Car rental have always been used for various occasions – be it for bridging accidents and repairs, as a chic wedding car for the bride and groom, or for business and vacation trips. There are now countless car rental and car hire companies around the world specializing in the rental of four-wheeled vehicles, i.e. cars, vans and minibuses. But which providers are there at all? We provide an overview of popular providers such as sixt, avis and europcar.
With so many cars and accessories to choose from, it’s easy to get lost in the shuffle. However, you should not be put off by this, because a rental car is a great way to be more independent on vacation and to explore new regions. But even in everyday life, a rental car can be extremely useful for certain appointments and excursions. Daily rates are also suitable for people who regularly rely on public transport. And the great thing about it: all you need is a driving license and a small budget!
In this guide, Reisetopia would like to take you on a road trip through the different car rental companies and explain what to look out for when renting a car, so that your next trip with the rented vehicle goes smoothly.
Which car rental companies are there?
Of course, there are countless car rental companies in various locations worldwide – we cannot list them all! That’s why we have focused on the most important and well-known car rental companies to give you a small but nice selection for your next booking.
Avis serves nearly 180 countries with more than 7.000 rental car stations worldwide. the u.s. car rental company places a high value on quality and therefore regularly sorts out its fleet and sources new cars to ensure that customers are always provided with high quality vehicles in good condition, which are usually only three to four months old.
Since 1970, avis has been cooperating with its partner lufthansa and therefore offers rental cars at 120 airports across europe. In germany, there are currently 344 stations with a total of 25 rental cars.000 rental vehicles. This button will take you directly to the official website of avis and you can get an overview of the entire offer yourself.
Enterprise rent-A-car
Enterprise rent-A-car rents vehicles to about 7.000 locations worldwide, including the USA, canada, france, the UK, spain, ireland, and germany. However, enterprise car rental has specialized in the german market more in the direction of business travel, corporate customer and replacement car rental. For holidaymakers, the competition’s rental cars are therefore the better choice.
Photo: official website of enterprise.De
Enterprise offers, in addition to the rental cars, four different levels of rewards that can be obtained by renting a certain number of cars. loyal enterprise plus customers benefit from between one and four free vehicle upgrades per year.
If you would like to take a look at the enterprise fleet, the button will take you directly to enterprise car rental, so you can easily find out about a vehicle for your next business trip.
Europcar
The French car rental company Europcar is also one of the leading providers of rental cars in Europe. Europcar has around 3.800 stations in over 140 countries throughout europe, africa, the middle east, latin america and asia and the pacific and operates its own low-cost brand interrent for less expensive car rentals. In germany alone, europcar autovermietung gmbh, headquartered in hamburg, has 520 locations nationwide and a fleet of 40.000 vehicles.
With this button you can easily choose between city cars, luxury cars, electric cars and vans and trucks from europcar.
Expedia
The expedia group is a u.s. online travel agency that offers the website expedia.Com (in germany expedia.De) and offers individual services, such as hotels, flights, rental cars and tickets, as well as package tours. Expedia serves 31 countries worldwide in addition to the united states. Expedia, however, only selects offers for rental cars and works together with the well-known car rental companies such as SIXT, avis, hertz, buchbinder europcar and many more.
Click on the button to go directly to expedia car rentals. There you can again choose between a rental car and an airport transfer, depending on your preference.
Hertz
Hertz has more than 8.000 stations in 150 different countries among the leaders in the rental car business. In north america alone there are around 2.000 hertz locations. In europe, the focus is particularly on the popular vacation regions of spain, italy, portugal and greece. But you can also rent a car from hertz in more exotic locations such as madagascar or papua new guinea. At all major airports, the hertz car rental agencies are located directly in the adjacent parking garages, so that vacationers can get directly from the plane into their own car. just like the competition, hertz rental cars are easy to book online before you go on your trip.
SIXT covers more than 4.000 car rental locations in over 105 countries and is one of the top car rental companies in germany. Therefore you can find SIXT stations in every german city. In addition, the provider has a particularly large presence in spain, italy, greece, france and the u.s.
In addition to classic rental cars, SIXT also offers vans, convertibles, transporters and even trucks. Customers can also expect high quality car models thanks to the cooperation with well-known brands such as BMW, audi and mercedes. With a click on the page of the SIXT car rental you can get an overview of the fleet yourself.
The rental process is very simple: the customer picks up the car and can either return it to the same station or book a one-way rental and return the car to any other SIXT station.
The ABC of rental cars
Booking a rental car may be confusing for the inexperienced at first. As a customer, you can almost get lost among the many offers available. Once a decision has been made in favor of a rental car model, the next surprise awaits the customer: some shortcuts require insider knowledge of car rental companies and co.
