Car shipping from Saudi Arabia to Tunisia comes down to one rule, and Gulf International Shipping applies it before anything else: under FCR, Tunisia admits a returning expatriate’s car that is five years old or newer, provided the owner has spent two years or more abroad. If yours qualifies, we collect it in your city, clear the export on Absher and Fasah, and strap it into a closed container that leaves Jeddah Islamic Port, transits Suez and is discharged at Radès. At Radès you decide between full exemption on RS plates or settling 25% or 30% of the duties in hard currency so the car is yours to sell, a choice you can make once a decade. Allow about 5–7 weeks from loading to arrival; one car typically fills a private 20 ft box costing from SAR 5,520, whereas a car sharing a 40 ft box with some of your furniture costs from SAR 7,360.
Not every question about shipping a car to Tunisia is about price. The real decision comes earlier: will the car still be inside the five-year limit on the day it enters Tunisia? Have your visits home added up to more than 183 days in any year? Do you want an RS-plated car that can only be sold with customs permission, or a free car on which you pay part of the duty? This guide puts those questions in the order you need to answer them, then walks through the shipment itself from your door to registration.
At a glance
- Who qualifies: Tunisians with two or more years abroad whose time in Tunisia stays within 183 days a year
- Car age: no more than 5 years on the day of import; passenger car or utility vehicle up to 3.5 t, in your own name
- How often: once every 10 years, with import within two years of your definitive-return date
- Two exemption options: full, with RS plates, or partial, paying 25% or 30% of duties in foreign currency, with normal plates
- Shipping method: sealed in a closed box at Jeddah Islamic Port and opened only at Radès; we never use RoRo
- Transit time: about 30 to 47 days from your door to Radès port, depending on the loading city
- Prices: spare parts from SAR 505; a whole 20 ft box from SAR 5,520; 40 ft for car plus furniture from SAR 7,360
Route: your city → Absher and Fasah → Jeddah port → Suez → transshipment port → Radès · Time: 5–7 weeks · Contact: 0568829975
Do you and your car qualify? The FCR conditions in one table
Before asking about price, check your situation against these conditions as published on Tunisia’s official administrative-procedures portal. If they all apply, your car can be shipped to Tunisia under the returning-resident benefit; if even one fails, the car pays full duties.
Conditions are confirmed before shipping
The table condenses the official procedure; only Tunisian customs can rule on your individual file. We ask for a photo of your registration card and your passport stamps before booking and go through them with you point by point.
What is the FCR scheme in Tunisia?
FCR is a tax and customs benefit that Tunisian law grants Tunisians living abroad when they return for good, allowing them to bring in one vehicle with full or partial relief from the duties and taxes normally charged on imported cars. It used to be a once-in-a-lifetime benefit and is now available once every 10 years. Because ordinary duties on cars in Tunisia are high, this scheme is what makes shipping a car from Saudi Arabia worthwhile for most returning families.
An FCR file passes through several offices in Tunisia and can take 3 to 7 months to complete, according to the official procedures portal, so it makes sense to start your Tunisian paperwork in parallel with shipping the car rather than after it arrives.
Full exemption with RS plates or partial exemption? A comparison
This decision shapes how you use the car for years after it lands, so make it before shipping, not at the customs counter:
The engine sets the rate. Petrol engines of 2,000 cc or less, diesels of 2,500 cc or less, and every hybrid, electric or utility vehicle pay 25%; bigger engines pay 30%. Because payment is in foreign currency, arrange the transfer early so the car is not left waiting at the port for funds.
How much does it cost to ship a car from Saudi Arabia to Tunisia?
You will not find a published car-shipping rate for Tunisia from any competitor, and we will not make one up. Gulf International Shipping prices your car once we know its type, dimensions and loading city, but there is a clear benchmark: one car normally fills a whole 20 ft container, priced from SAR 5,520, with lashing, export paperwork and clearance added according to your case.
