Can a Brit Drive in Kiribati? — Yes, Same Side, but Carry an IDP

Can a British licence holder drive in Kiribati? Yes — your UK licence is accepted for visitors, with an International Driving Permit recommended to carry alongside it. There is one piece of immediate good news: Kiribati drives on the left, the same as the UK, so there is no side switch to unlearn. After that, honesty serves you better than a padded checklist, because Kiribati is unlike almost anywhere else on this site.

This is a nation of low-lying coral atolls scattered across a vast stretch of the central Pacific, with its capital on South Tarawa. “Driving” here means a short, single ribbon of road running the length of the inhabited atoll, shared with pedestrians, dogs, scooters and children, at gentle speeds. There is no motorway network, no rural touring route and, on most outer islands, barely a road at all. Car hire is scarce and usually arranged informally through a hotel rather than an international rental desk.

Because of that, much of the formal rulebook — posted speed limits, the precise drink-drive threshold, mandatory equipment — is simply not well documented for visitors, and inventing figures would do you no favours. What is genuinely true and useful is this: distances are tiny, surfaces and verges are uneven, the only sensible speed is a slow one, and the single biggest hazards are people and animals on a road that doubles as the community’s main street. Drive as you would through a busy village, not a public highway.

Treat any alcohol as incompatible with driving regardless of the local figure, keep your documents on you, and accept that conditions and weather — Kiribati is exposed to flooding and king tides — can close the road entirely. The emergency number is 112.

In short: the licence answer is a clean yes and the side of the road is in your favour, but this is a destination where you walk or take a short hop far more than you drive. Before you travel, confirm what to carry with the Driving Permit Checker, and if you do hire a car, our guide to driving fines abroad and who pays is a sensible primer on how penalties tend to work for visitors.