Trains to and from Los Angeles

Book Los Angeles train tickets

Rail out of Los Angeles splits cleanly in two. Along the coast it is genuinely the right mode: the Pacific Surfliner runs 351 miles through six counties, with 13 daily round trips between San Diego and Los Angeles and five between Santa Barbara and San Diego. In every other direction the train is an experience rather than transport — Seattle is 35 hours, Chicago over 40, and there is no through train at all to the Bay Area.

Inside the city the picture has moved further than the city’s reputation has. Metro runs six rail lines and two busways, the D Line subway extension opened its first three new stations on 8 May 2026, and the fare system now caps what a rider can spend without anyone having to buy a pass or sign up for anything. Metrolink’s regional trains reach the rest of Southern California from the same building.

What follows is the station, the three operators that use it, and the handful of rules that decide what a journey here actually costs.

Union Station: a stub-end terminal, and what that means for you

Los Angeles Union Station is at 800 North Alameda Street, and its Amtrak station code is LAX — the same three letters as the airport, which is worth checking twice before confirming a booking. Over 100,000 passengers use the building daily, across Amtrak, Metrolink, the Metro A, B, D and J Lines, Greyhound and the LAX FlyAway bus.

Metro describes it as a “stub-end terminal, which means trains must enter and then reverse to leave the station”. That is not architectural trivia: it is padding in every long-distance timetable and a constraint on how many trains the platforms can turn. The Link Union Station project that would add run-through tracks and fix it is currently in the Design phase, with no service date published.

Two practical rules. The station is not open to the public overnight: between 1am and 4am, “only passengers with tickets for services that arrive or depart between 1 am and 4 am may access the station”. And Amtrak’s Metropolitan Lounge, open 5:30am to 10pm on weekdays and 6am to 10pm at weekends, sells a single-visit pass at $35 with a same-day reservation required — relevant if you are facing a long connection onto a sleeper.

The Pacific Surfliner, and the ticket you can cancel for nothing

The Surfliner is the one Los Angeles rail corridor that beats driving and flying on its own merits. It covers 351 miles through San Diego, Orange, Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties, at a frequency that makes turning up and travelling realistic rather than aspirational.

The fare rule worth knowing is what an Unreserved Coach ticket buys. It is valid on any Pacific Surfliner between the stations printed on it for up to a year from the reservation date, carries no change fees, and Amtrak states plainly that tickets “can be cancelled with a full refund to original form of payment with no fees if canceled before departure”. For a trip whose timing might move, that is a materially different product from a regional commuter ticket.

Discounts are automatic rather than card-based. Passengers 62 and over take 15% off the adult rail fare, not combinable with other offers and with published blackout dates including 24–25 November 2026 and 29 November–1 December 2026. Students 25 and under also take 15%, with “no advance purchase required”. Children 2–12 get 50% off the lowest available adult rail fare; the old one-child-per-adult limit was dropped in February 2023, though the discount does not apply in Business Class.

Cyclists should plan ahead. “Each Pacific Surfliner train has room for seven bicycles.” The bike reservation is free but required, unless the bike is a folding one under 34 by 15 by 48 inches, which travels as baggage with no reservation at all.

Metrolink: tickets that expire, sometimes before you travel

Metrolink runs seven regional lines — Antelope Valley, Inland Empire–Orange County, Orange County, Riverside, San Bernardino, Ventura County and 91/Perris Valley. Its pricing is straightforward; its timing rules are where people lose money.

A one-way ticket expires five hours from the moment you buy it. A SoCal Day Pass expires at 3:00am the day following purchase. Buying the night before to save time in the morning can leave you holding nothing, and there is no recovery: “All Metrolink fares are non-refundable and cannot be transferred to another rider.” That is the exact opposite of the Surfliner ticket described above, and the two are sold from the same station.

On price, the SoCal Day Pass is $15 on weekdays and $10 on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays for unlimited systemwide travel. The L.A. Zone Day Pass is a flat $5, but only between eight named stations: L.A. Union Station, Glendale, Burbank–Downtown, Burbank Airport–North, Burbank Airport–South, Cal State L.A., Montebello/Commerce and Commerce. Outside those, it is not a ticket. The 5-Day Flex Pass gives five chosen travel days within 30 and works out 10% cheaper than ten one-ways.

The genuinely underused rule: a valid Metrolink ticket is also a Metro pass, good for unlimited rides on all Metro Rail services in Los Angeles County plus Metro Rapid and Metro Local buses. An extra fare may apply on express or other non-local buses. A Monthly Pass adds unlimited systemwide weekend travel from 7:00pm Friday to 11:59pm Sunday, the FlyAway shuttle between Union Station and LAX, and Rail 2 Rail.

Rail 2 Rail lets Monthly Pass holders board any Pacific Surfliner within the station pair printed on the pass; travel beyond that pair means buying a Surfliner ticket for the extra portion, and the Coast Starlight and other long-distance trains are excluded outright. It is also suspended on named 2026 peak dates — Memorial Day (22–26 May), World Cup 2026, the Del Mar opening (17–20 July), Comic-Con (22–27 July), Labor Day (4–8 September) and Thanksgiving (25–30 November). Metrolink promotions do not travel either: “Metrolink free ride offers and fare promotions do not apply to Amtrak Pacific Surfliner trains.”

Watch the ages, because the two railways disagree. Metrolink counts a senior from 65, not Amtrak’s 62, and gives 50% off One-Way, SoCal Day Pass and 5-Day Flex Pass but only 25% off the Monthly Pass. Students of any age with a valid student ID and all youth 17 and under get 50%. Active military and veterans get 10% off all fares, “excluding L.A. Zone Day Pass”. At weekends, up to three children 17 and under travel free anywhere on the system with one paying adult.

