Car Rental Tenerife: Airport Pick-Up and Driving Tips

If you are staying in Costa Adeje, Los Cristianos or Playa de las Américas and mainly want the beach and Siam Park, you can manage without one for much of the week. Package transfers from Tenerife South are short, and the southern resorts sit close together.

The case for car hire in Tenerife grows the moment you look beyond the south. Puerto de la Cruz, with Loro Parque, Lago Martiánez and the old Castillo de San Felipe, is on the opposite coast. Santa Cruz de Tenerife has the Museo de la Naturaleza y el Hombre, the Castillo de San Juan Bautista and, a little further on, Playa de Las Teresitas and the Roques de Anaga. Add the Pyramids of Güímar and the Basilica of Candelaria on the east side and you have several days of touring that are far easier with your own wheels.

A sensible compromise many visitors choose is a car for part of the holiday rather than the full fortnight, picked up from the resort or the airport when you plan your day trips.

Car rental at Tenerife South airport is the obvious choice for most UK arrivals, since this is where the direct flights land. You will see it signed as Tenerife Sur, which is why searches for car hire at Tenerife Sur airport and Tenerife South mean the same place. From there it is 14 minutes to Playa de las Américas, 15 to Adeje, 24 to Guía de Isora and around 30 to Los Gigantes.

Tenerife North airport has no direct flights from the UK, but it is worth knowing about if you connect through Spain or base yourself in the north. It is 6 minutes from Tacoronte, 8 from Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 13 from Candelaria and 18 from La Orotava.

If you arrive on a package with transfers included, you can also hire from your resort for just the days you need. Compare airport and resort pick-ups in the live results on this page before you decide.

Distances look modest on paper, but this is an island where the coasts face very different directions, so allow time. A run from the southern resorts to Puerto de la Cruz or Santa Cruz is a proper day out, not a quick hop, and the Roques de Anaga lie beyond Santa Cruz at the far north-eastern end.

The weather rarely gets in the way. At Adeje, July records no rain at all and August just a single rainy day, with highs of 26 to 28°C. February and March are the damper months, with around five or six rainy days and up to 39 mm of rain in March, so expect occasional wet roads then.

Two ferry ports matter to drivers: Los Cristianos in the south and Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the east, with Las Palmas de Gran Canaria about 56 miles away by sea. Check your rental terms before taking a hire car on a ferry, as many agreements restrict it.

When you compare car rental for Tenerife airport pick-ups, look first at the fuel policy. Full-to-full, where you collect and return the car with a full tank, is usually the fairest and easiest to check.

Read the excess carefully. Standard cover often leaves you liable for a sizeable sum if the car is damaged, so decide in advance whether to take the rental desk's excess waiver or arrange your own cover from home. If you are travelling with children, request child seats when you book rather than at the counter, and confirm the number you need.

School holidays bring the most British families to the island, so booking early for those weeks gives you more choice of car sizes. The comparison on this page shows live car hire prices so you can weigh up the options side by side, and you can also check package deals and hotel prices here if you have not booked the rest of your trip.