Sofia Airport to the City Centre: Metro, Bus and Taxi

Sofia Airport sits 10 km east of the centre, and the metro from Terminal 2 gets you to Serdika in about 20 minutes for €0.80, less than a London bus fare. This is how I get into town from either terminal, what I do when a flight lands after the last train, and what a fair taxi fare looks like.

Sofia Airport to the city centre: metro, bus or taxi

Sofia Airport (SOF) has four ways into town, and the metro is how I do it nearly every time. For €0.80 it skips the traffic and drops me at Serdika, right in the old centre. Bus 84 is my pick from Terminal 1, the night bus covers late landings, and I only pay for a taxi when the hour or the luggage decides it for me.

Two of you on the metro pay €1.60 between you. A taxi into the centre costs about €14, so for a couple with cabin bags the train saves more than €12.

Sofia Airport metro from Terminal 2

The Sofia Airport metro station sits right next to the eastern end of Terminal 2, and from arrivals you reach it on the same level with no stairs. Walk along the arrivals hall to the last door at the far end and the station entrance is in front of you. The airport is the end of M4, the yellow line of the Sofia metro, so every train that leaves the platform runs into town through Serdika and you can't board one going the wrong way.

Tap a contactless bank card, or a phone with Apple Pay or Google Pay, on the reader at the barrier, and you're charged €0.80 for a Ticket 30 plus, which lets you change onto a tram or bus within 30 minutes of the first tap. Each person taps their own card or phone. I'd use a Visa or Mastercard at the barrier and keep the Amex for somewhere else.

Contactless taps cap at €2 a day for daytime trips on the same card. Over three days of getting around Sofia that's €6 at most, against €7.60 for a 72-hour card, and the card only pulls ahead if you plan to use the night buses. If you'd rather pay cash, the station sells a single metro ticket for €0.80 from the ticket desk or the machines. That one covers one metro journey with no transfer, valid for 60 minutes from purchase.

Trains leave the airport roughly every 12 minutes, and every one calls at Mladost 1, where M4 joins the M1 line for the run into the centre.

Which metro stop to get off at

Most of the central places to stay in Sofia are within walking distance of one of four stops, and only two of them need a change.

Serdika is the stop I'd pick for a first visit. You come up among the Roman streets of ancient Serdica, dug out during the metro works, with St Nedelya Church, the Banya Bashi Mosque and the top of Vitosha Boulevard a few minutes away on foot.

For a hotel near Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, get off one stop early at Sofia University and you'll save yourself the walk back across the centre with a case. For NDK, change at Serdika onto M2 towards Vitosha and ride one stop to the National Palace of Culture, the giant concrete block at the bottom of Vitosha Boulevard. Heading straight out of town, take M2 the other way, towards Obelya: Central Railway Station is 2 stops on, the Central Bus Station is next door, and trains in Bulgaria to Plovdiv and Varna leave from there.

Bus 84 from Terminals 1 and 2

Bus 84 is the city bus to the airport. It starts at Terminal 2, calls at Terminal 1 and runs into the centre to Gurko Street. Since the old 84 and 184 were merged into one route in July 2025, a bus has come about every 12 minutes. The fare is the same €0.80 as the metro: tap your card on the validator inside the bus and it counts as a Ticket 30 plus.

Expect about 45 minutes on a weekday and 35 at the weekend, because the bus sits in the same traffic as every car heading into town. The upside is no change, which counts for a lot after a 3-hour flight with a toddler or a big suitcase. Heading back to the airport, the sign on the front reads Летище София, which is Sofia Airport in Cyrillic.

Terminal 1 to the city centre

Terminal 1 is the older, smaller building of the two. Wizz Air and easyJet mainly use it, while Ryanair's flights to Sofia from the UK land at Terminal 2, and your booking confirmation names the terminal if you're unsure.

From Terminal 1, catch bus 84 from outside arrivals or ride the free shuttle bus across to Terminal 2. By day I take the 84 when I'm in no hurry, and the shuttle plus the metro when the traffic into town looks heavy, since the train runs to the same timetable whatever the roads are doing. Check the shuttle times on the airport's transport page before a late landing.

Late arrivals: night bus N4 and the last metro

The last train leaves the airport at 11.38pm on weekdays and 11.46pm at weekends and on holidays. Late Friday flights are the classic start to a weekend in Sofia, so check your landing time against that last train when you book. A landing after 11pm, plus passport control and a wait at the baggage belt, usually misses it.

After the last train, night bus N4 is the cheap way in. Since 14 July 2025 it has called at both terminals, and it runs through central Sofia all night. Tickets cost €1 from the conductor on board, so keep a coin handy. Bulgaria switched from the lev to the euro on 1 January 2026, so a euro coin left over from a trip to Spain does the job.

Past midnight with a case, I take a taxi from the official desk instead. The night tariff runs from 10pm to 6am and adds a little to every kilometre, so expect a couple of euros more than the daytime €13 to €14.

Taxi from Sofia Airport to the city centre

Both arrivals halls have an official taxi desk, and at the airport I only take a cab from there or one I've ordered on an app. Licensed Sofia taxis are yellow and show the company name and its tariff on a side window, and the meter runs from the moment you set off. OK Supertrans, the Sofia firm behind the OK Taxi app, posts its tariff in euros: €1.50 to start and €0.75 a kilometre from 6am to 10pm, then €1.70 and €0.85 a kilometre from 10pm to 6am, with waiting at €0.25 a minute. Its typical metered fares from the airport give you a yardstick for any licensed cab:

Uber doesn't run in Sofia. TaxiMe and OK Taxi are the apps I'd use to order a licensed yellow cab, and they need mobile data in the arrivals hall, so set up a Bulgaria SIM card or eSIM before you fly. Four people with big bags is the case where I'd skip the metro altogether: at €14 for the car, it's €3.50 each for a door-to-door ride.

From the centre back to Sofia Airport

Going home, read the board on the platform at Serdika before you board. M4 trains share the track with M1 as far as Mladost 1, and only the M4 trains carry on to the airport. If you end up on a Business Park train, get off at Mladost 1 and wait there for the next airport train.

Trains from Serdika to the airport run from 5.08am to 11.23pm on weekdays, and from 5.10am to 11.32pm at weekends and on holidays. I leave the centre about two hours before a short-haul flight home. Flying from Terminal 1, either ride the metro to Terminal 2 and the free shuttle across, or catch bus 84, which stops at both terminals.