Getting from Tashkent International Airport to the city

Yandex Go, and cash

• Yandex Go is the dominant ride-hailing app across Uzbekistan - Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara and the Fergana valley cities.
• Pick-up at the airport takes about 5 to 10 minutes.
• Payment is in cash som to the driver. Card payment through the app is not dependable in Uzbekistan, whatever the app suggests.

So the first thing to do on landing is get som. Change money or use an ATM in the terminal before you order a car. Turning up at the kerb with only a foreign card is the standard visitor mistake here.

The distances are small

• Tashkent airport is about 5 km from the city centre.
• Journeys are short and very cheap by any European or American standard.
• The metro is excellent once you are in the city - Tashkent's stations are worth seeing in their own right - though it does not serve the airport directly.

Practical points

• Uzbek som comes in large numbers. Prices in the tens or hundreds of thousands are normal; count carefully at first.
• Registration of your stay used to be a strict requirement and hotels handle it automatically - keep the slips they give you.
• US citizens have been visa-free since 1 January 2026, and the Uzbek embassy's own pages were slow to reflect it. See the Uzbekistan guide.

Onward

• The high-speed Afrosiyob train to Samarkand and Bukhara is excellent and leaves from Tashkent's railway station, not the airport.
• Book it in advance. It sells out, particularly in spring and autumn, and it is the single best way to travel in Uzbekistan.