Transport and the shape of the city in Porto

How the zones work

Metro, STCP buses, trams and the other operators of the Área Metropolitana do Porto are one intermodal system called Andante, on a tariff in force since 1 January 2026. A title is priced by how many rings of zones your journey crosses, not by distance and not by operator. A Z2 title lets you travel freely in the zone you boarded in plus the ring of zones bordering it, and Z4 adds two further rings. Each title also runs on a clock from first validation, an hour for Z2 and Z3, 1h15 for Z4 and so on up to 2h30 for Z9, and inside that window you may validate as many times as you need.

The monthly pass, and the airport trap

Andante 3Z/Municipal covers three zones, or every zone within one concelho, at €30.00 a month, and Andante Metropolitano covers every zone in the metropolitan area at €40.00. Central Porto is zone PRT1 and central Gaia is the neighbouring VNG1, so Trindade to Santo Ovídio, Jardim do Morro, Campanhã, Casa da Música or Estádio do Dragão are all Z2 journeys, and Trindade to Senhor de Matosinhos is Z3, which uses up all three zones of a municipal pass on that one corridor. The airport is out of reach of it entirely. Metro do Porto's own route data returns Metropolitano for Aeroporto to the centre, so a regular flyer needs the €40 pass, and Trindade to Póvoa de Varzim is Z6 and needs it too.

• The card is a separate purchase: €6.00 for the personalised card a monthly pass requires, €3.00 for the youth version, €0.60 for the paper Andante Azul.
• Concessions: over-65s pay €22.50 municipal and €30.00 metropolitan, the Família pass is €60.00 and €80.00, and the Jovem pass is free on the Metropolitano tier.
• A combined Andante and CP rail pass is €50.00.
• The table also lists 3Z_IR at €40.00 and Metropolitano_IR at €50.00 without expanding the abbreviation. Ask at a counter what it covers before buying one.

Singles, and what not to pay

On an Andante Azul a Z2 single is €1.40, Z3 €1.85 and Z4 €2.30, rising in steps to €4.65 at Z9. You can load one to thirty trips of the same type, and loading ten identical titles gets you an eleventh free. Paying the driver costs €2.50 for STCP's onboard ticket, valid for that one journey, which is nearly 80% more than the same short hop on a card. For a few days there is Andante 24, giving 24 consecutive hours in the zones bought at €5.35 for Z2 and €8.55 for Z4, or Andante Tour across the whole network at €7.75 for 24 hours and €16.55 for 72.

The network, and what it misses

Six metro lines run: A blue, B red, C green, D yellow, E violet and F orange. Line D crosses the Luís I bridge into Gaia at Jardim do Morro and carries on through General Torres, Santo Ovídio and Vila d'Este, Line A runs out to Senhor de Matosinhos near the beach, and Line E terminates at the airport, a Z4 journey to the centre at €2.30 on an Andante Azul. Foz do Douro has no metro station. It is reached by tram line 1 along the Douro from Infante in the historic centre to Passeio Alegre, with line 18 linking Carmo to Passeio Alegre and line 22 running a city-centre circular between Carmo and Batalha; check the current timetable on stcp.pt, because the trams run a limited daytime service rather than a turn-up-and-go one. STCP confirms that monthly Andante passes work on trams 1, 18 and 22 as long as the zones loaded on the card cover the route, so they are not tourist-only.

Works, timetables and what to check yourself

Building works on the Linha Rosa were still disrupting the network in September 2026: the section between Campo 24 de Agosto and Senhora da Hora closed from 22:00 on Saturday 12 September until midday on Sunday 13 September, with replacement buses. Expect further weekend closures and check before relying on the metro at a weekend. STCP returned to its term-time timetable on 7 September 2026, raising frequencies around school opening and closing times and withdrawing the summer beach reinforcements. Metro do Porto runs secure Bike & Ride parking at Senhora da Hora and Casa da Música, Póvoa de Varzim and Pedras Rubras, and Fórum Maia, but the extent of the city's cycle lanes, whether bicycles may be carried on the metro, and what on-street parking costs are all worth confirming with the câmara before you plan around them.