The last pier shuttle leaves at 1:30
At our assumed $45 a day, a one-way from FLL runs about $59 with Broward’s tax, Florida’s surcharge and fuel. That’s under FLL’s $86 taxi estimate and the $160 private car — and under Carnival’s $36.99-a-person transfer once there are two of you. Money settles quickly here; the clock doesn’t. The downtown cruise desks send their last shuttle to the pier at 1:30 PM, and FLL tells you to allow at least 90 minutes for the drive at rush hour.
Drive it if
- You land at FLL by late morning, or the day before
- Two or more of you are going, or one of you has a lot of luggage
- Somebody is happy driving I-95 into downtown Miami
- You’d rather end at a pier shuttle than a taxi line
Skip it if
- Your flight lands after about noon on sail day
- You’re sailing Carnival and its $36.99 transfer suits one or two of you
- Nobody wants the wheel after the flight
- You could still move the flight to MIA
Which desk can you still reach?
Choose your sail day and the time you expect to pull up on SE 2nd Street in downtown Miami.
Be honest about the landing time.
Land at 11, get the keys by noon, and you’re downtown with an hour of shuttles left — on a good day.
On a bad one, MIA’s car center is the fallback: Avis and Budget there never close, and a taxi covers the last stretch.
Addresses, codes and each desk’s own wording: the PortMiami rental guide.
Five stops between the gate and the ship
Get to the Rental Car Center
From Terminal 1, walk the Concourse B pedestrian bridge on level 2. From Terminals 2, 3 and 4, take the free shuttle from the lower level outside baggage claim — it runs every 10 minutes, 24 hours a day. Avis and Budget never close there.
Choose a downtown cruise code
Avis Q8M sits at 99 SE 2nd St; Budget P2F and Payless M15 share 93 SE 2nd St. Those codes carry the free pier shuttle — miss the 1:30 cutoff, and MIA’s Rental Car Center is the drop instead.
About 27 miles down I-95
Our estimate is 26.6 miles and about 40 minutes with no traffic; the port says 25.7 miles, and FLL says to allow at least 90 minutes at rush hour. Stay in I-95’s general lanes, then take I-395 and the toll-free PortMiami Tunnel — the 95 Express lanes are transponder-only.
Keys in, bags onto the van
Avis puts its shuttle past the port every 20–30 minutes, traffic and ship count permitting, with the final run at 1:30 PM.
Check in
Your boarding documents name your terminal and your check-in window. That window is the real deadline, not the ship’s departure time.
Only one row goes to the transfer
| Travelers | One-way rental, all in | Taxi (FLL’s estimate) | Private car (Florida Sunshine) | Carnival transfer |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $59 Midsize car, $45/day assumed | $86 | $160 | $37 |
| 2 | $59 Midsize car, $45/day assumed | $86 | $160 | $74 |
| 4 | $77 Standard SUV, $60/day assumed | $86 | $160 | $148 |
| 6 | $100 7-passenger minivan, $80/day assumed | Two cabs | $175 | $222 |
The base rates are ours, not quotes. Each rental adds an assumed 10% for FLL’s unpublished airport charges, plus Florida’s $2 surcharge, Broward’s 7% tax, no tolls, and fuel for 27 miles at 30 mpg and $4.37. It ends at a downtown cruise desk, so there’s no taxi at the end. Florida Sunshine includes tolls and fees but adds $125 for a pickup before 10:30 AM to a cruise port, and Carnival’s transfer is for its own guests, with one departure at noon. Illustrative
One traveler on Carnival is the single row where the car loses.
At two, the rental is already ahead — and at four, it isn’t close.
Plug in the quote you actually got
Set your group and the daily rate from your quote. The rest fills in from published figures, and you can override any of it.
The rental, line by line
A worked example, not a quote. We set the $45 base rate; Discover Cars advertised Miami and Fort Lauderdale airport rentals “from $8” a day on Sept 28, 2026, and cautions that its US prices can omit some taxes and surcharges.
Replace our rate with yours, plus whatever one-way drop charge the quote lists. The airport-fee percentage is an assumption as well — MIA and FLL don’t publish their rental charges as a figure.
