Expat retirees now have a couple of affordable taxi platforms from which to choose.

One way to save money while living in Costa Rica is to take advantage of the country’s affordable taxis.

Many of the clients on my monthly relocation tours (see: http://www.liveincostarica.com/) ask the follow question, “Does Uber exist in Costa Rica? Yes, it does. In fact, the country leads Latin America with over 25,000 drivers. Uber has been operating in San Jose since August of 2015 and expanded its service area in 2019. Unfortunately, 90 percent or more of the drivers are concentrated in San José and its surrounding suburbs. However, there are a growing number of drivers in smaller towns and some beach areas outside of the metropolitan area.

I swear by Uber and use it a couple of times a week. Costa Rica’s regular taxis, or fuerza roja as they are called, are affordable but not as reasonably priced as Uber. For example, a trip in a normal taxi costs me about $16 dollars from my home in Heredia to downtown San José. On the other hand, the Uber rate is little over half of said price.

It was just announced that the Chinese version of Uber, DiDi, will begin operating soon in the the Central Valley. The company was created in 2012 currently sells around 10 million trips a year. Presently, it has strong presence in China, Mexico, Brazil, Japan, Colombia, Hong Kong, Chile and Taiwan and is planning to expand aggressively to more countries in Latin America.

It is easy to sign up for DiDi. All one has to do to get the DiDI app is to go to GooglePlay or the APP Store and download it.

To contact the local office with your questions call 4002-3814 or visit the Hotel Jade in San José.