Tbilisi Airport to City Centre 2026: Bus 337, Bolt, Train

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 airport train has stopped, Rustaveli Avenue is shut for rebuilding until late November 2026 so the bus takes a detour, the airport's own taxi desk has switched to a fixed 40 GEL fare, and Bolt at the airport now costs more than the 15 GEL many blogs still quote. Everything below was checked on 5 October 2026 against the airport's own site, the Tbilisi Transport Company's timetable and fare page, gotrip.ge, airalo.com, tkt.ge and our own recent rides. USD figures use the National Bank of Georgia rate of 3 October 2026 (1 USD = 2.60 GEL). If you would rather have the answer for your own flight, the airport arrival helper takes your landing time, party and bags and ranks the options below for that hour.

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 minutes on weekdays and every 18 to 19 minutes at weekends, and runs into the centre along Kakheti Highway past Samgori and Isani, along Queen Ketevan Avenue to Avlabari, over the river to Freedom Square, then along the right bank past Heroes' Square to Station Square. The company's timetable gives it 70 minutes end to end; rush hour (08:00-10:00 and 17:00-19:00) adds to that.

The stops you want: Avlabari for the metro, Sameba cathedral and the bath district; Freedom Square 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. Samgori, 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, and our Tbilisi bus routes guide has the operator's stop-by-stop timings for the 337 and the other city buses.

Bus 337 timetable

These are the Tbilisi Transport Company's scheduled times, read from its transit system on 5 October 2026. The airport's own page still prints 06:59 to 22:59, which is the same thing rounded. Scheduled minutes are from the airport stop; add ten to twenty in traffic.

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 the airport at 23:00 on weekdays and 22:57 at weekends, 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.

Airport to the old town, the station or your hotel

To the old town. Get off the 337 at Freedom Square (49 minutes on the timetable) and walk: Sololaki, the Abanotubani baths and most old-town guesthouses are five to fifteen minutes downhill from the square. A Bolt from the airport to an old-town address is 15-25 GEL by day and takes 25 to 40 minutes; the narrow streets below the square are one-way and sometimes closed, so expect the driver to stop at the nearest corner.

To the railway station. Tbilisi Central is at Station Square, the 337's last stop (70 minutes on the timetable), with the metro underneath. Allow the full 70 minutes plus traffic before a train; for anything tight, a Bolt is 25 to 45 minutes and about 20 GEL by day. The Didube marshrutka yard is two metro stops on from Station Square, so the bus plus the metro gets you to a Kazbegi or Kutaisi van for 1 GEL in total.

To Vera, Vake or Saburtalo. Stay on the bus past Freedom Square to Heroes' Square (65 minutes) for Vera and the start of Vake, or take a Bolt: these neighbourhoods are on the far side of the centre from the airport, so the ride is at the top of the daytime range.

To Sameba and the baths. Avlabari (45 minutes) is the stop for both, and for the metro's Line 1 if you are staying further along it.

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. At the top of that range the airport's own fixed-fare taxi at 40 GEL is the same money with no wait. 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 5 October 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. Separate them in your mind from the airport's official taxi, which has a desk by the arrivals exit and a rank at the kerb. By the airport's own page on 5 October 2026 that service charges a fixed 40 GEL to the city centre and 50 GEL to the suburbs, 24 hours, 20-30 minutes; the operator's own site prints 40 GEL in and 20 GEL back to the airport, with minivans from 30 EUR. In September it still quoted a meter, and travellers reported an 80 GEL zone fare in August, so confirm the figure at the desk before you get in. At 40 GEL fixed it is not the bargain, but at 02:00 with Bolt surging to 30-40 GEL and a fifteen-minute wait it is a reasonable choice.

The touts are a different matter. They start higher and negotiate down to about the official fare while making it feel like a favour. 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, a scenic loop through Varketili. There is no version of this that beats a Bolt at 20-40 GEL, the official desk at 40 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. On 5 October 2026 the station list behind tkt.ge's railway search had 36 stations and no Tbilisi Airport among them (Kutaisi Airport is there, with its own trains), so nothing can be booked. A restart has been talked about for years; if a service reappears, it will show up on tkt.ge before it shows up in guidebooks. Plan around the bus and Bolt.

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; the official airport taxi at its fixed 40 GEL if Bolt is slow; Yandex Go or Maxim as a fallback. 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; our lari converter shows what 100 GEL is in your money and what a window in town pays.

SIM cards. Magti's red desk sits just inside the arrivals hall, on the right as you come through the doors, and it is staffed around the clock. Magti's own page for the airport desks (read 5 October 2026) lists two tourist packages, both valid 15 days: 30 GEL for a free SIM with 3 GB, 30 international minutes and free local calls and texts, or 15 GEL for 5 GB and free local texts; the desk's boards also sell bigger unlimited-data packages that the page does not list, at 60 GEL for 15 days on a July 2026 reading. All of it costs more per gigabyte than a regular SIM plus a data bundle from a Magti shop in town (10 GEL for the SIM, 10 GEL for a week of unlimited data), 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 from 06:00 to 22:45 on weekdays and 06:00 to 22:39 at weekends, via Heroes' Square, Baratashvili Street and Avlabari (not Freedom Square while Rustaveli is closed), 70 minutes on the timetable, or you call a Bolt from your door; departing fares are the same as arriving ones, and the official airport taxi charges 20 GEL from the centre to the airport. 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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