State law sets the $2-a-day surcharge, and Florida DOR’s 2026 surtax table sets the county tax: Miami-Dade and Broward at 7%, Orange at 6.5%. Fuel is 30 mpg at $4.37, AAA’s Florida average for Sept 27, 2026.
Every other ride is priced as its company publishes it; a taxi figure marked “our estimate” applies Miami-Dade’s meter rates to our route distance.
There are no toll days to begin with, since I-95’s general lanes are free.
Not so the 95 Express lanes — they take a transponder only, and in a rental one trip through them bills the company’s toll fee for that day.
Seventy miles from DJT
Flying into Palm Beach (DJT) makes it a much longer drive — about seventy miles, roughly an hour and a half on empty roads by our estimate.
Florida Sunshine Shuttle charges $425 for a private car for up to four and $470 for five to seven. A one-way rental at our assumed $45 a day comes to about $71, and a standard SUV for four at $60 to about $89.
Two things are different at DJT.
The rental counters sit in baggage claim, but the cars don’t — Enterprise and Alamo shuttle you to Belvedere Road, Avis to Turnage Boulevard. And Palm Beach County’s sales tax is 6.5% now (the rate changed Jan 1, 2026), with a $6-a-day airport charge on top that a local news report gives and the airport’s own site doesn’t publish.
For one light packer, there’s rail.
Tri-Rail from West Palm Beach to the Miami Airport station is six zones, $8.75 (weekend and holiday pass $5), and Palm Tran Route 2 links DJT to the West Palm Beach station free with a Tri-Rail fare. From the airport station, the port’s own directions from MIA continue by Metrorail and the free Coral Way Trolley.
That’s slow and cheap, with three changes. More on picking up at Palm Beach: our Palm Beach airport page.
- Pick-up: Palm Beach (Discover Cars says PBI)
- Return: downtown Miami or MIA
- Drop charge counted in the total
Pier pickup, then north to FLL
The reverse works too.
Coming home, the desks’ shuttle meets passengers at the pier after the cruise, so you can collect a car downtown, drive north and leave it at FLL for your flight.
Skipping the car? FLL’s $86 taxi estimate is for the ride down from the airport; a cab from the port runs on Miami-Dade’s meter instead. A late flight home means a long morning either way — plan it on the PortMiami airports page.
Book the cruise code, not just the address
Search with FLL as the pickup and Miami as the return.
For the pier shuttle, pick the Avis or Budget downtown cruise location, not the regular branch.
Avis’s everyday downtown office at the same address (M6I) says nothing about the port — and Budget’s own regular code there (M5E) sends you on to P2F.
- Pick-up: Fort Lauderdale airport (FLL)
- Return: an SE 2nd Street desk, or MIA
- Drop charge counted in the total
- Free to cancel 48 hrs ahead
FLL or Palm Beach to a Miami ship: what people ask
How much is a taxi from Fort Lauderdale airport to PortMiami?
FLL’s own taxi table estimates $86 to the Port of Miami, or $90 in a luxury sedan. A one-way rental usually costs less — about $59 all in at an assumed $45 a day.
How far is FLL from PortMiami?
PortMiami puts it at 25.7 miles. Our route estimate is 26.6 miles and about 40 minutes on empty roads, and FLL tells cruisers to allow at least 90 minutes at rush hour.
Can I drop a Fort Lauderdale rental car at PortMiami?
Not at the port itself, which has no rental counters. Book a one-way to the downtown cruise-shuttle codes on SE 2nd Street — Avis (Q8M), Budget (P2F) or Payless (M15) — whose free shuttle runs to the pier until 1:30 PM, or drop at MIA.
Are there tolls from Fort Lauderdale to PortMiami?
Not on I-95’s general lanes, and the PortMiami Tunnel is toll-free. The 95 Express lanes accept only a transponder, and a rental that uses them sets off the company’s daily toll fee.
What does a shuttle from Palm Beach airport to PortMiami cost?
Florida Sunshine Shuttle, which runs private cars only, charges $425 for up to four and $470 for five to seven, including tolls and fees. A one-way rental from Palm Beach usually costs a fraction of that.
More on renting around a PortMiami cruise
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