The sale of alcohol is prohibited throughout the city from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. The exception are shops in the duty-free zone of Chopin Airport. In practice, this means that it will come into force on Monday from midnight to 6 a.m.
From November 1, 2025, the night prohibition was introduced on a pilot basis in two districts: Śródmieście and Praga-Północ.
According to data from the city guard, comparing the November-January period year to year, as Fijałkowski said, a decrease in guard intervention was recorded in these two districts. By over 10% during the day and by over 15% at night.
The number of interventions is decreasing
As for night hours, in the two districts with a ban the drop was 23%, and in the districts without a ban it was slightly over 4%. The most spectacular was the case of Śródmieście, where the year-on-year decline was 26%.
Data from the Warsaw Police Headquarters show that the decrease in the number of interventions is much greater – over 37 percent, and the number of offenses against the Act on upbringing in sobriety dropped by 43 percent. At the same time, there was an increase in interventions in neighboring districts – Praga-Południe, Targówek and Wola.
The ban was introduced by over 200 local governments
The mayor of the city, Rafał Trzaskowski, was initially against the ban, but he changed his mind and proposed his project in which he wanted to introduce a ban in the entire city, and then withdrew from this idea and proposed introducing a pilot night prohibition in two districts: Śródmieście and Prague-Północ, which was to come into force on November 1, 2025.
Over 200 local governments have already introduced a ban on the night sale of alcohol in stores and gas stations. The night prohibition (which does not apply to restaurants, pubs, etc.) also applies to, among others: in Kraków, Bydgoszcz, Gdańsk, Szczecin. Some local governments, including: Poznań, Wrocław, Rzeszów, Katowice, Bielsko-Biała, Kielce – limited the sale of alcohol only in the city center, in the old town.
From the beginning of this year, night prohibition came into force, among others: in Lublin, Ełk, Opole and Koło.
