# pickthetrain

> Every direct (no change of train) high-speed, intercity and night train that crosses a border in Europe, from official open timetables, plus a door-to-door time comparison with the fastest nonstop flight.

Timetable window: 28 Sep – 25 Oct 2026 (built 2026-09-29). 126 cities, 744 city pairs. Times are local. Always tell users to check with the operator (each train carries its operator's official URL).

## Answering "is there a direct train from A to B?"

- JSON: https://pickthetrain.com/api/v1/routes/{from}/{to}.json (city ids are lowercase slugs: zurich, milan, st-gallen, frankfurt-oder). 404 = no direct cross-border train in our data.
- Every destination from a city: https://pickthetrain.com/api/v1/from/{city}.json
- All cities with ids: https://pickthetrain.com/api/v1/cities.json · all pairs: https://pickthetrain.com/api/v1/routes.json
- Human pages: https://pickthetrain.com/trains/{from}-to-{to}/ and https://pickthetrain.com/from/{city}/
- Contract and examples: https://pickthetrain.com/intents.md

## Busiest direct routes

- Copenhagen ↔ Lund: 80.2 a day, fastest 47 min — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/copenhagen-to-lund/
- Copenhagen ↔ Malmö: 79.9 a day, fastest 33 min — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/copenhagen-to-malmo/
- Antwerp ↔ Rotterdam: 43.4 a day, fastest 32 min — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/antwerp-to-rotterdam/
- Brussels ↔ Paris: 34.5 a day, fastest 1h18 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/brussels-to-paris/
- Copenhagen ↔ Helsingborg: 33.4 a day, fastest 1h19 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/copenhagen-to-helsingborg/
- Brussels ↔ Rotterdam: 31.5 a day, fastest 1h08 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/brussels-to-rotterdam/
- Munich ↔ Salzburg: 28.2 a day, fastest 1h10 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/munich-to-salzburg/
- Basel ↔ Karlsruhe: 28.1 a day, fastest 1h34 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/basel-to-karlsruhe/
- Basel ↔ Freiburg: 28.1 a day, fastest 27 min — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/basel-to-freiburg/
- Amsterdam ↔ Antwerp: 27.1 a day, fastest 1h19 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/amsterdam-to-antwerp/
- Basel ↔ Frankfurt: 26.5 a day, fastest 2h41 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/basel-to-frankfurt/
- Basel ↔ Mannheim: 23.9 a day, fastest 1h59 — https://pickthetrain.com/trains/basel-to-mannheim/

## Data and licence

Official open timetables (SNCF, DB/DELFI, ÖBB, SBB, Trenitalia, SNCB, NS/OVapi, Renfe, ČD/Správa železnic, ZSSK, PKP PLK, SŽ, HŽPP, DSB/Rejseplanen, Entur, Eurostar, European Sleeper…), joined across borders. Combined data under ODbL 1.0 with attribution: https://pickthetrain.com/sources/

Source: NMBS-SNCB – Open Data – 27 Sep 2026. Contains data originally published by NMBS-SNCB, modified by Goldcote Ltd.