Shorter than the forums suggest
It is roughly 70 km from the terminal to Budva and, in normal conditions, sixty to seventy minutes. That is about fifteen minutes more than the same trip from car hire tivat collection points, and in high summer, when the coastal approach to Budva jams, it can be quicker from Podgorica. The Sozina tunnel is why: four kilometres through the ridge that separates the interior from the sea, turning a mountain crossing into five minutes of straight road.
Almost all of the difficulty on this trip happens after you arrive. The driving is the easy part.
Out of the airport and south
The access road feeds onto the M2 and you turn south. Dual carriageway, flat, fast, no traffic lights for the first stretch. Fuel here rather than on the coast, where it is consistently dearer, and carry a few coins for the toll booth even if you intend to pay by card.
Thirty kilometres of plain, then the climb to the tunnel and the booth at its southern end. Emerging near Sutomore you are on the coast, and Budva is a straightforward run north from there.
The Lake Skadar alternative
There is a second route, west on the E762 past Virpazar and along the northern shore of Lake Skadar before rejoining the coast. It is slower by a good half hour and much prettier, and it makes sense only if the lake is part of the plan rather than a detour on an arrival day.
On a first afternoon with luggage in the back and an unfamiliar car, take the tunnel. Save the lake road for a day when arriving late costs nothing.
The approach, and the queue
The E65 enters Budva from the south, and the junction at Becici is the pinch point: on a summer weekend it can hold you for twenty minutes at walking pace. There is a bypass tunnel through Spas Hill for traffic continuing along the coast, but if Budva is the destination you come off before it and join the queue with everyone else.
That crawl is the single best argument for an automatic on this route. Stop-start traffic in August heat is where a manual stops being charming, and automatics are the first class to sell out for exactly that reason.
Arriving: parking is the whole problem
Budva parks badly and it parks worst between Friday afternoon and Sunday evening in July and August. The nearer the old town you aim, the earlier you need to be, and by mid-morning in season the search itself costs more time than the drive did.
Two things make it manageable. A compact opens up spaces a larger car cannot use, which is worth more here than legroom. And parking is mostly cashless now, so a card or the local parking app saves standing at a machine that will not take your coins.
If you are staying somewhere with its own parking, the Budva page covers collection points in town and delivery to an address, which removes the problem from the arrival entirely.
Practicalities worth knowing
Headlights day and night, all year, and enforced. The coast road after Petrovac is twisty and local drivers overtake on blind bends, so leave room rather than matching their pace. The Sozina toll is the only one you will pay in the country. And if you are carrying on to the bay afterwards, the Kotor drive picks up where this one ends.