Note: the container reaches Radès from your city in roughly 30–47 days, and keys and papers sent by air arrive in 3–7 days.
The freight price does not include what you pay in Tunisia: the 25% or 30% if you choose partial exemption, stamps and registration fees at the land-transport technical agency, and any port storage if collection is delayed. Marine cover for the car is priced on its value; we can include it in the same quote. All Tunisia categories and their starting prices are listed on shipping prices from Saudi Arabia to Tunisia.
Why a closed container? How your car travels from Jeddah to Radès
We do not ship cars to Tunisia on RoRo vessels. The voyage passes through a Mediterranean transshipment port and lasts weeks, and inside a closed container nobody drives the car, and it is shielded from sea salt, sun and tampering in port yards. The car rolls into the container on a ramp, all four wheels are lashed with straps, and wooden chocks go under the tyres so nothing shifts when the crane lifts the box.
What we ask you to do before handover:
- Empty the car of personal belongings: the container is declared for the car alone, and items inside it complicate inspection.
- Leave only a little fuel in the tank, enough to drive in and out of the container.
- Hand over both keys, or keep the spare to send by air with the papers.
- We take photos of all four sides, the interior and the mileage reading before loading, and send them to you.
- We fit a protective cover before lashing and record the chassis number on the export declaration and the bill of lading.
Exporting the car from Saudi Arabia: Absher first, then Fasah
A car can only leave the Kingdom for good once the export has been issued through the vehicle export service on Absher and the export declaration filed on Fasah. Usually the vehicle must be in your name, have no unpaid traffic fines, and carry no outstanding finance or ownership by a finance company; if it is financed, the finance must be settled and ownership transferred to you first.
- 1Pay fines and confirm ownership
Make sure the registration is in your name and the car is not held by a finance company. - 2Issue the export on Absher
Under vehicle services choose final export, and keep a copy of the document. - 3Hand the car to our team
In your city or at our Jeddah warehouse, with the registration card and keys. - 4Fasah declaration and port slot
Our team submits the Fasah export declaration and reserves a delivery slot for the box at Jeddah Islamic Port. - 5Loading and sealing
The car is lashed and the container closed with a seal whose number appears on the bill of lading we send you.
How long does car shipping from Saudi Arabia to Tunisia take?
A car needs roughly 30 to 47 days to reach Radès, and the difference between cities is the truck distance to Jeddah. Cars from Dammam, Al Khobar and Al Ahsa do not sail from Eastern Province ports; they cross the Kingdom by road to Jeddah first and board the ship there.
These times do not include the FCR file itself in Tunisia, which is a separate administrative track that can take months, as noted above, so we advise starting it before the car arrives.
The two-year window and the five-year limit: when should you ship?
Two clocks run together on your car’s file. The first is the car’s age, counted on the day it enters Tunisia, not the day you bought it or the day it leaves Jeddah; if your car turns five a month from now, a six-week voyage is enough to push it outside the rule. The second is the two-year window that opens on your definitive-return date, which is the last date you entered Tunisia as recorded by customs.
In practice: if your car is close to the five-year limit, ship it first, ahead of the furniture, and count the full time to Radès with a two-week margin. If it is fairly new, you have more flexibility to send it with your furniture in one container once you have settled in Tunisia, as long as you stay inside the two-year window.
A car close to the five-year limit
Send us the first-registration date on your registration card before anything else. We calculate the expected arrival date at Radès with you, and if there is no safe margin we tell you before you pay a riyal.
Arrival at Radès and registration in Tunisia
When the container reaches Radès it is unloaded in the port yard and the car is rolled out on ramps, then presented for customs inspection, which matches the chassis number against the papers. The FCR formalities are then completed with customs, you choose the exemption regime, pay the percentage in foreign currency if you chose partial exemption, and register the car with the land-transport technical agency to receive RS plates or normal plates.
If you cannot be there on arrival day, someone can act for you under a power of attorney certified at the Tunisian embassy (Riyadh) or consulate general (Jeddah). We stay in touch with our agent at the port until the car is released.
