Nationwide drink-driving checks until 9 November. Fines from €250, criminal charges from 1.2 g/l
From 3 to 9 November the PSP police and the GNR national guard are running drink-driving checks across the country as part of the “Taxa Zero ao Volante” (“Zero alcohol at the wheel”) campaign. Together with the road safety authority ANSR, they will carry out five operations on the mainland, and there will also be checks in the Azores and Madeira (Notícias ao Minuto, Observador).
In 2025 about 2.1 million breath tests were carried out on drivers on the mainland, and 1.6% of them came back over the limit. Not everyone killed in a crash had a post-mortem, but of those who did, 28% were over the legal limit, and in 78% of these cases the alcohol level was high enough to be a criminal offence.
The standard limit is 0.5 g of alcohol per litre of blood (0.5 per mille). A level of 0.5 to 0.8 g/l is a serious offence, with a fine of €250 to €1,250 and a driving ban of one month to a year. From 0.8 to 1.2 g/l it is a very serious offence: a fine of €500 to €2,500 and a ban of two months to two years. At 1.2 g/l or more it becomes a criminal offence, punishable by up to a year in prison or up to 120 day-fines (the court sets the daily amount according to income), plus a driving ban of three months to three years (Código da Estrada, Article 81).
For drivers who have held their licence for less than three years and for professional drivers, the limit is 0.2 g/l, and for them 0.5 g/l or more already counts as a very serious offence.
