Winter tyre rules in Sweden

The two periods

• 1 December – 31 March: winter tyres are required when there are winter road conditions: snow, ice, slush or frost on any part of the road. On a dry, bare road in January summer tyres are legal; on a frosty road the same day they are not.
• 1 October – 15 April: studded tyres are allowed. Outside that period only when there are, or may be, winter road conditions.

The periods overlap but are not the same rule. Today’s ice risk for each municipality is on our forecast pages (in Swedish).

What counts as a winter tyre

• Studded tyres.
• Studless winter tyres with the alpine symbol (a mountain with a snowflake, 3PMSF). Since 1 December 2024, tyres marked only M+S no longer count on a passenger car.
• All four wheels must have winter tyres. Mixing studded and studless tyres on the car is not allowed.

Tread depth

• 3 mm on winter tyres when the winter tyre requirement applies (1 December – 31 March, in winter road conditions).
• 1.6 mm the rest of the year.

The legal limits are well below the point where a tyre starts to lose grip. The tyre trade and motoring organisations recommend changing winter tyres at about 4 mm.

Fines

Driving a car without the required winter tyres in winter road conditions carries a fixed fine of 2,000 SEK, issued by the police on the spot (checked against the prosecutors’ catalogue on 3 October 2026). The driver is responsible, also in a borrowed or hired car. Too little tread, studs outside the period without winter conditions, and mixed tyres have fines of their own.

Streets where studs are banned

Some streets ban studded tyres all year: in Stockholm (for example Hornsgatan and Fleminggatan), Göteborg, Uppsala and Gävle, as of our check on 17 October 2026. The ban applies only where the round sign with a studded tyre (C44) is posted. The fine is 1,000 SEK. The streets are listed on our Swedish page Dubbdäcksförbud.

Hired cars and driving on

• Cars hired in Sweden usually have winter tyres in the season; a car hired abroad often does not. Ask before you collect it.
• Heading for Denmark, Norway, Finland or Germany? The rules there differ: Denmark allows studs only 1 November – 15 April, and Germany bans them. See our table (in Swedish): Vinterdäck utomlands.
• Heavy trucks and buses, and their trailers, need winter tyres 10 November – 10 April whatever the road conditions, with at least 5 mm tread (in Swedish: Tung lastbil och buss på vintern).

Sources

• Transportstyrelsen (Swedish Transport Agency): Vinterdäck (in Swedish)
• Transportstyrelsen: Nya krav på dubbfria däck (2024) (in Swedish)
• Åklagarmyndigheten: fixed fines catalogue (ordningsbotskatalog) (in Swedish)

Swedish version: Datum för vinterdäck och dubbdäck.