Bucharest Tourist Tax Adds 10 Lei Nightly Fee 2026

Published on Dec 30, 2025, 11:17 am CST

6 min read

Key points

Bucharest's General Council adopted a 2026 tourism promotion tax on December 23, 2025
The fee is a fixed 10 Romanian lei per tourist per night across all accommodation types in the city
Hotels, hosts, and intermediaries such as Booking and Airbnb can be responsible for collecting the charge
Accommodation documents must show the tax as a separate line item under the city's rules
The hotel industry federation FIHR criticized the fast approval process and the lack of a transparent spending plan

Impact

Trip Cost Math: Expect a small but predictable nightly add on that will be easiest to see on itemized invoices and platform checkout screens
Budget Versus Luxury Stays: Lower priced rooms and short stays will feel the fixed fee more than higher priced rooms where a percentage tax would have scaled up
Short Term Rentals And Platforms: Verify whether the platform or the host is collecting the tax so you do not get charged twice at check in
Business Travel And Receipts: Keep itemized invoices because the tax is meant to be shown separately, which helps reimbursement and expense reporting
What Travelers Should Do Now: Confirm how your booking channel handles the fee, then build a small buffer into your per night budget for 2026 Bucharest stays

Bucharest has approved a new, fixed overnight visitor charge that will apply to stays in the city during 2026. The change affects anyone booking hotels, serviced apartments, guesthouses, or short term rentals inside Bucharest's city limits, including travelers arriving for concerts, conferences, and weekend breaks. Travelers should plan for the fee to appear as a separate line on invoices or platform checkout, and confirm whether it is collected in advance or on arrival to avoid surprises.

The Bucharest tourist tax adds a per night cost to most paid stays in the city in 2026, regardless of the room rate.

Under the council decision, the tax is set at 10 Romanian lei per tourist per night, and the rules require accommodation providers to show it distinctly in the documents used to collect lodging charges. The regulation also anticipates that online intermediaries and travel agencies that collect lodging payments can collect the tax as part of that transaction, which is the piece most likely to shape what travelers see at checkout when booking through major platforms.

Who Is Affected

Leisure travelers are the largest group exposed because the fee applies across the lodging spectrum, from budget rooms to upscale hotels, and it is charged per night rather than as a percentage. That structure makes the add on most noticeable for lower priced stays where a percentage based charge would have been smaller, and less noticeable for high end properties where a percentage would have risen with the nightly rate.

Business travelers and event attendees will also feel the change in a practical way because the charge is designed to be itemized. That can be helpful for reimbursement, but it also means travelers should keep the final invoice, not just a booking confirmation email, especially when the stay is booked through an intermediary and the hotel front desk is not the party that collected payment.

Travel advisors and anyone building multi city Eastern Europe itineraries should treat the tax as one more fixed nightly line item that can alter final package totals. It is unlikely to be trip changing on its own, but it can matter when travelers are comparing Bucharest against nearby alternatives, or when they are stacking multiple nights plus airport transfers, tours, and event tickets into a tight budget.

What Travelers Should Do

Travelers with 2026 bookings should check the final price breakdown in their booking channel, then ask one direct question if it is unclear, is the Bucharest tax collected now, or at check in. If the platform indicates it will collect the tax, keep a screenshot or confirmation showing that line item so the hotel does not charge it again on arrival.

For trips that are still flexible, the decision threshold is simple. If the booking is nonrefundable and the nightly base rate is strong, the added fee is usually not worth rebuilding the trip around, especially once you factor rebooking penalties and fare changes. If you are comparing similar stays across multiple neighborhoods and properties, treat the tax as constant, then optimize around what actually changes the experience, location, cancellation terms, and how early you need to leave for flights.

Over the next 24 to 72 hours before travel, monitor your hotel's pre arrival messages and your platform's payment status, because this is where double charge risk and receipt confusion tends to show up. If you are flying in and out of Henri Coandă International Airport (OTP), add a small buffer for check in questions at the front desk if the tax is not clearly settled in advance, and keep your lodging paperwork handy in case you need to reconcile charges after departure.

How It Works

Bucharest's measure is framed as a special tax for tourism promotion, and it sits inside the larger way cities fund destination marketing and visitor infrastructure. The first order effect is straightforward, an extra nightly amount is collected alongside the accommodation charge, and it is meant to be tracked and spent on tourism promotion and related activities defined by the city's regulation.

The second order effects are where travelers may feel friction. Any time a destination requires intermediaries to collect a local fee, there is a risk of inconsistent implementation across channels, especially early in a cycle when platforms, agencies, and individual hosts are aligning their checkout and reporting workflows. That can propagate into longer check in conversations, invoice corrections, and extra time spent on receipts, which matters most when travelers arrive late, have early departures, or are on tight business schedules.

The change also ripples into how travelers compare Bucharest against nearby alternatives and how planners price groups. A fixed per night fee changes the relative value equation more for budget rooms than for luxury rooms, and that can shape where cost sensitive travelers stay, how long they stay, and whether they consider splitting nights between Bucharest and nearby areas. Over time, shifts like this can affect occupancy patterns, short term rental competitiveness, and package pricing, and it can influence whether travelers route into the city on low cost flights, a dynamic already visible in some European networks serving Bucharest, as covered in Wizz Air Italy new routes highlight eastbound push from northern Italy.

Finally, the regulation includes compliance language, and it outlines fines for failures tied to the tax's administration. For travelers, that matters because it increases the incentive for hosts and hotels to enforce collection and documentation, which makes it more likely the fee appears as a discrete line item, even on stays where travelers previously saw only an all in nightly total.