Tbilisi Airport to City: Bus 337, Bolt and Transfers 2026

Distance to centre

17 km

Bus 337

1 GEL

Bolt, daytime

15-25 GEL

Pre-booked driver

54 GEL

We do this run several times a month, in both directions, at every hour the airlines throw at us. The short version has not changed in years: bus if it is running and you are travelling light, Bolt if you want a door, a pre-booked driver if you land at 3 in the morning and want a name on a sign. The details have changed, though. The bus runs shorter hours than it used to, the airport train has stopped, Rustaveli Avenue is shut for rebuilding until November 2026, and Bolt at the airport now costs more than the 15 GEL many blogs still quote. Everything below was checked on 6 September 2026 against the airport's own site, the Tbilisi Transport Company fare page, gotrip.ge, Bolt's fares and our own recent rides. USD figures use the National Bank of Georgia rate on 5 September 2026 (1 USD = 2.61 GEL).

The options at a glance

Bus 337, the cheap and easy one

If your flight lands between 07:00 and about 22:00, this is the move. Route 337 leaves from the stop directly in front of the arrivals hall every 15 to 20 minutes and runs into the centre along Kakheti Highway, Queen Ketevan Avenue and Baratashvili Street, then along Rustaveli Avenue and Kostava Street to Station Square. The airport's own timetable lists the first bus at 06:59 and the last at 22:59 in each direction. Allow 50 to 70 minutes; rush hour (08:00-10:00 and 17:00-19:00) is at the long end.

The stops you want: Avlabari for the metro, Sameba cathedral and the bath district; Freedom Square (the Pushkin Park stop) for the old town, Sololaki and most first-timers' hotels; Station Square, the last stop, for trains and the Didube marshrutka yard two metro stops on. Isani, early in the route, is the place to get off if you are heading straight to Kakheti. Google Maps shows the 337 with live positions, so you can watch it come.

How to pay

No cash. Tap a contactless bank card, a phone wallet or a Tbilisi transport card on the reader as you board; you do not tap off. The fare is 1 GEL, and the transport company charges about 1.50 GEL on foreign cards. That single tap also gives you 90 minutes of free transfers to the metro and other buses if you paid with a Metromoney card or a bank card, so bus to Avlabari and metro onwards costs 1 GEL in total.

The catch

The last bus leaves at 22:59, and with passport control and bags a flight landing after about 22:00 will miss it. Many Istanbul, Gulf and European arrivals land between 23:00 and 04:00, exactly when the bus is not running and the taxi touts are busiest. For those flights, read on.

Bolt, the door-to-door option

Bolt is the ride-hailing app in Georgia and works like Uber, which does not operate here. Open the app, set your destination, read the fare, confirm. Drivers pick up on the road directly outside the arrivals exit; there is no separate ride-hailing car park and no airport surcharge, so if a driver asks for anything above the app price, say no and cancel. Our Bolt guide covers the app in detail; the airport specifics are here.

What it costs. On our recent daytime rides the airport to Freedom Square, the old town or Vera has been 15-25 GEL (about $6-10). Rain, an early-morning arrival bank or anything after midnight pushes it to 30-40 GEL, and 30-40 GEL is what most travellers arriving at night in 2026 report paying. Even at the top of that range it is well under the airport taxi desk. XL cars for up to six people are available in the app at a higher fare.

Before you fly. Install Bolt and verify your phone number at home; the app is tied to a number, and most travel eSIMs are data-only, so registering after landing can fail. Add a card so you are not counting cash at the kerb. And sort out data: the free airport Wi-Fi is weak and ride apps often refuse to load on it, which is the single most common reason people give up and take a tout's car.

Waiting. By day a car is usually two to eight minutes away, because drivers wait near the terminal for arrivals. After midnight expect ten to fifteen minutes and the higher fare. Confirm the plate and car colour in the app before you get in; people climbing into the wrong car is a regular airport sight. Yandex Go and Maxim also operate in Tbilisi with fewer drivers; they are a fallback if Bolt shows nothing.

