Arriving to Budapest

By Air

Your options for reaching the center from the airport:

• Ride, it’s either a 20 km straight route, or 21-22 km using backroads with less traffic.
• Ride or take bus 200E to Ferihegy train station and use railway services from there. You’ll arrive at Nyugati Pályaudvar (Western Station).
• Alternatively, if you don’t have a bike, you can take bus 100E directly to the center. You need a special ticket for this line.

See below for how you can purchase tickets for buses and trains.

By Train

You can get your train tickets from the website or mobile application of Hungarian State Railways or use one of the ticket vending machines at stations.

Local public transport

For public transport, the easiest way to buy tickets is the BudapestGO app. You can find ticket vending machines at major stations and stops, just as well as at the airport. The airport also has a ticket counter where you can ask for help from an English speaking crew.

It’s a unique feature of the Budapest public transport system that single tickets are only valid for one ride without changes, with the exception of changing from one underground line to another.

You can purchase special time-based tickets of 30 or 90 minutes. These allow you to change as many times as you want within that timeframe, provided that you validate them whenever you do so. When they expire, you can continue traveling, you just cannot change any more.

Bikes can be transported on certain tram and suburban railway lines (if physically possible), or as regular luggage under specific circumstances described below.

Size of luggage can’t be bigger than the sum of two allowed sizes:

• 2 pieces of 40 x 50 x 80 cm
• 2 pieces of 20 x 20 x 200 cm
• 1 piece of 40 x 50 x 80 cm and 1 piece of 20 x 20 x 200 cm

If you only use one of the allowed two pieces, you have the opportunity to bring a stroller, a small bike or a folded one.

Money

Official currency in Hungary is the forint (Ft, HUF). The rate should be around 400 HUF for one Euro. We suggest not to pay with euro at businesses, their exchange rate is much worse than that of exchange offices.

Cards are accepted basically everywhere by law, and the best rate is probably the one offered by your bank.