Amtrak Train Travel USA: Fares, Rail Pass and Routes

Book Amtrak the way you’d book a flight: on amtrak.com or the Amtrak app, as early as your plans allow. Reservations open up to 11 months before travel and Amtrak’s own advice is to book early for the best fares, but the two cheapest fare types, Sale and Value, can’t be changed, so buy them only once the date is fixed. If your trip strings several long rides together inside a month, price the $499 USA Rail Pass, 10 coach segments in 30 days, against separate tickets first.

Read the timetable as closely as the fare. On some long-distance routes the stretch you’re paying to see comes up in the morning one way and late in the evening the other. Take journey times from the dated timetable for your route, too, rather than from the headline figure on its web page: the two don’t always agree, and the timetable is the one the train runs to.

Seven routes and their scheduled times

Times come from Amtrak’s route timetables dated 16 September 2026, and on the busy corridors the range runs from the fastest daytime train to the slowest.

The Northeast Regional also runs overnight trains, which take far longer and aren’t in its range: one is scheduled at 7h 57m between Washington and New York. Miss a train on the corridors and there’s usually a later one the same day, though the ticket for the one you missed is gone whatever the fare type. Miss the Zephyr, the Chief or the Builder and the next one is tomorrow, because each runs once a day in each direction. Their clocks also decide what you see: the Zephyr is scheduled at Salt Lake City at 11:40 p.m. westbound and 3:20 a.m. eastbound, so it’s a city to board or leave from, not one you’ll watch from the window.

A 45-hour train is a trip in itself, not a way to be across the country by a set time. Outside the Northeast Corridor almost all the track belongs to freight railroads, and Amtrak’s own page on delays points to freight train interference, when a freight railroad’s dispatcher holds the passenger train so its freight can go first. The same page says none of the long-distance routes met the Federal Railroad Administration’s on-time standard in 2024, so don’t book a flight home, or anything else you can’t move, for the day a Zephyr, Chief or Builder is due in. If you’re still choosing between plane, car and train for one particular leg, the distance rule in getting around the USA settles it faster than any fare search.

Booking early, and who pays less

Buy on amtrak.com or in the app, not on the train: on most Amtrak trains the onboard fare is typically higher than the regularly available one. If you change your mind quickly, Amtrak’s risk-free cancellation gives a full refund to the card you paid with when you cancel within 24 hours of buying, as long as the train hasn’t left yet.

Kids ride at half price. Children aged 2 to 12 travel at 50% off the adult fare when at least one adult 18 or older is on the same reservation, and one infant under 2 rides free on the lap of each passenger paying an adult fare. Travelers 65 and over get 10% off most rail fares on most Amtrak trains, with proof of age when they buy and on board. Neither discount applies to sleeping accommodation charges.

If the train is the middle of your trip rather than all of it, say New York to Washington, look at flying into one city and home from the other: which US airport to fly into explains open-jaw tickets. Our 7-day East Coast itinerary rides the corridor between New York City and Washington DC.

Sale, Value or Flex

Coach, Acela Business and Acela First are each sold in three fare types, and what separates them is what happens when your plans move.

Business Class on trains other than Acela, the Northeast Regional for one, is fully refundable and can be changed without a fee. Sleeper rooms run on their own clock: a full refund 121 days or more before departure, 75% back between 120 and 15 days out, and inside 14 days that 75% only comes back as a non-refundable eVoucher. Once the train has left, nothing is refundable, and a no-show loses the whole segment.

In practice, put Flex on any train that hangs off a long-haul flight or a tight connection, and keep Sale for the rides you’d take whatever happens.

Coach, Business, First and sleeper rooms

Coach on the long-distance trains means wide reclining seats with plenty of legroom and no middle seat. Business Class, where a train has it, adds extra legroom and, on many routes, a free non-alcoholic drink; on the Northeast Regional it also lets you choose your seat. Acela doesn’t sell coach at all. Every Acela seat can be picked when you book, and First Class adds complimentary at-seat meals, priority boarding and access to Metropolitan Lounges at selected stations.

The California Zephyr, the Southwest Chief and the Empire Builder all sell private rooms. A Roomette has two seats that turn into upper and lower beds, with access to shared restrooms and a shower. A Bedroom gives you twice the space, a sofa and a chair that become beds, and its own sink, toilet and shower. A Family Room spans the width of the car for two adults and two children aged 2 to 12, and there’s an Accessible Bedroom too. Every room includes meals on board, lounge access at major stations and priority boarding, so count the meals before you compare a room with two nights in coach.

How the USA Rail Pass works

The pass costs $499 and buys 10 segments of coach travel. Only a limited number of seats on each train can be booked with the pass, so reserve each segment as soon as your dates are fixed. It’s valid for 120 days from the day you buy it, and once you’ve ridden the first segment you have 30 days to finish the rest. A segment is every time you board a train or other scheduled service and get off it, so a journey with a change of trains uses two.

