NOL Card Prices in Dubai

NOL card price by card type

Five cards are on sale and two of them share a price. A Silver card and a Gold card both cost AED 25; the difference is the fare, not the plastic. A Blue Personal card is AED 70, a Red Ticket is AED 2 and the NOL Travel card sold to visitors is AED 100.

Validity is where the Red Ticket separates itself. Silver, Gold, Blue and Travel cards run 5 years, and the anonymous ones keep working on their existing balance for 2 years after that without accepting a top up. A Red Ticket dies at 90 days or 10 trips, whichever comes first. Prices are identical across Dubai, at the airport terminals, City Centre Deira, Mall of the Emirates and every station in between, and the buying guide maps each sales point.

What you actually get to spend

The sticker price is not the cost. A Silver card at AED 25 hands back AED 19 as travel credit, leaving an issuance fee of AED 6. That is six one zone rides at AED 3 before anything needs adding.

The Blue card works the other way round. Its AED 70 is a AED 50 application fee plus AED 20 of credit, so the card itself is the expensive part and the concession eligibility is what you are paying for. A Red Ticket includes AED 0, which means the AED 2 buys the paper and nothing else.

The NOL card prices that are not on the sticker

Registration of an anonymous Silver or Gold card costs AED 30 and lifts the balance ceiling from AED 1,000 to AED 5,000, which is also what allows a 30, 90 or 365 day pass onto the card.

Personal card variants cost more than the standard AED 70: AED 80 for a Personal Gold card, AED 95 with an ISIC student card printed on it, and AED 100 or AED 110 for the special designs. People of Determination pay AED 0.

Replacements are charged at the full new issuance rate every time, so a lost Blue card is another AED 70. Top up minimums are a cost of a different kind: AED 20 at a ticket machine and AED 50 at a ticket office, against AED 5 in the NOL Pay app. All 12 top up channels are compared with their minimums.

Fare prices per trip

Fares depend on how many of the seven RTA zones a journey touches, not on distance. A Silver or Blue card pays AED 3, AED 5 or AED 7.50; Gold doubles each of those on Metro and Tram but pays the standard rate on a bus.

Concession holders pay half: AED 1.50 to AED 3.75 for students, seniors and Social Affairs beneficiaries on a Personal card. People of Determination and children aged 5 or under pay AED 0. RTA's last published daily cap was AED 20 on Silver and AED 40 on Gold, from the 2014 tariff revision, and it no longer appears on the current fares page.

Travel pass prices

Passes are priced by duration and by how many zones they cover. Seven days runs AED 50 for one zone up to AED 110 for every zone, and a year runs AED 1,060 to AED 2,670. Gold passes are double throughout and concession passes are half.

An anonymous card can hold the 7 day pass only; the 30, 90 and 365 day passes need a registered or Personal card. At AED 7.50 a trip the AED 350 monthly all zones pass pays for itself at 47 journeys. Every pass price and its break even point is set out in one table.