Trains in Thailand - Everything Travelers Need to Know

Trains in Thailand are a great way to travel, especially for budget travelers. Their downside compared to planes is obviously the speed, but they are much cheaper. Compared to intercity buses in Thailand , trains are more comfortable (they are more comfortable to sleep on when traveling long distances) and safer (bus companies often neglect safety in pursuit of profit).

As for the cost, it depends very much on the class of the train and even the specific type of carriage in the same train, as well as the distance of the trip: if you travel by train over long distances on bunk beds, then compared to a bus, the train will be a little more expensive; if you compare it with a bus in the second or third seated class, then trains in most cases are much cheaper than buses. Well, trains are, for the most part, slower than buses.

✔ Pros of trains in Thailand

The price of seats is almost half that of buses, not to mention airplanes.
Safer.
More reliable schedule: they are almost never cancelled and are rarely late.
On the train you can get a good night's sleep and save on a night's accommodation during long overnight journeys.
You can even travel abroad from Thailand by train: to Malaysia, Laos and Cambodia.

❌ Cons of trains in Thailand

Difficulty in purchasing tickets remotely due to blocking of Russian cards (but still possible).
Trains are slower than planes and buses.
The price for sleeping berths is higher than the price of train travel on the same routes.

Routes and schedules

The route network allows you to visit almost all the most interesting tourist places in the country, and in combination with buses you can get almost anywhere, and even to neighboring countries. What is very convenient is that you can buy a combined ticket (Joint Tickets) at the ticket office to places where trains do not go. For example, you can buy a ticket from Bangkok to Koh Samui, and it will include a train, a transfer from the railway station to the pier, and delivery by ferry.

You can get information about all routes, schedules and prices on the official website of the Thai Railways https://www.railway.co.th/ . The price you get on this site will correspond to the ticket price when buying at the station ticket office; when buying tickets online, a commission will be added to the price.

However, do not be surprised if this site opens for you once every ten. All this is presumably due to protection from attacks, so access from suspicious non-Thai IP addresses is blocked. If it does not open for you, you will have to install a VPN server that imitates a Thai IP address. You can also try opening not the main page of the site, but this one - https://www.dticket.railway.co.th/ , sometimes this helps, but you will not find the schedule of commuter trains (electric trains) on it, but only long-distance trains available for online booking.

If you still can't open the site, you can use the schedule from the commercial site 12go.asia as an alternative , and buy tickets there. We have also created separate convenient pages with schedules for all destinations in Thailand here .