After you buy, you book each segment separately, straight from your purchase confirmation, in My Trip on amtrak.com or in the Amtrak app. The pass covers coach only, with no upgrade to a room, and it isn’t valid on Acela, the Auto Train, Thruway buses numbered 7000 to 7999, or the Maple Leaf at its Canadian stations. You’re also limited to two round trips, four one-way rides, between the same two stations.

Spread over 10 segments, $499 works out at $49.90 a ride, so the pass pays off on long legs and is wasted on short hops. Chicago to Seattle on the Empire Builder is one segment. So is New York to Philadelphia. Price the short corridor rides as separate tickets before you spend a segment on one.

What you can bring on board

Each passenger can carry on one personal item up to 25 lbs and 14 x 11 x 7 inches, plus two carry-on bags up to 50 lbs and 28 x 22 x 14 inches each. The Pacific Surfliner is stricter on size, at 28 x 22 x 11 inches. Bring more or bigger and it’s $20 for each extra item, with no more than two extras per passenger. On Acela there are overhead racks, space under the seat in front and luggage towers on both sides of the car.

Checked baggage stretches to four bags: two free, two more at $20 each, every bag up to 50 lbs and 75 linear inches, and an oversized bag between 76 and 100 linear inches costs $20. Not every train or station handles checked bags, though. Look up the station page for each stop on your ticket before you pack the big suitcase, and check it in before the scheduled departure; cut-off times vary by station. Pacific Surfliner trains can run with no checked baggage service at all, so look at the Surfliner’s own site before you plan on checking a bag there.

Boarding, seats and which side to sit on

Anyone 18 or older needs valid photo ID when checking bags, exchanging a ticket or when the crew asks, and your passport counts. Get to the station 30 minutes before departure, or 60 if you need help with bags or tickets. At the big stations the track or gate only appears on the screens a few minutes before boarding, so stay where you can see them.

Crossing the Canadian border on Amtrak Cascades, make it an hour early. Heading south from Vancouver on a UK, Australian or other Visa Waiver passport, you’ll need an approved ESTA just as you would flying in, and Amtrak advises anyone who isn’t a US or Canadian citizen to get there earlier still.

Seat selection exists on a number of routes for First, Business and some coach tickets, so check whether you can pick a seat when you book. Board in Seattle or in Portland, Oregon, or join a long-distance train in Los Angeles or Albuquerque, and your seat is assigned at the station: you show your ticket to an Amtrak employee at the gate before boarding. Elsewhere on Amtrak Cascades it’s mostly first come, first served, though the conductor may assign seats once you’re on.

The Pacific Surfliner doesn’t assign seats, and only Business Class guarantees you one. The ocean runs along the west side of the train between San Diego and San Clemente and again between Ventura and Grover Beach. The trap is Los Angeles Union Station, where the train changes direction: the west-side seat you had coming in faces inland on the way out. Riding through, no single seat faces the water on both stretches. Whichever way you’re heading, the inland seat before Los Angeles is the ocean seat after it, and with no assigned seats you can simply cross the aisle at Union Station if there’s room; take the conductor’s seat check from above your old seat with you.

On the long-distance trains, when you pass something matters more than your side of the car, and the Zephyr, the Chief and the Builder all carry a Sightseer Lounge for the views. On the Zephyr and the Builder, check the clock before you pick a direction:

• California Zephyr: westbound, the train is scheduled at Denver at 8:46 a.m. and at Glenwood Springs at 2:43 p.m. Eastbound, it’s Glenwood Springs at 11:42 a.m. and Denver at 6:59 p.m.
• Empire Builder: eastbound, the Glacier stops come up in the morning, from Whitefish at 7:26 a.m. to East Glacier Park at 9:36 a.m. Westbound, the same stretch runs from 7:48 p.m. to 10:21 p.m.

From the station to the park

Glacier has stations of its own. The Empire Builder stops year-round at West Glacier and at Essex, and seasonally at East Glacier Park, and in summer Glacier National Park Lodges runs a paid shuttle from the West Glacier depot to Apgar Village and Lake McDonald Lodge, with reservations required. In summer, that’s enough to start a trip to Glacier National Park without a car.

The Southwest Chief’s stop for the Grand Canyon is Flagstaff, and you can carry on from there without a car too. Groome Transportation runs scheduled shuttles, by reservation, from the Flagstaff Amtrak station to the South Rim, stopping on the way in Williams, where the Grand Canyon Railway leaves in the morning for the historic depot in the park’s village. The hard part is the Chief’s clock. It’s scheduled at Flagstaff at 7:55 p.m. westbound and 3:39 a.m. eastbound, while the shuttles and the railway run during the day, so off the westbound train you’ll spend a night in Flagstaff first, and off the eastbound one you’ll have hours to wait.

If you’d rather drive, the park service puts the South Entrance about 90 minutes from Flagstaff. Flagstaff’s rental desks aren’t at the Amtrak station, so check the office’s hours against the train before you book. Renting a car in the USA covers age fees, insurance and the one-way drop charge you’ll face if the car goes back somewhere else.