Waste and recycling in Czechia: sorting bins, collection yards and the waste fee

Czech households sort their waste: paper, plastics, glass, metals and more go into coloured bins on the street or in your building, and what doesn't fit goes to a collection yard. Every town also charges a fee for household waste, but towns collect it in different ways. This page covers Prague in detail and Brno, Ostrava and Plzeň briefly.

Which bin takes what in Prague?

Every municipality must set up places to sort hazardous waste, paper, plastics, glass, metals, bio-waste, edible oils and fats and, since 1 January 2025, textiles.¹ Each town decides the bins in its own ordinance (obecně závazná vyhláška). Prague changed its rules on 29 September 2026:²

• Metals: if your building has its own shared bins, metals can go in with the plastics and cartons there. At a street stand, the yellow bin takes only plastics and cartons, so metals go in the grey bin.²
• White glass bins: the city's web page and older stickers on the bins may still say clear glass only, but the ordinance now takes glass of any colour in both, so clear glass is fine in either.³
• Bio-waste: your building's owner or owners' association can order a brown bin free; it isn't something a tenant orders. Collection is year-round, or seasonal for 40 weeks from 1 March.⁴
• Textiles: clothes go in textile containers marked with the waste code 20 01 11; the city sets no colour for them.²

Where do bulky and hazardous waste go?

• Furniture and mattresses: to a collection yard (sběrný dvůr), or to a large container (velkoobjemový kontejner) that a city district puts out on set days.⁵ The districts publish the dates and places, and you can use any container in the city, not only one in your own district.⁶
• Collection yards: run by the city or a district, with staff, for sorted waste you bring yourself.⁷ The city's leaflet says they're free if you're 15 or older with permanent residence in Prague, shown on your ID card or residence permit card, and Pražské služby, which runs most of them, says people without it can hand in waste for a charge. Old electrical appliances are free for everyone.⁸
• Limits: at Prague's yards each person can hand in up to 750 kg of bulky waste a year, and rubble from their own building work up to 4 m³ a year and 2 m³ a visit.⁹
• Hazardous waste (batteries, paints, solvents, motor oil): to a collection yard or a mobile collection stop, and only at the time the stop is scheduled.¹⁰
• Medicines: every pharmacy must take back medicines you no longer need or that have expired.¹¹

What do shops have to take back?

Some waste goes back to the shop for free, with nothing to fill in:

• Electrical appliances: when you buy a new appliance, the shop must take back an old one of a similar kind, one for one.¹³ A shop with at least 400 m² for selling electrical goods must also take back small appliances, none of whose sides is longer than 25 cm, of any brand, without a purchase.¹³
• Batteries: shops that regularly sell portable batteries, such as larger supermarkets and electronics, DIY and phone shops, must take used ones back during opening hours, without a purchase.¹⁴
• Tyres: only to a take-back point or someone allowed to accept them; tyre producers must take them back free, of any brand.¹⁵
• Returnable bottles: whoever sells drinks in returnable deposit bottles, such as glass beer bottles, must buy them back with no limit on how many and without a purchase.¹⁶

There's no deposit on plastic bottles or cans yet. A bill from a group of deputies proposes one from 2028, but as of 28 October 2026 it hasn't passed.¹⁷

Who pays the waste fee in Prague?

Prague doesn't charge per person. It charges a fee for each building by the size of its mixed-waste bins: 0.50 Kč per litre of bin capacity, under city ordinance 17/2021.¹⁸

• Who owes it: whoever lives in the flat or house, tenants included, or the owner if nobody lives there.¹⁹
• Who pays the city: the owners' association (společenství vlastníků jednotek, SVJ) or the owner. It must collect the fee from the people who live there.¹⁹
• When: by 15 June for January to June, and by 15 December for July to December.²⁰
• Registering: the owner or owners' association files a notice with the city within 15 days of becoming the payer. You file only if there's no one to pay it for you.²⁰ The city keeps no list of residents, so newcomers aren't reported to it.²¹
• Exemptions: none, the city says, not even for people over 70 or with disabilities.²¹

In a rented flat, your landlord collects your share, usually with the service charges (zálohy na služby). The law counts waste collection among the services, split by the number of people if nothing else was agreed.²² Ask your landlord how they split it, and check the yearly statement.

How does it work in Brno, Ostrava and Plzeň?

