Can’t Get a Glacier Express Seat? You Don’t Actually Need One

You’ve picked the dates. You’ve booked Zermatt. Then….

You go to reserve the Glacier Express website, the one journey the whole trip was arguably built around, and it’s sold out.

Every departure, for the week you’re there.

Here’s the part nobody tells you: the Glacier Express is not the only train on those tracks.

It isn’t even the only train on those tracks that day. Ordinary regional trains run the identical route, through the identical scenery, hourly, all year, with no reservation and no supplement.

The base fare is the same. You just change trains four times instead of none.

That’s the whole trick, and it’s not a loophole. It’s a regular Swiss train timetable.

First, the reality check

You cannot ride the Glacier Express itself without a reservation. That is not what I am suggesting

Bookings on the Glacier Express trains are compulsory. They are tied to a specific departure, and your rail pass doesn’t cover the seat fee (CHF 54 in 2026 for second class).

If the Glacier Express is full, it’s full, and there’s no back door onto those trains.

What follows isn’t a way to sneak aboard.

It’s a different series of trains, on the same rails, and for a lot of people it turns out to be the better ride.

The route, leg by leg

The Glacier Express runs from Zermatt to St. Moritz (or vice versa) in around 7 hours 45 minutes. The regional version covers the same ground in roughly 8.5-9 hours with four changes. It depends how you dice it, and which connections you get of course, and I will show you how to do that further 👇👇👇

But first, this is how the legs break down…

Zermatt to Brig

The Matter valley, narrow for most of its length, with rock walls climbing to over 4,000 m on both sides. You lose altitude fast. Zermatt sits at 1,605 m, Visp at 651 m.

Brig to Andermatt

Through the Furka base tunnel and into Uri.

Andermatt to Disentis

The Oberalp Pass, at 2,033 m the highest point of the entire journey. On a clear day this is the leg people remember.

Disentis to Chur (or Reichenau-Tamins)

The Rhine Gorge, known as the Ruinaulta and sometimes called the Swiss Grand Canyon. White limestone cliffs, turquoise water, and almost nobody outside Switzerland has heard of it.

Chur to Bergün to St. Moritz

The Albula line, and the Landwasser Viaduct: six arches, 65 m up, curving straight into the rock face. This is the photograph you’ve seen. You get it from a regional train exactly as you’d get it from a panoramic one.

How to actually find these trains

This is the step that defeats most people (including me when I first tried), so do it exactly this way.

Search on sbb.ch/en or the SBB Mobile app, not on the Glacier Express or Rhaetian Railway sites, which are built to sell you the panoramic product.

And the trick to “forcing” the SBB to give you the regional trains is to break the route up.

When I was working on this with a client on a video call last week, this is how I did it

👉👉 🚫 DON’T DO THIS 🚫

DO NOT Enter Zermatt to St. Moritz because SBB tries to get you from A to B the fastest/best route. So you’ll get routed through Zurich or Bern. That’s the fast connection, and it’s the wrong one. Use can use the “via” field and enter the waypoints, but I still find it a mess.

So here’s what I do…

Break the trip up into three parts (even if you connect the trains later)

• First do Zermatt to Andermatt
• then Andermatt to Chur
• then Chur to St Moritz

⚠️ IMPORTANT ⚠️

You will still get offered Glacier Express trains which you DON’T WANT and CANNOT GET ON. Here is how to spot those

First they appear with no changes – ie. no hollow dots along the line. As they are direct trains. You can spot them with the RED PE Direction St Moritz 👇👇👇

If you click or tap on them, you will see more information that shows GLACIER EXPRESS

What you want instead is any other train between these stops.

Here is an example of Zermatt-Andermatt at about 9 am in July. No red PE, and one white dot in the middle (ie. one change).

Click on those trains and you will see you need to change in Visp or Brig (doesn’t not really make much of a difference apart from travel time- so pick the one that works for you)

Now, you have to continue the chain of searches and go from Andermatt to Chur and find the non-Glacier Express (no PE) trains.

From the search I am doing today (July 2026) trains depart once an hour at 38 past. So you can stop and have lunch here, go for a walk and catch the next one to Chur.

Now look for the IR 38 from Chur to St Moritz which takes you along the same stunning leg as the Glacier Express over the jaw-dropping Landwasser Viadukt bridge and the trains also have carriages with windows you can open for better shots!

Yes, you have to do a little detective work to piece this together, but it’s not that hard (especially with all my tips above!)

👉👉 By the way, if you want to support my work, you can use any of my links for hotels or train passes or I have a tip jar here :>

What you give up

Just so we are clear before you commit to this alternative, as I don’t want you to be disappointed or feel mislead.

Here is what you need to understand…

• No panoramic windows. The curved roof glass is the Glacier Express’s actual product. Regional carriages have ordinary windows, big ones, and they open at some stations, which photographers may consider an upgrade.
• No dining car. No meal served at your seat (there may be a restaurant carriage occasionally or a mini bar, but it’s generally BRING YOUR OWN); there is also no commentary, no headphone track explaining what you’re looking at.
• Four changes with luggage. Some are tight. So, plan your stops accordingly. But there are usually luggage storage lockers and left-luggage counters at SBB train stations along the way if you want to get off.
• No guaranteed seat. In June to August these trains fill with people doing exactly what this article describes, and reservations mostly aren’t possible on them. If a reservation is possible the train is marked with an R in the features section.

If you want the eight-hour cocooned experience with a hot lunch and a glass of wine at 2,000 m, book the Glacier Express, next year, months ahead. It’s genuinely lovely. This isn’t a takedown of it.

What you get instead

You can get off.

This is the real prize. The Glacier Express runs up to three times a day, so hopping off means abandoning the rest of your journey. Regional trains run hourly. You can stop at Andermatt for lunch, at Disentis for the monastery, at Bergün to walk a section of the Albula line on foot, and pick up the next train an hour later.

You can travel in November.

The Glacier Express doesn’t run from late October to mid-December. The regional trains run every day of the year.

You can do it in either direction, on any day, deciding that morning.

No commitment, no non-refundable booking, no watching the weather forecast turn while you’re locked into a Tuesday departure.

You can split it over two days.

Stay a night in Andermatt or Disentis and the eight-hour day becomes two half-days with a mountain evening in between.

Other options if you missed a seat

If the regional route doesn’t suit you, in rough order of how well they work:

1. Book a shorter Glacier Express segment. Full-length seats sell out first. Chur to Andermatt or Brig to Zermatt sections sometimes have availability when the whole run doesn’t.
2. Shift your date by a day or two. Availability moves. Cancellations release seats over time, so keep your eye out.
3. Go in shoulder season. Late September and early October have the same scenery, thinner crowds and easier booking, and the larches turn gold in the Engadin (usually late Oct/early Nov).

1. Take a different panoramic train. The Bernina Express (also sells out fast), the GoldenPass Express and the Gotthard Panorama Express all carry the same compulsory-reservation model, but they sell out later and cost less.

If you go

IMPORTANT Do the SBB search yourself the week you travel. Times shift with the seasonal timetable, and the December change is a big one.