Warsaw's Golden Ticket Contest: How to Win 360 Days of Free Transit
The essentials: Apply on 4 December 2026, 08:00-20:00. Adult passengers need an active Bilet Warszawiaka and qualifying 30- or 90-day ticket history from 2014 to October 2026. Up to 35 winners receive 360 days of travel; total eligible ticket-holding days rank entrants, then submission time breaks ties.
A Warsaw tram. WTP's Golden Ticket gives winners 360 days of travel across the city's buses, trams, metro and SKM trains. Photo: Patrycja Rosa (ptrcnull), CC BY 4.0. Resized and JPEG-compressed; no content edits.
If you have been faithfully buying long-term tickets on your Warsaw City Card, December brings a chance to make that loyalty pay. Warsaw Public Transport (WTP) has announced the fourth edition of its passenger contest, with the top prize being the Złoty Bilet (Golden Ticket): 360 days of travel on Warsaw's buses, trams, metro and SKM city trains.
What the Golden Ticket actually is
This year there are 35 Golden Tickets to win. Each is a personalised Warsaw City Card with a special graphic design, onto which four consecutive 90-day personal Warszawiak tickets are encoded - together covering 360 days of validity.
Who can enter
The contest is open to adult WTP passengers who use long-term tickets with the Karta Warszawiaka entitlement. All three conditions must be met, WTP says:
- you held valid 30- or 90-day tickets with the Karta Warszawiaka entitlement on your city card at some point between 1 January 2014 and 31 October 2026,
- you have an active Bilet Warszawiaka on the day you apply,
- you fill in the application form correctly.
Tickets that were returned in whole or in part do not count toward the ticket-holding period.
One day only: 4 December
Applications are accepted only on 4 December 2026, between 08:00 and 20:00, through a form at benefity.wtp.waw.pl. The form asks for:
- the 11-digit number of your card and its type: physical Warsaw City Card (WKM) or the mobiWAWA app card,
- your first and last name,
- your PESEL number - and here is the detail expats need: foreigners without a PESEL give their date of birth instead,
- an e-mail address and a phone number.
If you used more than one card during the contest period, tick the relevant field and list all the card numbers. You may only enter a card you own, and each participant may submit one entry.
How winners are picked
This edition rewards seniority. Winners are the eligible applicants with the largest total number of days holding Warszawiak tickets during the contest period. If several people have the same number of days, the order of application submission decides. WTP plans a maximum of 35 winners, and after verification the winning card numbers will be published on the organiser's website.
Check the exclusions before setting a reminder
The announcement gives the main entry conditions, but the fourth-edition regulations contain several exclusions that matter when deciding whether to apply. The competition is not open to ZTM employees and their family members, people working for ZTM under a contract of mandate or another legal relationship, and the family members specified in the rules up to the second degree of kinship. It also excludes users of the WTP Biznes ticket offer, and public-transport operator employees using employee tickets and their children.
There is a separate rule about unpaid fare notices. A person cannot become a winner if they have received a demand for payment for travel without a valid ticket or proof of a free or reduced-fare entitlement and have not paid it before entering. That is more specific than simply having an active monthly pass on application day. If this situation applies to you, check it with ZTM before submitting rather than assuming that buying another ticket settles the older notice.
These exclusions come from section 4 of the official regulations. They are worth reading alongside the three basic entry conditions, especially if your travel entitlement comes through an employer rather than a ticket you buy in the usual way.
Which parts of your ticket history count?
The relevant history runs from 1 January 2014 to 31 October 2026. Within that period, the organiser checks qualifying Warszawiak ticket validity against the records held in its own system. The ranking is based on days with qualifying tickets, not the number of times you tapped into the metro, how many bus journeys you made, or how long you have lived in Warsaw.
The regulations exclude tickets returned in full or in part. They also exclude ticket periods encoded before a break lasting at least five years during which neither a valid ticket nor a valid Karta Warszawiaka entitlement was recorded on the participant's card. For someone who lived in Warsaw, moved away for several years and later returned, that second exclusion can change which part of an apparently long history counts. Do not assume that every old card or every old purchase will contribute to your total.