Pre-booked drivers, the no-thinking option

If you are landing at 02:00 with two suitcases and tired children, a pre-booked driver removes every variable. We use GoTrip: you book on the website (there is no app) with your flight number and hotel address, the price is fixed per car before you travel, the driver tracks your flight and waits in the arrivals hall with your name, and you pay in cash at the end. Child seats can be requested and there are six-seat minivans for groups. On 6 September 2026 the cheapest cars for the airport to the city were 54 GEL, about $21, which is roughly what a Bolt costs with night surge and about half what most hotels charge for their own pickup.

Hotels and guesthouses will also arrange a pickup. Ask the price first: in our experience they charge 70-100 GEL for the same 25-minute drive, and the driver is often the owner's cousin in whatever he happens to drive. Book your own unless the hotel's rate is close to GoTrip's.

The taxi desk and the touts

Outside the doors, and increasingly inside the hall, men will offer you a taxi before you have found the exit. Some carry laminated cards. The airport's official taxi service has a desk by the arrivals exit and, by the airport's own page, charges 40-60 GEL on the meter for a 20-30 minute drive; travellers in August 2026 reported a fixed zone fare of 80 GEL to central hotels from the same desk. The unofficial drivers start higher and negotiate down to about the same.

This is not a safety problem. Georgia is one of the safer countries you will visit and nobody is going to drive you into the hills. It is a money problem and, occasionally, a route problem: fares that change on arrival, meters that stop working, a scenic loop through Varketili. There is no version of this that beats a Bolt at 20-40 GEL or a pre-booked driver at 54, so walk past, politely, and do not stop to explain.

The airport train

Tbilisi Airport has its own railway station a five-minute walk from the terminal, and a train to Station Square used to run twice a day for 0.50 GEL. It is not running. No trains served the airport station in September 2026, and while a restart has been talked about, nothing was on sale on tkt.ge when we checked. Plan around the bus and Bolt; if a service reappears, it will show up on tkt.ge before it shows up in guidebooks.

Arriving late at night

Between 23:00 and 06:00 the bus is not running and the touts are at their most persistent. In order of preference: a pre-booked GoTrip driver waiting with your name; a Bolt, accepting a 10-15 minute wait and 30-40 GEL; Yandex Go or Maxim as a fallback if Bolt has no cars. The Magti SIM desk, the exchange counters and the ATMs in arrivals stay open through the night, so you can get data and cash before you go outside. If your onward flight is early the next day, the Ibis Tbilisi Airport, which opened in October 2024 as the airport's first hotel, sits next to the terminal; there is nothing else within walking distance.

Cash, SIM cards and the rest

ATMs. Bank of Georgia (orange), TBC (light blue) and Liberty machines stand by the exit doors inside arrivals; the freestanding terminals right outside customs are bill-payment boxes and do not give cash. Bank of Georgia and TBC charge a foreign-card fee of a few lari, shown on screen before you confirm. Take 100 GEL or so for the first day and the rest later; our money guide lists the banks that skip the fee. The half-dozen exchange desks in arrivals stay open all night but quote worse rates than the city.

SIM cards. The red Magti desk is immediately to your right as you enter the arrivals hall and is open 24 hours. It sells only a tourist package, which costs more per gigabyte than a regular SIM plus a data bundle from a Magti shop in town, but it is set up for you in 10-15 minutes with your passport and it works before you reach the kerb. If you need Bolt now and did not install an eSIM, buy it. Our SIM card guide compares the three networks and the airport packages.

Rental cars. Avis, Budget, Hertz and the other international desks are in the terminal. We book through Localrent instead: local agencies, most cars with no deposit, and they will deliver the car to the airport or to your hotel, which spares you driving out of the airport road jet-lagged. Compact cars start at about $30 a day; our car rental guide covers insurance and licences.

Insurance. Since 1 January 2026 visitors need travel insurance covering their stay; our insurance guide has the rule and the exemptions. Have the policy on your phone at passport control.

Getting back to the airport

Bus 337 runs from Station Square to the airport on the same hours (06:59 to 22:59), via Freedom Square and Avlabari, or you call a Bolt from your door; departing fares are the same as arriving ones. The airport itself is small, and security and passport control rarely take more than 20-30 minutes. The road is the variable.

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