Can I bring alchol into AbuDhabi

According to the law you can't unless you are a resident and have a liquor license. Now that's the theory. In practice you can easily buy up to 4 units of alcohol per adult at the airport (e.g. 4 bottles of anything, and a 12-tin-box of beer is counted as 1 unit). Nobody will ever stop you for that.
You can consume alcohol in international hotels. Bars may have certain restrictions during the holy month which this year will end around 30th August. Normally there's also a dry night on the eve of Islamic holidays so it'd be good for you to have an emergency bottle for that rainy day.

Great questions - cause I was thinking the same thing. Travelling from Australia to Europe and catching up with some expats in London, after a 2 night stop over in Dubai and would have loved to have taken a bottle of Red Bundaberg Rum over to Europe with me in my check-in luggage, not for consumption in Dubai, but for my friends in London. But by the sounds of this I wouldn't be able to take it.

Edited by: mackiewilltravel

@mackiewilltravel - don't worry about it. Bring the Bundaberg Rum with you. Dubai is not like the Maldives where importation of alcohol is banned. There is a massive duty free shop in the baggage reclaim area full of booze. Whenever I have people visiting me in Dubai, I usually ask them to pick up a few bottles on arrival. There's never been a problem.

@OP and @ #2 - I second dxb1969's post. As I pointed out in my first post it's something totally normal to bring alcohol into UAE as the law is not enforced and they'd have to put at least 80% of all arriving foreigners to trial. The only emirate where you would get into real trouble is Sharjah. Since you mention that you'll arrive in AUH or DXB, this will not be an issue at all. So feel free to bring it in.

dxb - is that the same with Abu Dhabi, that you can buy alcohol before leaving the airport (as opposed to buyingbefore I fly).

Yes, Dubai is the same in that respect.

awesome! should tide me over when i arrive until i can get my licence then ;-)

btw - any posters based in AD? i used to be pretty prolific on TT but gave up several years ago. have always been up for meeting people from the tree. i'm planning on being in AD for two years.

I don't live there any more, but am there on a very regular basis. I will be there for a couple weeks in early December if you are going to be there then. PM me if you are interested in having a drink one day.

suzanne - pm'd you.