Boryspil International Airport (KBP) (Міжнародний аеропорт "Бориспіль") is about 40 minutes from the city center. The city's second airport Zhulyany (IEV) (аеропорт "Жуляни"), used mostly for domestic flights, is located 20 minutes from the center.
Ukraine has two major international airlines - Ukraine International Airlines (Міжнародні Авіалінії України - Mizhnarodni Avialiniyi Ukrayiny) and Aerosvit (АероСвіт). These airlines have daily flights to major European cities. Aeroflot, Alitalia, Austrian Airlines, British Airways, Czech Airlines , Delta , Estonian Air , Finnair , KLM , Lufthansa , Malev , Turkish Airlines and others have scheduled flights to Borispol airport. Semi-Budget airlines flying to Kiev include AirBaltic . Budget airline Wizz Air has flights from several European cities. There are occasional budget charters from Italy, and in summer, Ukrainian Mediterranean Airlines runs charters to destinations including Italy and Turkey. Aerosvit and Delta are the only airlines with non-stop service to North America.
The simplest way to get to the city center is to take a marshrutka, which is a minibus. These leave very regularly, cost 30UAH, and terminate at the plaza behind the main train station, close to the Metro. A taxi costs 250-500UAH, with the taxis operated by people who meet travellers off the plane with the promise of taxis being the most expensive.
POLIT operates a regular bus service between the airport and Kiev city center (ploshcha Peremohy (площа Перемоги) and the Central Railway station (bus schedule ). Buses depart frequently and the cost is 25UAH. Tickets are bought from the driver. On average, it takes 40-70 minutes to get to city center by bus. To find the buses, you must walk over to the largest terminal (terminal "B") and they will be outside, which is to the right of the arrival terminal.
It can take a lot of time to go through immigration although the situation has reportedly improved somewhat recently. Passport control can still take more than an hour if there are several flights arriving around the same time. Plan your first day's schedule accordingly. Standing in line is not the norm for Ukrainians, so learn to line hop if you want to get though passport control quickly. There are separate lines for Ukrainians, no-visa-required visitors, and others (including visa-required) countries. Look for the signs "NO VISA" and "VISA" above the heads of the immigration officers.
When leaving there can be very large queues waiting to go through security. Travelers flying to the United States may be required to go through a second security checkpoint. Going through check-in queue, security queue and passport control queue may take less than 30 minutes but can be much longer. Check-in counters open two hours before the scheduled departure time and going from the city to the airport may take anything between 30 minutes and 2 hours depending on city traffic.
The Most Frequently Asked Travel Questions about Kiev
Where To Stay & Best Hotels in Kiev - updated May 2024
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Kiev Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.