For this reason, we have created the following ABC of rental cars, a list with the most important abbreviations and their explanation. This should help you to understand the cryptic details of the booking.
Abbreviation |
meaning |
AC |
air conditioning stands for an air conditioning system in the vehicle. |
Additional authorized driver |
additional driver (AD), which can be booked for an additional fee. |
Airport service charge |
fee for customers who want to pick up the rental car at the airport as airport transfer. this includes additional services and accessories including local VAT. |
Age requirement |
depending on the country of travel and the car rental company, the minimum and maximum age which entitles the renter to drive the rental car differs. |
baby seat |
special baby and child seats can be purchased for an extra charge. Otherwise, it is recommended to carry your own baby seat, as i.D.R. For this there is no extra charge with most airlines anyway. |
Choice line |
choice lines are particularly well known among major car rental companies in the USA. Renters are allowed to choose between several vehicles in a row in their selected category. The key is already in the car and you can start right away. |
FE |
full/empty fuel policy: the rental car is rented with a full tank of fuel and may be returned empty. |
FF |
full/full tank regulation: the rental car is rented with a full tank and must be returned with a full tank. |
FP |
fuel paid means that the first tank of fuel is included in the price. |
GPS |
GPS stands for a navigation system, which can be booked as an optional extra. |
Hotel shuttle |
this shuttle service transports customers from the respective hotels and accommodations to the car rental company. From there, the vacation with the rental car can then start. |
Deposit |
the deposit must be paid prior to rental. It serves as a deposit and will be refunded if the car is returned without damage. Otherwise, you do not get back the deposit and pay additional fees for the damage caused to the vehicle. |
kilometers |
vehicles can be rented with different mileage limits or unlimited. This has the advantage that vacationers who only use their vehicle as an airport transfer can choose a cheaper offer. For those who want to use their vehicle permanently, then unlimited kilometers is recommended. |
minimum rental period |
the minimum period for which the vehicle must be booked varies depending on the provider and often starts at two to three days. |
snow chains |
snow chains for the icy regions can also be added to the shopping cart as an additional service. |
4WD |
four wheel drive stands for vehicles with 4 wheel drive. |
Which provider is one of the most popular car rental companies??
In 2019, the german society for consumer studies conducted a test of different car rental companies. the test criteria were divided into four areas and weighted differently. These included prices and conditions, range of offers and availability, booking convenience and customer service.
With 88.4 percent, SIXT is one of the most popular car rental companies in Germany, but also internationally, due to the wide range of vehicles and services it offers. SIXT does not only provide rental cars for a certain period of time, but also offers leasing cars for a longer period of time, which can be leased by customers for the desired period of time.
In addition, the german car rental company offers an environmentally friendly alternative for rental cars: car sharing. Car sharing is becoming increasingly popular and is officially defined as "organized shared use of one or more cars on the basis of a framework agreement". In short, the principle is the same as for the e-scooters that can now be found in every major city. Customers need access to an app, in this case the latest version of the SIXT app, and can then conveniently see all the locations where a SIXT share car is located via their created customer account and then rent it via the app for any period of time, use it and park it after the trip so that the next person can rent the car.
This button takes you directly to the SIXT-share website, where you can rent a car for as little as nine cents per minute – significantly cheaper than a regular rental car from a car rental company.
But also hertz and avis, closely followed by europcar, were able to shine with over 85 percent each and are therefore among the currently most popular car rental companies.
When is the best time to book a rental car??
Of course, the travel period plays an important role when you want to book especially cheap rental cars. It should be noted that during the high season in very popular tourist destinations, such as Majorca, holidaymakers often pay many times the price they would normally pay in the low season. Therefore it is always more sensible to look for rental cars in the off-season. However, not only the travel period, but also the period of booking is relevant for finding the cheapest offers. Some providers, for example SIXT, offer special early booking rates or discounts for early bookers. It is therefore advisable to make the booking in good time. On the other hand, rental cars are also often rented at last-minute prices. So if you’re running late, you’re often still in luck and can secure a top offer at short notice.
The booking period is not only important in terms of cost, but also in terms of the quality of the vehicles. The cars with the best price-performance ratio are already sold out, so it’s worth taking a look at the websites of the providers early on. Otherwise, you may be left with the older models that no one wanted to book in the first place. One thing is for sure: everyone will find what they are looking for, even shortly before or even during the trip – the only question is at what price!
How much does a rental car cost??
