London to Bolzano: The Complete 2026 Transport Guide

If you’ve decided to swap the peak of the Shard for the peaks of the Dolomites, you’ve made an excellent choice. Getting from London to Bolzano is pretty easy, but it can seem a little complicated at first glance.

I’ve lived in London since 2010, and over the years, I’ve gotten to a point of hubris where I almost just assume anywhere I want to go, I can get there easily. Bolzano had been on my list for quite awhile, but when it came to booking, turns out there isn’t a £20 Ryanair flight direct from Stansted. For my fellow Londoners, I’ve put this post together so you can have a few options on how to get from London to Bolzano, and make your own trip planning easier.

The Fastest Way: SkyAlps from London Gatwick

Bolzano has a small airport (BZO) that’s mostly serviced by charter flights and a small airline, SkyAlps. SkyAlps flies direct to Bolzano from London Gatwick. Frequency varies depending on the season, but typically there are flights on Wednesdays and Sundays. In higher seasons, they may add extra routes and in 2026, they’re offering flights on Fridays and Saturdays from July to September.

You’re paying a premium for the convenience. At the moment, the most basic, hand luggage only flights are going to set you back about €320 for a round trip. However, what you lose in budget, you make up in time. The airport is only 6km outside of the city, saving travel time compared to taking trains from Verona or Innsbruck.

If you’re a nervous traveller, or convenience is a higher priority to you than budget, this is the best option for you.

The Most Flexible Way: Verona or Innsbruck

The most flexible, and common way, to get from London to Bolzano is by flying into either Verona (VRN) or Innsbruck (INN), then taking a train onward to Bolzano. Either option will take you about the same amount of time. For those of us that work a standard Monday to Friday job, this is your best route as it’ll give you more options that can fit around your work schedule and annual leave.

From Verona to Bolzano

This is the route I took to get from London to Bolzano, and I’d recommend it as it’s painless.

Ryanair, EasyJet and British Airways all fly direct from London to Verona, and between the three airlines, there are daily non-stop flights. If Stansted is your closest airport, Ryanair is your best bet. For Gatwick, it’s EasyJet or British Airways.

Flight prices vary, but looking at May 2026, a Friday – Sunday trip is on sale at the time of writing for £80-150, and in December 2025, I paid £111 for a weekend trip.

Once you land at Verona airport, take the airport shuttle bus to Porta Nuova station. It takes 15 minutes, costs €7 for a single ticket, and your ticket is valid for 75 minutes. If you’re hanging around Verona before going to Bolzano, you can use your ticket on the urban buses to head into the city.

From Verona Porta Nuova station, there are direct trains to Bolzano. You can buy them online on Trenitalia’s website, or from the kiosks inside the station. The trains go at least once an hour, sometimes more frequently.

Train options:

• Regional trains (my recommendation): The cheapest option, at about €19 for a one way ticket. There are fast trains and slow trains on regional services. The fast train is 1 hour 40 minutes, the slow train is 2 hours and 20 minutes. Even if the next train is a slow one, it’s worth waiting for the next fast one as it’ll usually get you in earlier. Check the arrival time when you’re booking.
• Frecciarossa trains: This is Trenitalia’s high speed rail, but it is more expensive at €32 for a single ticket. They take 1 hour and 30 minutes, so in my opinion, it’s worth going for the cheaper regional train as it’s only 10 minutes in the difference.
• Rail jet: These are the international trains. You’ll see it on the board as Munich, although it stops in Bolzano. They’re around the same price and time as the Frecciarossa trains, and again, not worth the extra cost compared to the faster regional trains.
• Italo: This is a private rail company, not operated by Trenitalia and you can check their tickets here. They only run about twice a day, usually in the morning and evening. Their trains take about 1 hour 30 minutes to Bolzano, and cost around €22. While they wouldn’t be my first recommendation due to their infrequency, if you’re travelling on a day that there are planned strikes on Trenitalia, they’re a good backup option.
  • Note: Italo have their own kiosks inside Porta Nuova station. If you want to get on one of their trains, you must buy the ticket directly from their website or their kiosk, you can’t get them through Trenitalia kiosks/website.

From Innsbruck to Bolzano

If Heathrow is your closest London airport, or you want to travel via Austria, then Innsbruck is your best choice to get from London to Bolzano. Here, your airline options are EasyJet from Gatwick, or British Airways and Lufthansa from Heathrow. Similar to the Verona options, there are daily direct flights to Innsbruck from London.

It’ll probably be slightly more expensive to fly to Innsbruck, but not by much, and I can see flights on a May weekend in 2026 for £129.

Innsbruck airport has a direct bus to the train station (Bus line F, book here) which takes about 20 minutes and costs €3.20. If you have the IVB app, your ticket is valid for 90 minutes, in case you want to take a bus onwards and explore Innsbruck a little more.

From Innsbruck main train station, you can get a direct train onward to Bolzano.

Train options:

Check and book on the OBB website.

