an Uber in Rome.
What to do if you lose something in a Roman taxi
If you leave something in a taxi, your best hope of getting it back is having a way to identify the taxi and the driver, which is another reason why the apps are handy.
There’s a city office for items left in a taxi, which you can try contacting at oggettismarriti@comune.roma.it. Again, I can’t promise anything, but you can try to recover whatever it is you lost.
I hope you found this guide to taxis in Rome helpful. Questions or thoughts? Share in the comments!
This post may contain affiliate links. This means that if you click on one and make a purchase or booking, I’ll receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thanks for supporting Luggage and Life! I research and write all of the content on this site without the help of other people or AI, and your financial support is a meaningful way to contribute to the continuation of my work. Grazie mille!