Most towns charge per person (poplatek za obecní systém odpadového hospodářství). It's owed by everyone registered in the town, or by the owner of a home where nobody is registered, and the law caps it at 1,200 Kč a year.²⁴ For this fee a foreigner counts as registered if they have:²⁵

• permanent residence;
• temporary stay of more than 3 months;
• applied for asylum or temporary protection; or
• international protection or temporary protection.

Whoever owes a local fee must file a notice with the town unless its ordinance says otherwise, and report changes within 15 days.²⁶

• Brno: 900 Kč a year under ordinance 24/2023 as amended by ordinance 31/2024, due by 31 May. People are exempt from the year they turn 70, and children up to and including the year they turn 3. Foreigners must file a notice once, then again whenever their details change.²⁷
• Ostrava: 720 Kč a year under ordinance 14/2023, due by 30 June. A new payer files a notice within 30 days. People with temporary protection are exempt, and young children and people over 65 pay less.²⁸
• Plzeň: by bin size, as in Prague: 0.31 Kč per litre under ordinance 5/2021, collected by the owners' association or the owner.²⁹

Elsewhere, look for the fee on your town's website. Reporting your address (Register your address) is often what makes you liable in a town that charges per person.

Sources

1. Waste Act (Act 541/2020 Coll.), §59(2). ↩

2. Prague ordinance 20/2022 on waste, as amended by ordinance 17/2026, §4(1) and annex 1, in force from 29 September 2026. ↩ ↩² ↩³

3. Prague ordinance 17/2026, annex 1; the city's environment portal, how to sort, still says white bins are for clear glass only. ↩

4. Prague ordinance 20/2022 on waste, as amended by ordinance 17/2026, §8(1) to (3). ↩

5. Prague ordinance 20/2022 on waste, §4(3) and (6). ↩

6. City of Prague environment portal, how to sort and where to take each kind of waste, section on large containers. ↩

7. Prague ordinance 20/2022 on waste, as amended by ordinance 17/2026, §5(1). ↩

8. City of Prague, collection yards leaflet, February 2025; Pražské služby, collection yards. ↩ ↩²

9. Prague ordinance 21/2024, art. I points 4 and 8, amending §4(3) and §14(1) of ordinance 20/2022, from 1 January 2025. ↩

10. Prague ordinance 20/2022 on waste, §4(4). ↩

11. Pharmaceuticals Act (Act 378/2007 Coll.), §89(2). ↩

12. Waste Act (Act 541/2020 Coll.), §61 and §117(1)(c) and (t), (3)(b) and (e). ↩

13. End-of-Life Products Act (Act 542/2020 Coll.), §66(1) and (2). ↩ ↩² ↩³

14. End-of-Life Products Act (Act 542/2020 Coll.), §88(1) and annex 4. ↩

15. End-of-Life Products Act (Act 542/2020 Coll.), §96 and §97(1). ↩

16. Packaging Act (Act 477/2001 Coll.), §9(4) and (5). ↩ ↩²

17. Chamber of Deputies, bill 73 amending the Packaging Act, status on 28 October 2026; the government gave a negative opinion on 20 January 2026. ↩ ↩²

18. Prague ordinance 17/2021 on the fee for depositing municipal waste from a property, §4. ↩

19. Local Fees Act (Act 565/1990 Coll.), §10i and §10n. ↩ ↩² ↩³

20. Prague ordinance 17/2021, §3(1) and (3) and §5(2). ↩ ↩² ↩³

21. City of Prague, local fee for municipal waste. ↩ ↩² ↩³

22. Act 67/2013 Coll. on services in flats, §3(1) and §5(2)(d). ↩

23. Local Fees Act (Act 565/1990 Coll.), §10g(a). ↩

24. Local Fees Act (Act 565/1990 Coll.), §10e and §10h(1). ↩

25. Local Fees Act (Act 565/1990 Coll.), §16c(b). ↩ ↩²

26. Local Fees Act (Act 565/1990 Coll.), §14a(1) and (4). ↩

27. Brno ordinance 24/2023 as amended by ordinance 31/2024, arts. 3 to 6; City of Brno, who must file a notice. ↩

28. Ostrava ordinance 14/2023, as amended, arts. 4 to 7. ↩ ↩²

29. Plzeň ordinance 5/2021, arts. 4, 6 and 8. ↩