Amsterdam & Region Travel Ticket: Is It Worth It?
How to choose the right travel pass for you on your next trip to Amsterdam
Amsterdam, unlike basically every city in the United States (with some exceptions, of course) has phenomenal transit. It is certainly possible — if not easier — to live or travel in this city with no car, but for travelers who don’t live in the city, the options are a little different.
When my fiancée and I went this past February, we used a mix of different options for getting around, and one of those was the Amsterdam & Region Travel Ticket. We also used simple GVB travel passes with access to transit in the city of Amsterdam itself as well as purchasing individual tickets for train rides when our passes expired.
So, I am going to do my best to break down this travel pass and how it compares to the other options for visitors to Amsterdam. Hopefully it will help you decide what is right for you when you make the journey to the Dutch capital.
The Amsterdam & Region Travel Ticket
The Amsterdam & Region Travel Ticket is fairly self explanatory. As the name implies, this pass will get you around transit both in the city of Amsterdam and in the surrounding areas. You are able to download an app or receive a cute red card to put in your bag that you use to scan on and off trams, metro trains, ferries, and regional rail as you make your way through the city and its close by towns.
It is important to note that with any travel pass in Amsterdam, you need to scan it once you get on transit and also when you exit (even if you are using a debit/credit card). For trams in Amsterdam it is located inside the tram itself, but for other modes of transportation they are located somewhere nearby, usually on a standing post.
That being said, this travel pass takes you to a fairly diverse set of areas. My fiancée and I were able to reach all the way to the beach, to the cute town of Zaanse Schans, and to Haarlem during our stay. This is because the regional part of the pass involves the ability to get on NS Sprinters (the regional rail of the Netherlands’ national rail company), which run periodically to and from the city.
Other Options
1. If the travel pass itself isn’t enough, you can also expand it out to be a city pass that would include entry into museums, discounts at restaurants, and a plethora of other benefits that can be found on the website.
If you are booking museums separately or have certain other sites you want to see, the steep price of the city pass may be enough to deter you and persuade you to take the planning on yourself, but for those looking for an easy, quick way to explore the city, the option is always there.
2. If you’re not looking to go outside of Amsterdam, then there are several other options for you. One that we used was the GVB pass, which gives unlimited travel on transit within Amsterdam, so we were able to use the ferries, trams, and metro lines with no problem. It comes in a nice blue card, and we found it very helpful to just have unrestricted access to as many transit trips around the city as we wanted. The pass also has multiple options for single or multi-day travel.
3. For someone who maybe won’t be moving around so much, is staying in walking distance of their activities, or maybe is only there for a day or so, there is one other option that may be just right: your debit/credit card.
The transit readers throughout Amsterdam are all operated with the tap-to-pay symbol that reads their paper travel passes. To forgo the pass, travelers can simply tap their card when they enter and exit transit and pay directly for the transit that they use, instead of buying a card to cover any trips they may take, though after a few trips it becomes cheaper to have gone with the pass.
Conclusion
Whether you are in Amsterdam for a weekend or for a month-long voyage, there is sure to be the perfect option for you to get around in style. With Amsterdam’s clean, efficient, and abundant public transportation, there’s no need to worry about how you’ll get where you need to go on time.
To recap: If you’re looking to travel around the city and surrounding region, the Amsterdam & Region Travel Ticket is for you. If you are just looking to get around the city, the GVB pass should do just fine. If you are only here for a bit or won’t need much transit, just use your card!
I hope you love the city as much as I did.
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