Do you need to carry your driving licence in Poland? Rules since 2020

No. Since 5 December 2020 a driver with a Polish driving licence does not have to carry it while driving in Poland: the police officer checks your entitlements in the Central Register of Drivers (CEK). The exemption does not cover a foreign licence or driving abroad. A missing required document means a 50 zł fine.

Since when you no longer need to carry your driving licence

The change has applied since 5 December 2020. It was introduced by the amendment to the Road Traffic Act (Prawo o ruchu drogowym) of 14 August 2020 (Journal of Laws, Dz.U. item 1517), which changed art. 38 of the Act. From that day, a driver with a driving licence issued in Poland does not have to carry the document or show it during a roadside check within the country.

The police summed it up in one sentence in their December 2020 announcements: drivers holding a Polish driving licence are not obliged to have it with them while driving. The officer checks your entitlements in the IT system, which is the Central Register of Drivers (Centralna Ewidencja Kierowców, CEK).

That does not make the document pointless. You still need it in many situations outside a roadside check, for example at a car rental desk or abroad. The only thing that changed is that an empty glovebox is no longer an offence.

What art. 38 of the Road Traffic Act actually says

Art. 38(1)(1) of the Road Traffic Act, as worded in September 2026, requires you to carry a document confirming your entitlement to drive other than:

1. a driving licence issued in Poland,
2. a tram driving permit,
3. a temporary electronic driving licence.

So the provision is built the opposite way to what intuition suggests. The obligation exists, but three kinds of Polish documents are excluded from it. Anything that does not fit into those three points has to be with you.

Who the exemption does not cover

The largest group outside the exemption is drivers with a foreign document. In the same 2020 announcement the police remind that foreigners entering Poland are still obliged to have the proper driving licence, the registration certificate and proof of valid third-party liability insurance (OC). If you live in Poland permanently and hold a licence from outside the EU, check when to exchange a foreign driving licence for a Polish one. After the exchange the exemption will cover you too.

The second exception is travelling abroad. The Polish provision works only on Polish territory. In another country its own law decides on documents, so take the plastic licence with you on any trip, wherever you are going.

What a roadside check without the document looks like

The officer who stops you has to establish who you are. Only then will they check in the CEK whether you hold entitlements, for which category and whether they have been suspended. So carry an identity document: an ID card or a passport. Without it, establishing your identity takes longer and requires other methods.

In the 2020 announcement the police also remind that giving false details or refusing to give personal details has legal consequences. In an extreme case it ends with being taken to the nearest police station to establish your identity. A check without a driving licence is normal, then. A check without any document and without cooperation is not.

What happens in practice:

1. You are stopped and told to stay in the vehicle, unless the officer decides otherwise.
2. Your identity is established, fastest from an ID card.
3. Your entitlements are checked in the CEK: categories, validity, suspension, points.
4. Further steps depend on the reason for the check.

If your driving licence has been seized and you received a receipt that entitles you to drive for a set period, that receipt is exactly what you must carry. The catalogue of exam questions asks about this directly in question 10835.

mObywatel: mPrawo jazdy and penalty points

The mObywatel app (the Polish government's digital ID app) contains the mPrawo jazdy document with a preview of your categories and penalty points. You log in with a trusted profile (profil zaufany). During a check you can show mPrawo jazdy, though you do not have to, because the officer checks the CEK anyway.

The most practical function is the penalty points preview. You can check them on your phone at any time, with no visit to a police station and no fee. If you want to know how many points you can collect and when they expire, read the text on penalty points and losing your driving licence.

Temporary electronic driving licence after the test

If you have only just passed your test, the document comes later, but you can drive straight away. After a passed state exam for categories AM, A1, A2, A, B1, B, B+E and T, the CEK system generates a temporary electronic driving licence (Act on Vehicle Drivers, ustawa o kierujących pojazdami, art. 5b). You see it in mObywatel.

Such an e-licence is valid until you collect the plastic document, but no longer than 30 days from passing the test. It works only on Polish territory. Art. 38 excludes it from the obligation to carry, so during this period the rules of a roadside check are exactly the same as with an ordinary licence. The whole procedure is described in the text on collecting your driving licence and the temporary e-document.

One caveat: not having the document with you is something different from not having the entitlement. If the e-licence expired after 30 days and you have not yet collected the plastic document, you have no entitlement confirmed by a document. The catalogue of questions puts it plainly in question 10089: an invalid driving licence means you have no right to drive.

How much a missing required document costs

When a document is required and you do not have it, art. 95 of the Code of Petty Offences (Kodeks wykroczeń) comes into play. The fines tariff (item 231) provides for 50 zł (PLN) for each missing document, no more than 250 zł in total. This applies, for example, to a driver with a foreign licence who left it at home, or to a person without the receipt for a seized document.

A fine for a missing document has nothing to do with driving without entitlement. If the CEK shows no entitlements for you, or they are suspended, the consequences are entirely different and far more serious.

What about the registration certificate and insurance

The driving licence was the last of three documents a driver had to carry. Rzeczpospolita, describing the December 2020 change, recalled that the registration certificate and proof of OC insurance had not needed to be carried since 1 October 2018. So since 5 December 2020 the driver of a vehicle registered in Poland, holding a Polish driving licence, can drive without any of these three documents.

The rule concerns vehicles registered in Poland. The driver of a car on foreign plates still has to carry the registration certificate and the insurance document, as the police point out in the 2020 announcement.

How this appears in exam questions

The topic comes back in the theory test, because the official catalogue contains questions directly about the obligation to carry the document. In question 10828 the catalogue asks who is obliged to carry a driving licence issued in Poland, and the correct answer is: there is no such obligation, regardless of the type of vehicle. Question 10835, in turn, checks whether you know that you must carry a valid receipt for a seized driving licence.

When studying for the test, do not rely on old tests or on answers your parents remember, because the provision changed in 2020. Work through questions from the current catalogue and check every answer about documents against the wording of art. 38.

A practical tip to finish: in Poland you can drive without the plastic card, but always keep mObywatel with mPrawo jazdy on your phone, and take the physical document when you travel abroad. At a rental desk, after a bump with a foreign driver or at the border, a CEK lookup alone will not help you.