• Regional trains: These trains go about every half hour and cost around €28 for a single ticket. For most trains, you’ll need to change at Brennero/Brenner. The total journey time is about 2 hours and 20 minutes.
• Rail jet: These are the international trains, usually headed for Verona or Bologna. They’re a little more expensive at around €31.50, but the better option as they’re direct trains to Bolzano. Travel time from Innsbruck to Bolzano is about 2 hours.

A Note on Crossing International Borders

If you fly into Verona, you’re already in Italy, so you’re not crossing any borders to get to Bolzano.

If you’re flying into Innsbruck, you’re landing in Austria, so will be crossing the border to reach Bolzano. However, Austria and Italy are both within the Schengen Area. If you’re not familiar with it, the Schengen Area is a series of open borders within 29 European countries, so there are no passport checks at the border. It doesn’t matter what your citizenship is, once you’re inside the Schengen Area, you can travel freely. You won’t even notice you’re crossing from one country to the next in most cases.

If you’re nervous about this please take my word for it: It’s genuinely no more stressful than getting a train from London to Oxford (in fact, I’d argue that’s worse as you have to contend with Paddington station). You don’t need to show up hours early, there are no security scanners, and you definitely don’t need your liquids in a crumpled sandwich bag.

The Scenic Route: London to Bolzano by Train

If you’ve got time to spare and want to take the long route, you could travel by train!

To get off the island of Britain, you’ll need to take the Eurostar to either Paris, Brussels or Amsterdam. From any of these cities, it becomes a bit “choose your own adventure”, and if you’re the type of person taking this route, chances are you’re going to want to make the most of it and explore places along the way. I’ve laid out some straightforward routes to give you ideas.

For each route, the actual travel time will vastly vary – I’ve given a rough idea below, but these will naturally vary depending on what routes and services you take. For the same reason, I haven’t included prices as it’s so variable – if you take a high speed train over a coach for example, it’ll be more expensive, and certain days of the week are cheaper than others. In all cases, however, each of these journeys will be much more enjoyable split up over multiple days, giving you a chance to see the cities you pass through.

The train via Paris

• Arrive via Eurostar to Paris Gare du Nord. Walk 5 minutes to Paris Gare de l’Est.
• From Paris Gare de l’Est, take the TGV (high speed train) to Stuttgart.
  • Book and check on either the SNCF website (France), or the DB website (Germany). The train is joint operated by both countries. You may find slightly cheaper fares on the French website, but cross check on each just in case.
• From Stuttgart, take the train to Munich. (Book and check on DB website).
• From Munich, take the train going in the direction of Bologna or Verona, and get off in Bolzano. (Book on Trenitalia website)

Total journey time from Paris is about 11 hours.

The train via Brussels

• Arrive via Eurostar to Brussels Midi/Zuid station. Take the bus for 10 minutes to Brussels Nord (or walk the 46 minutes through the city!)
• From Brussels Nord station, take the train to Frankfurt. (Book and check on DB website)
• From Frankfurt Hauptbanhof, head onward to Munich. (Book and check on DB website)
• From Munich, take the train going in the direction of Bologna or Verona, and get off in Bolzano. (Book on Trenitalia website)

Your total journey time from Brussels is about 12 hours.

The train via Amsterdam

• From Amsterdam Centraal, head to Cologne (Köln) or Frankfurt via direct train. (Book and check on NS website)
• From Cologne or Frankfurt stations, take the train to Munich. (Book and check on DB website)
• From Munich, take the train going in the direction of Bologna or Verona, and get off in Bolzano. (Book on Trenitalia website)

Your total journey time from Amsterdam is about 13 hours.

The Recommendation

All of the options I’ve laid out for you here to get from London to Bolzano have their own pros and cons. The direct SkyAlps route from Gatwick is clearly the fastest, but you pay at least double what you’d pay with other flying routes, while the train routes are naturally going to be the slowest, but you get an adventure across at least three countries.

Personally, if your goal is to see Bolzano, I’d recommend the Verona route. It’s what I did myself, and I chose that route because it was the cheapest and most flexible. I work Monday to Friday, so annual leave is precious. When I went to Bolzano, I flew into Verona from Stansted on a Friday morning, then immediately took the train up to Bolzano. By the time I got to my accommodation Bolzano, it was about 5:30pm, leaving me the whole evening to go out for dinner and see some of the city.

Returning home on Sunday, I chose a flight at 17:45 from Verona. By the time I checked out of my accommodation and got into Verona by train, it was noon. It was enough time to head into the city, get some lunch, do a little sightseeing, and still be back at the airport about 2 hours before my flight home – and to be honest, Verona airport is so small that I could easily have gotten there 1 hour 30 minutes before and I’d have had plenty of time.

As much as I love the idea of doing the epic train journey one day, London -> Verona -> Bolzano is the route I’d most recommend, and what I’d do again on a return visit.

And in the meantime, if you’re looking for more Bolzano ideas, I’ve written a full guide here and a 24 hours in Bolzano itinerary here.