Getting from Munich Airport to the city

The fare, and why it is unremarkable

• Munich Airport sits in fare zone 5, and a journey into the city crosses zones M to 5.
• The Airport-City-Day-Ticket covers exactly that, from EUR 17.50, and is valid on every MVV service in those zones: S-Bahn, U-Bahn, bus, tram and regional train.
• MVV states in its own FAQ that an ordinary day ticket for zones M to 5 is equivalent in price and in what it covers. There is no airport levy hiding inside the name, which puts Munich in a small group of European cities.
• It runs until 6am the following day, so a late arrival is covered on one ticket into the small hours.

Travelling as a group

• The single version is for one adult, plus up to three children aged 6 to 14.
• The group version covers two to five people, with children aged 6 to 14 counting as half a person. That is how a family of four ends up on one ticket.
• A child's day ticket on its own is EUR 3.80, and unlike the adult version it is valid across the whole MVV area rather than a chosen set of zones.
• A group day ticket for the city is from EUR 19.70 if the airport is not involved.

Single tickets

• A single is from EUR 4.20, but the price depends on how many zones you cross, and the airport is a long way out.
• The validity is unusually generous on this route. A single is good for two hours in zone M or across two zones, three hours from M-1 or three zones, and five hours from M-5 or seven zones, which is what an airport journey is.
• MVV's own advice is that a single or a strip ticket is only worth it for short hops, for instance boarding at Unterschleissheim rather than the airport.
• You pay for each zone once, even if the route crosses it twice.

Machines and validation

• Tickets bought at the airport machines are already validated. So are online tickets, tickets from DB machines at S-Bahn stops, and those from the mobile machines on buses and trams.
• Stamping an already-validated ticket is the classic mistake here, and it invalidates it.
• At some S-Bahn stations near the airport the ticket is not offered by name. MVV's instruction is to select "Flughafen" as the destination instead.

Longer stays

• The Deutschland-Ticket is EUR 63.00 a month and covers regional and local transport across Germany, the Munich S-Bahn included. If you are in the country for a couple of weeks and moving around, it will usually beat buying day tickets.