As a simple illustration of the ranking principle, someone with more qualifying ticket days ranks ahead of someone with fewer, even if the second person sends the form earlier. Submission time becomes decisive when the qualifying-day totals are equal. The organiser also reserves the decision where entries arrive at the same time or raise doubts. There is no published promise that submitting at a particular minute guarantees a prize.
If you used several cards, the form provides a way to declare that and list their 11-digit numbers. That is a reason to find your own older card details before 4 December, not a reason to submit separate entries. The limit remains one entry per participant, and you can enter only a card you own.
What happens after you submit?
The form is the start of verification, not an instant award. ZTM checks the entry conditions and ticket history using its records. Under section 5 of the regulations, the organiser must publish pseudonymised winning card numbers on the WTP website and make the card-checking tool available no later than ten working days after the entry date. In this rule, working days are Monday to Friday, excluding statutory public holidays in Poland.
Winners are also notified individually by email. The official announcement identifies the benefits checking page as another way to check winning card numbers after verification. If you look before the current edition's results are published, do not confuse an older competition's information with the December Golden Ticket results. Follow the fourth-edition WTP announcement and the date of the results you are reading.
Keep access to the email address and telephone number you enter. The regulations say that, after the winning email and telephone contact from the organiser, the winner must provide a photograph for the personalised card through the photo service identified in the rules. The photograph has to meet Warsaw City Card requirements. If it is unsuitable, the organiser can request another one; failing to provide it within the stated deadline or failing to cooperate can mean losing the prize.
Collection, validity and tax: the details after a win
The Golden Ticket must be collected personally at the Passenger Service Point designated by the organiser. The deadline is 31 January 2027. It is not a promise that you can choose any service point, receive the physical prize by post, or have somebody else collect it for you. The regulations do not allow the winner to transfer the right to receive the prize to another person.
The 360 days start on the day the winner collects the Golden Ticket. The prize is therefore described as four consecutive personalised 90-day Warszawiak tickets, rather than a calendar year beginning on 1 January. When the organiser contacts you, check the collection instructions and how the new card will fit with any ticket you already hold. Do not assume that an existing pass will automatically be refunded or that the prize can be delayed beyond the collection deadline.
Each Golden Ticket has a stated value of 1,000 zł. The regulations assign an additional 111 zł cash component to cover the competition's flat-rate income tax. That component is not paid to the winner: the organiser uses it to pay the tax. Section 7 says winners do not have to make a tax payment for this prize or include it in their annual tax return. The award cannot be exchanged for cash or another benefit, so the published value is not a cash alternative you can request.
If something goes wrong with the competition
The regulations give [email protected] as the organiser's contact. Complaints about the running of the competition can be submitted from the competition's start until three calendar days after the results are published. The stated response period is ten working days after the complaint is submitted. Keep a copy of your entry details and any messages if you need to explain a problem.
Read the current fourth-edition regulations again before applying. They are the governing document, and the organiser may make changes that do not infringe participants' acquired rights. For an expat, the useful preparation is straightforward: check the exclusions, gather your own card numbers, confirm the active Warszawiak ticket, and use the PESEL or foreign-applicant date-of-birth field that actually applies to you.
Your entry data
The regulations identify ZTM as the administrator of participants' personal data and limit their use to running the competition. They say the data will be processed during the competition and the complaints process, but no longer than 15 February 2027. Participants have rights including access and correction. That is another reason to use the official entry page and check the details before submitting: a mistyped card number or email address can affect verification and later contact. The full privacy provisions are in section 8 of the fourth-edition rules, separate from the shorter news announcement.
Frequently asked questions
Who can enter the WTP Golden Ticket contest in 2026?
Adult WTP passengers with an active Bilet Warszawiaka on the application day, who held valid 30- or 90-day Karta Warszawiaka-entitlement tickets on their city card between 1 January 2014 and 31 October 2026.
How do foreigners without a PESEL apply for the Golden Ticket?
The application form accepts a date of birth instead of a PESEL number for foreigners. You also need your 11-digit card number (WKM or mobiWAWA), name, e-mail and phone.
When and where do I apply for the Warsaw Golden Ticket?
Only on 4 December 2026, between 08:00 and 20:00, via the form at benefity.wtp.waw.pl. One entry per person, and ties between equal ticket-holding records are broken by application submission time.