Documents required to ship a car to Tunisia
The detailed document list for an FCR file is set by Tunisian customs and can change, so we send you the current list at booking and review it with you before sailing.
Diesel, hybrid, electric and motorcycles
Unlike some countries, Tunisia’s FCR scheme does not exclude diesel cars; they fall under the 25% partial rate up to 2,500 cc. Hybrid, electric and utility vehicles fall under the 25% rate as well. Motorcycles are also covered and travel in a container with other goods or on their own depending on size, under the same age and ownership conditions. A utility vehicle is accepted if its gross weight does not exceed 3.5 t.
Worth remembering: cars sold in Saudi Arabia have the steering wheel on the left, which is also the norm in Tunisia, so the driving position raises no registration issue.
If you do not meet the FCR conditions
If your car is older than 5 years, you have not completed two years outside Tunisia, or the car is registered to someone else, it will not enter under the returning-resident benefit and will pay full duties and taxes under ordinary import rules, which may make shipping it uneconomic. In that case we tell you plainly before shipping; selling the car in the Kingdom and buying another in Tunisia may well work out cheaper. We do not ship any car to Tunisia until its customs status is agreed with you.
Can the car share a container with the furniture?
Yes, and many returning families choose this. Inside a forty-foot container, priced from SAR 7,360, the car is strapped down at the far end and the wrapped furniture stacked in front of it up to the doors behind a timber divider. It saves the cost of two containers, but the car and the furniture remain separate files at customs, with the furniture declared on the household-effects declaration. How the furniture is prepared and listed is explained on furniture moving from Saudi Arabia to Tunisia.
Air freight for the spare key, papers and spare parts
The car itself never flies, but air freight is useful for what goes with it: the spare key, copies of documents, or an urgent spare part. Saudia flies nonstop between Jeddah and Tunis-Carthage every day and Tunisair also serves the route; items from Riyadh or Madinah connect through Jeddah and reach you in 3–7 days. Air costs SAR 17 per kilogram at the lowest, with a minimum weight billed on each consignment, and heavy spare parts are better value by sea, from SAR 505. See our air freight service.
Costly mistakes when shipping a car to Tunisia
- Counting the car’s age from the shipping date instead of its entry into Tunisia.
- Spending more than 183 days in Tunisia in a year without noticing, which breaks the residence-abroad condition.
- Shipping a car registered to your wife or your company while the file is in your name.
- Choosing full exemption and then wanting to sell the car a year later.
- Delaying the foreign-currency transfer for partial exemption while port storage days add up.
- Leaving belongings inside the car in the container.
- Believing offers of “car shipping to Tunisia by road” or “by sea in 10 days”.
Insurance, payment and tracking
Marine insurance on the car is optional and calculated on its value, and we recommend it for a voyage that calls at more than one port. You pay us in Saudi riyals inside the Kingdom, separately from anything you pay Tunisian customs. On WhatsApp we send you loading photos, the container number and the sailing date, followed by arrival notices at the transshipment port and at Radès.
Why Gulf International Shipping for your car to Tunisia?
Conditions first
We check the car’s age and your passport stamps before booking, not after it reaches Radès.
Closed containers only
Your car is lashed and covered, and nobody drives it during the voyage.
Absher and Fasah handled
We follow the export, the declaration and the Jeddah port formalities for you.
One number
Calls and WhatsApp on 0568829975 from collection until the car leaves the port.
Does your car qualify for FCR?
Send a photo of your registration card, your last entry date into Tunisia and your Saudi city, and we will tell you whether it qualifies, the cost and the next sailing.
Related Tunisia guides
- Shipping company from Saudi Arabia to Tunisia and furniture moving to Tunisia
- Returning to Tunisia from Saudi Arabia: household goods and shipping prices to Tunisia
- Car shipping, customs clearance and all destinations from Saudi Arabia
