Money in Tanzania: currency, cards and cash

The currency is the Tanzanian shilling, written TSh or TZS. Since 28 March 2025, the law requires goods and services inside Tanzania to be priced and paid for in shillings. The headlines at the time said Tanzania had "banned the dollar". That is not quite what happened, and the detail matters — it is the next section.

For a visitor, the practical position is straightforward. Carry a Visa or Mastercard, draw shillings from ATMs in the towns, keep a modest reserve of US dollars in cash for the things that still want them, and expect the national parks to take no cash at all.

No — but it has restricted it, and the rule is more specific than most reporting suggested.

The Foreign Currency Usage Regulations, 2025 (Government Notice No. 198 of 2025) came into force on 28 March 2025, under an amendment to the Bank of Tanzania Act made by the Finance Act 2024. They require that all goods and services be priced and transacted in shillings. Publishing prices, invoicing or demanding payment in a foreign currency is prohibited, and so is refusing payment offered in shillings. Existing foreign-currency contracts had twelve months to be renegotiated into shillings, failing which they become void unless the Minister grants an extension.

The background is a genuine foreign-exchange shortage through 2023 and 2024, when dollars became hard to obtain in Tanzania. The regulations are a response to that, not a gesture.

For tourism specifically, the government issued a clarification. The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Finance, in a communication dated 22 May 2025 (Ref. CAB. 465/558/01), following a consultative meeting in Dodoma with the Bank of Tanzania, the Tanzania Revenue Authority and industry bodies including TATO, set out the distinction that actually governs your trip:

Booked from abroad — foreign currency is allowed. A business may quote and receive payment in foreign currency for services sold to non-residents negotiating from outside the country. This is why your safari operator can still invoice you in dollars before you arrive.

Bought inside Tanzania — shillings. For services consumed in-country, including hotels, park fees and local transport, prices are to be quoted and paid in Tanzanian shillings.

In practice, enforcement varies and dollars are still accepted informally in tourist areas. But the legal position is the one above, and a hotel that asks you to pay a walk-in bill in shillings is following the rules rather than being difficult.

The Bank of Tanzania publishes indicative exchange rates daily, and it is the authority worth checking rather than any figure on a travel site, including this one. On 21 September 2026 the Bank's indicative rate was TSh 2,628.06 buying and TSh 2,654.34 selling to one US dollar.

The largest banknote is TSh 10,000 — worth a little under four US dollars. This is the single most practical thing to know about Tanzanian cash: any substantial payment in notes is a thick stack, ATMs run out, and withdrawal limits bite faster than you expect.

Change is a real constraint. Small traders, taxis and market stalls frequently cannot break a 10,000 note, and "do you have change?" is a normal part of a transaction rather than a rebuff. Keep small notes deliberately.

ATMs are the practical way to get shillings. They are common in Dar es Salaam, Arusha, Moshi, Mwanza, Dodoma and Stone Town, and thin on the ground everywhere else. Draw what you need before leaving a town for a park or a rural district, and expect a per-withdrawal limit well below what your home bank allows.

Visa and Mastercard are accepted at hotels, lodges, larger restaurants and tour operators. American Express and Diners are rarely useful. Card acceptance outside the tourist economy is limited, and a surcharge of a few per cent on card payments is common and usually disclosed.

US dollars in cash still have a role: immigration fees, tips, and the occasional place that prefers them. Two rules about the notes themselves, both widely enforced and both surprising to first-time visitors. Notes must be clean and undamaged — torn or heavily marked notes get refused. And older series notes are frequently rejected: bring notes issued in the last decade or so, in good condition, and avoid small denominations, which often attract a worse rate than hundreds.

Tell your bank you are travelling. A card blocked for suspected fraud on day two, in a country where you cannot easily walk into your own bank, is a genuinely difficult problem.

Tanzania runs on mobile money to a degree that surprises visitors. M-Pesa (Vodacom), Mixx by Yas (formerly Tigo Pesa), Airtel Money and HaloPesa between them handle a large share of everyday payments, and the agent network reaches places no bank branch does. Bills, wages, market purchases, bus tickets and park fees all move through it.

To use it you need a local SIM, and registration is a formal process. The Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority requires visitors to present a valid passport with a valid visa — or, if visa-exempt, the passport alone — and service providers carry out fingerprint verification at the point of registration. Budget half an hour in the shop rather than five minutes.

Whether it is worth it depends on your trip. For a two-week safari booked through an operator, a card and some cash are enough. For independent travel, a longer stay, or anywhere off the tourist circuit, mobile money is the difference between paying easily and not being able to pay at all.

Withdrawals at agents and ATMs carry both an operator fee and a government levy, so take out larger amounts less often rather than small amounts repeatedly.

This catches people out more than anything else on this page. Tanzania's national parks do not accept cash. Entry fees are paid against a control number issued through the Government Electronic Payment Gateway, settled by Visa or Mastercard at the gate, or through mobile money.

If you are travelling with an operator, they handle this and the fees are usually inside your quoted price. If you are self-driving, you need a working card — a card that is declined at a park gate has no cash fallback.

Fees for non-resident visitors are set by the park authorities and published in US dollars, and they differ by park, by season in some cases, and by category — adult, child, vehicle, and the separate concession and crater fees. Each park's current rate belongs on its own page rather than here: see the parks, and the best time to visit for how season affects the rest of the bill.

Tipping is customary in the tourism economy and genuinely matters to the people who depend on it: safari guides and drivers, camp and lodge staff, and — significantly — the porters and crews on Kilimanjaro, where tipping is an established and expected part of the cost of the climb rather than a gratuity in the Western sense.

Either currency is accepted for tips. Small US dollar notes are convenient and widely welcomed; shillings are never wrong and are more useful to the recipient for everyday spending.

Keep a supply of small notes from the start of the trip. The most common tipping mistake is arriving at the end of a climb or a safari with nothing but large notes and no way to break them.

Zanzibar uses the same currency and the same rules — it is part of the United Republic, not a separate monetary jurisdiction. ATMs are reliable in Stone Town and thinner along the beaches in the north and east, so draw cash before heading out to a beach village.

Zanzibar does add one compulsory cost that is separate from all of this: the government's own inbound travel insurance, required of every foreign visitor. See Tanzania visa requirements for what it costs and how to buy it.