As of today, the Christmas holidays begin in the first federal states. Until Christmas Eve, there will be traffic jams and delays nationwide because many people are traveling to visit family and friends. FOCUS online knows the critical routes.

Christmas travel in Germany reaches its peak between Thursday afternoon and Friday evening. The Christmas holidays have already started in Baden-Württemberg, Berlin, Brandenburg, Hesse, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Saarland, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia.

For travelers this means: stress, traffic jams and delays.

Bremen, Hamburg, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate and Schleswig-Holstein will follow on Friday. In Bavaria, travel starts on Friday afternoon, because the school holidays start at noon.

There will already be delays and flowing traffic on the A1 (Trier and Saarbrücken), the A5 (Frankfurt and Kassel) and the A3 (Passau and Nuremberg) on ​​Thursday.

If you are traveling by car or coach, you have to expect traffic jams on the most important travel routes in Germany.

According to the ADAC, the metropolitan areas of Hamburg, Berlin, Cologne, Frankfurt and Munich are affected.

There is a risk of traffic jams on the following motorways:

If you travel abroad by car or long-distance bus, you must expect traffic jams and delays on the following routes:

In Switzerland, on the

Also at the Furka, Lötschberg and Vereina car loading stations.

To ensure that you reach your destination safely, colleagues from the CHIP editorial team have put together the most important traffic jam apps for you here.

On train routes with intermediate stations in the metropolitan areas of Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Karlsruhe, Cologne, Munich and Rostock, travelers should definitely reserve a seat from Thursday afternoon.

It could be more crowded on the trains than usual. At the same time, the more people there are on trains, the longer it takes to get on and off. This causes delays that you should allow for when planning your itinerary.

FOCUS online advises: Make sure you plan sufficient transfer time. Find out in good time about alternative train routes if you should miss your connecting train.

On the afternoon of Boxing Day, all drivers are threatened with slow-moving return traffic.

Many travelers then return from their Christmas vacation or family visits. However, the volume of traffic will not be as strong as at the beginning of the Christmas weekend, according to the ADAC in a press release.

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On our e-mobility portal EFAHRER.com you will find all e-vehicles available on the German market

You can also arrange a test drive for the car of your choice free of charge and thus start e-mobility in an uncomplicated manner.