As with airlines, car rental companies have various loyalty programs for customers who book their rental car more frequently through SIXT, for example. SIXT cards are differentiated into eight different customer cards that give customers additional discounts for SIXT vehicles or for the numerous SIXT partners such as hotels and airlines. So a quick look at the programs is definitely worthwhile in terms of car rental prices.
europcar’s privilege loyalty program also contributes to cost savings on car rentals. Members receive a discount of ten percent on their booking with every new booking. However, the offer is only valid for cars and vans with a rental period of three days or longer. In addition, special conditions, such as a faster pick-up process, free weekend rentals and vouchers, are included.
Different packages are offered by avis. This includes the avis basic tariff and the avis prestige tariff. In the basic package, some rental cars are offered at bargain prices, while in the prestige model you have to dig a little deeper into your pocket and in return you get popular luxury car brands, such as Porsche models, as rental cars.
Photo: official website of billiger-mietwagen.De
The website cheaper-rental-car.De is an online portal for direct price comparison between different car rental companies. For 2021, the website has been selected by stiftung warentest as the best car rental portal, with the best basic package and customer rating. for an overview you only have to enter the car preferences as well as the booking period and location and the price comparison starts automatically. In addition, you will also find a rating of the website operator, so that the choice of the appropriate rental car is easier.
In general, the costs depend on various factors, which we have listed below:
Rental period
In general, rental cars can now be rented for any length of time. Some car rental companies charge a minimum duration of about two to three days, others even rent their cars for hourly rates. It should be noted, however, that the price of a rental car for a period of four hours often starts at 24 euros – significantly more expensive than the daily rent at other providers. So you should always compare prices carefully and check if it is not even cheaper to rent the car for a whole day instead of a few hours.
Deposit, insurance and free kilometers
In addition to the rental car prices, there are also costs for the deposit and the insurance flat rate added. These costs also vary depending on the provider. Normally, the deposit varies from 300 euros up to 2 euros.300 euro, depending on the value of the rental car. The system is similar to the pawn system: the deposit must be paid when the car is picked up. It should be noted that it may happen that only credit cards are accepted as means of payment. Sometimes the car rental companies block the deposit amount on the customer’s credit cards until the car is successfully returned to the customer. The deposit will be refunded only if the vehicle is returned in its original condition and no further costs are incurred, for example, overkill.
The overkilometers are already the keyword for the second important aspect to consider when booking a rental car. The number of free mileage also varies from provider to provider. If you exceed the specified daily limit, which can be booked in advance and is usually between 200 and 500 kilometers per day, you will have to pay a certain amount for each additional kilometer driven. This additional payment is usually only around 20 cents per kilometer, but this can quickly add up over longer distances. It is therefore advisable to look for providers with unlimited free kilometers, such as avis, in order to drive longer tours without worries.
Age
In principle, any person who is entitled to drive a car with a valid driver’s license may rent a car. However, the age of the person plays a big role and even influences the price. Many agencies require a certain minimum age for the rental of a car. Some providers, such as SIXT, europcar and avis, allow rentals from the age of 18, especially for small cars. Others set the minimum age to 21 years, hertz even to 25 years. With this provider, people over the age of 21 are only allowed to rent a car for an additional fee of 24 euros.
special cars, off-road vehicles, convertibles and sport coupes are only rented in germany, with a few exceptions, to drivers who have held their driving license for at least 3 years. When renting a truck from group 3, the driver must have had his driver’s license for at least 2 years.
In foreign countries, rental cars are usually rented only to drivers over 21 years of age. You must be at least one year old and have held your driver’s license for at least one year. Again, these age requirements may vary from country to country. So you can see that the question about the cost of a rental car is quite difficult to answer, because many factors influence the final rental car price.
Conclusion on booking a rental car
When booking a rental car, there are really a lot of things to consider – no matter if in germany or for a stay abroad! But the time-consuming search for a trustworthy car rental company and the right rental car is definitely worth it. There is hardly any other means of transportation that can guarantee as much freedom and independence during a trip as exploring on your own four wheels. But not only when traveling, but also in everyday life, a rental car can be more profitable than your own car, especially in large cities or metropolitan areas. But of course it always depends on the personal purpose of the booking and the kilometers driven!
Frequently asked questions
The majority of the car rental companies listed above have locations at some of the major airports. However, it is also advisable to make the booking online to get cheaper offers. Of course, the cars can also be booked on the spot, but this service is more cost-intensive and it cannot be guaranteed that the desired vehicles are available, because no reservation has been made in advance. Often the car rental agencies are located a few kilometers away from the airports in the direction of the city center.
In this guide you will learn more about the airport transfer and the shuttle buses to the respective rental car company.
This differs of course from provider to provider. Usually the vignettes are already attached to the car when renting in a certain country, where there are annual vignettes, and are therefore included. However, when traveling to another country where a toll sticker is required, or when traveling on toll roads, each driver must pay for the cost of obtaining the sticker. If you are unsure, you should ask the respective provider directly.