Yes, you can smoke at Montevideo Carrasco Airport (MVD) in the open air outside the terminal, landside on the forecourt before you clear security.
Carrasco International is Montevideo’s sole international gateway, housed in a single Rafael Viñoly-designed terminal that opened in 2009 beneath its signature sweeping curved roof. Uruguay was the first country in the Americas to make every enclosed public space smoke-free under Decree 268/2005, so the whole building is non-smoking and there is no indoor or airside smoking room anywhere in the terminal.
Landside: The Forecourt Before Security
The terminal is stacked over two passenger levels — an upper departures floor where you check in and drop bags, and a lower arrivals floor for baggage claim and ground transport. From either level your smoking spot is the same in principle: step back out through the terminal doors onto the open-air forecourt, which sits landside, before the security checkpoint.
The official airport site documents no marked or fenced smoking area, so treat the curbside as the practical spot and stand well clear of doorways, the taxi rank and other travellers when you light up. Because it is landside, you can smoke here freely right up until you head through the checkpoint — time your last cigarette for just before you join the security queue.
Airside: After Security
Once you pass the checkpoint you are committed to a fully smoke-free terminal until you board. There is no airside smoking lounge, no sealed smoking cabin at the gates, and no rooftop smoking terrace. The top-floor viewing area that overlooks the apron sits inside the sealed, air-conditioned building, so it is smoke-free like the rest of the concourse.
If you have already gone airside and need to smoke, your only option is to exit back out to the landside forecourt and then re-clear security and passport control to return — a full round trip, so weigh it against your boarding time on a tight connection.
Vaping and E-Cigarettes
Vaping is treated the same way as smoking: e-cigarette use is prohibited wherever smoking is prohibited in Uruguay, which means the entire terminal interior is off-limits and the open-air forecourt is the only place it is tolerated. Uruguay also bans the sale and import of e-cigarettes and heated-tobacco products, so plan on not bringing one into the country at all.
Summary
| Smoking option | Available |
|---|---|
| Outside terminal (open air, landside forecourt) | Yes |
| Indoor smoking room | No |
| Airside (after security) | No |
| Rooftop / viewing-deck smoking | No |
| Vaping indoors | No |
For Uruguay’s national smoke-free law and the vape rules in full, see our Uruguay airport smoking guide.