Glacier Express seat reservation – when exactly does the booking open
A traveler named Kamil is gearing up for a trip on the Glacier Express with his wife and is trying to secure seat reservations. He's faced challenges with the booking process, trying to find out the exact time it starts, which he discovered is at 1:00 AM Swiss time. Kamil has done test runs to confirm this timing and is now ready to book.
- Reservations for the Glacier Express start at exactly 1:00 AM Swiss time, not midnight.
- Prepare all your information in advance to book as quickly as possible.
- When booking, immediately select your seats without wasting time reading the available options.
- Avoid trying to reserve seats on train no 902 since they are rarely available at the opening time.
AI-generated summary-
Hello! In the next week I’m going to try to buy seat reservations for “Glacier Express” full route for me and my wife. According to official information the booking process start 93 days in advance. During last 4 nights I tried to check (only to learn how it work) what time exactly the sell is opening, because the train hava a huge demand, especially “1+1” seat layout in 1st class. I expected that tickets is showing immidiatelly after 00:00, but – in every of above 4 nights – it wern’t. I was waiting until 00:30 every night, but reservation system still shows “Travel date too far in the future. You can only book 93 days in advance” message. On the other hand at about 6:30 in the morning seat were avalaible, but – of course – 80% of them were sold out 🙁 So the question is – does anybody knows which hour – excactly – booking process starts everynight?
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Edited to remove incorrect info.
I am correcting my incorrect reply above…
My previous message was based on reading a wrong email.
I purchased my seat reservation shortly after 8:00 pm in USA Eastern Time Zone. So that meant it was 2:00 am (the next day) Switzerland at the time of purchase. I had also done exactly what you are doing, I started doing daily test purchases about a week in advance of the 93 day point since I wasn’t exactly sure what day they would open.
Thank for your information! It should be helpful 🙂
Hi kamil_krk,
Based on my experience, the earliest you can book your seat is 93 days before your date of departure, and booking opens at exactly the second after midnight Zurich time. So far I have done this twice. I would wait in front of my laptop and at exactly midnight refresh the website and you’ll see a a new date pops up. Make sure you have your information at the ready (name, date of birth) so you can book your seats instantly.
Further information about the Glacier Express is available here: https://www.myswissalps.com/activity/glacier-express/
Regards,
Anna
Thank you too Anna! I’ll try tonight at 2 o’clock 🙂
Kamil
Thanks for the feedback. This is all very interesting. I just assumed getting seat reservations was simple.
I am calling from USA Central Standard Time but the clock will spring forward on March 10 due to daylight savings time. Switzerland also has daylight savings time beginning March 31, so on that date Switzerland will be back to being 7-hours ahead of me. I will check my math, but it seems that when Switzerland is 1-minute after midnight, it puts my time at 1-minute after 6 PM. I will check my math again when I am fresh. 🙂
I will do a couple dry runs just to be comfortable. I am surprised it is this competitive. Hope this discussion helps others.
I need to get to Switzerland just to relax from all this planning.
Thanks for the heads up!
This night I bought long awaited seats onboard “Glacier Express”. After 4 (!) weeks tests I’ve a few important informations / tips (I tested first class in trains from Zermatt to St. Moritz):1) reservation starts exactly at 01:00 am. swiss time, NOT at midnight;2) if you want to reserve best seats in first class (“1+1” layout) you have no more than 10 seconds (!) to “block” places; it means that you must click button called “Next” on seat layout graphic – after seats selection – no later that about 01:00:10, especially in warm season;3) don’t waste the precious seconds to read information about quantity free places; immidiatelly choose the connection and seats;4) my advice – don’t try to reserve seats onboard train no 902 (you loose seconds, again!), because in 100% cases in last few weeks in the moment of opening reservation there is NO ANY free places next to window and in 95% cases there is NO ANY free places at all; the better solution is choose in first step the train no 904 (in warm season) or 920 (in winter).
Kamil
Hi Kamil,
Thanks so much for sharing your experience with the Glacier Express seat reservation. Your determination has paid off and happy to hear you secured your reservations 🙂
In case you were interested. We’ve recently compiled a guide to securing a seat on the Glacier Express https://www.myswissalps.com/blog/glacier-express-reservations/
Kind regards,
Yolanda
Yolanda – I used yours advise too; there is a lot of very useful informations 🙂 But you should correct the informations – reservation starts at 1 am o’clock, no at midnight. It is the same in Golden Pass trains too.
Kamil
Thank you Kamil.
This has been updated.
Kind regards,
Yolanda
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