Metro fares: $1.75 a ride, and a cap nobody has to apply for

Metro’s regular one-way fare is $1.75. The number that matters more is the ceiling. “Daily Cap: Pay for 3 rides in one day. Ride free after that. Never pay more than $5.” Above that sits a seven-day cap of $18, and the week is a rolling one: “the 7-Day cap start date is flexible and begins when you first tap”, not on a fixed calendar week.

There is nothing to buy and nothing to join — “No sign-up necessary. You will automatically receive the benefits of fare capping.” One condition switches the whole thing off: “If you pay per ride with cash, you will not be eligible for the benefits of fare capping.” Cash never reaches the cap, at any price.

A tap also buys two hours of free transfers, with “roundtrips not included”, and those free transfers do not count as paid rides towards either cap. So it is three charged journeys that hit $5, not three touches of a validator.

Paying is the easy part for a visitor. Contactless Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Discover, JCB and UnionPay cards, along with Apple Pay and Google Pay, work directly at validators and rail stations, so there is no need to buy anything at all. A physical TAP card costs $2 on top of the fare loaded onto it, from a TAP vendor or a station vending machine; the digital TAP card in the app adds nothing. At the rail gates, “you must pay with a credit, debit or TAP card” — cash is not accepted. On buses, exact change works only on those without all-door boarding, and a cash fare includes no transfer.

Concession caps are lower again. Seniors and riders with disabilities “never pay more than $2.50 a day or $5 in seven days”; students cap at $2.50 a day and $6 in seven; children under 6 ride free with a fare-paying adult. Two residents’ programmes sit alongside them: GoPass gives students at participating K-12, Adult Schools and Community Colleges free travel on Metro buses and trains, with the 2026–27 pass valid 1 July 2026 to 30 September 2027, and the LIFE programme gives lower-income riders an initial 90-day unlimited pass and then 20 free rides a month, with a one-person household income ceiling of $58,300.

What runs now, and what is still a construction site

Metro operates six rail lines: A (Pomona–Long Beach), B (Union Station–North Hollywood), C (Norwalk–LAX/Metro Transit Center), D (Union Station–Wilshire/La Cienega), E (East Los Angeles–Santa Monica) and K (Expo/Crenshaw–Redondo Beach), plus the G Line busway (Chatsworth–North Hollywood) and the J Line busway (El Monte–Harbor Gateway/San Pedro).

The D Line is the one that changed recently. Section 1 opened on 8 May 2026, adding underground stations at Wilshire/La Brea, Wilshire/Fairfax and Wilshire/La Cienega. Sections 2 and 3 — Beverly Hills and Century City, then Westwood, UCLA and the VA Hospital — remain under construction, and Metro publishes no opening date for either on the project page. Plan around the line that exists, not the one on the renderings.

The airport still has no train to its terminals. Passengers connect from LAX/Metro Transit Center, Bus Bays 1 and 2, to all terminals by a free, frequent shuttle — a real connection, but a connection, and one to budget time for on the way to a flight. The Los Angeles flights page covers the rest of that journey.

Further out: the East San Fernando Valley Light Rail, a 6.7-mile, 11-station line along Van Nuys Boulevard from the G Line to San Fernando Road, has a published completion of 2031. And Brightline West, the 218-mile high-speed line from Las Vegas at up to 200mph in roughly two hours, does not reach Los Angeles: its Southern California terminus is Rancho Cucamonga, from where the operator points passengers at Metrolink for the run into downtown.

The long-distance trains, and where rail is the wrong answer

Three long-distance services use Union Station. The Coast Starlight runs daily to Seattle in 35 hours. The Southwest Chief runs daily to Chicago across eight states in over 40 hours. The Sunset Limited to New Orleans is not daily at all: “Three trains depart weekly in each direction”, taking around 48 hours. The Texas Eagle routing from Chicago is 65 hours 20 minutes, and passengers on trains 421 and 422 sit through a 2 to 5 hour layover in San Antonio while the train is coupled to the Sunset Limited.

The gap that surprises people most is closer to home. There is no through train from Los Angeles up the Central Valley to the Bay Area. Amtrak’s Gold Runner runs only as far south as Bakersfield, where Amtrak Connection buses take over for Southern California destinations. San Francisco by rail from LA is a train plus a coach, whichever way you buy it.

So the honest summary: for San Diego, Orange County, Ventura and Santa Barbara, take the train and do not think about it again. For San Francisco, Las Vegas or anywhere east, rail is the scenic choice rather than the quick one — compare it against the coach options and whether a car is worth it here. The general trains page covers booking horizons and fare tiers across operators.

Common questions

Do I need a TAP card to ride the Metro in Los Angeles?

No. Contactless Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Discover, JCB and UnionPay cards, plus Apple Pay and Google Pay, are accepted directly at validators and rail stations. A physical TAP card costs $2 on top of any stored fare from a vendor or station machine, while the digital TAP card in the app adds nothing. What does not work at a rail gate is cash: “you must pay with a credit, debit or TAP card”.

What is the most I can spend on Metro in one day?

$5. Metro caps the day at three paid rides at $1.75 and everything after that is free, with a rolling seven-day cap of $18 that starts on your first tap rather than on a Monday. Free two-hour transfers do not count as paid rides towards either cap. The catch is that paying per ride in cash makes you ineligible for capping entirely.

Is there a train from Union Station to LAX?

Not to the terminals. The nearest rail is LAX/Metro Transit Center on the C and K Lines, and you finish the journey from Bus Bays 1 and 2 on a free, frequent shuttle to all terminals. Metrolink Monthly Pass holders also get the FlyAway coach between Union Station and LAX included in the pass.

Can I use a Metrolink ticket on the Metro?

Yes, and it is the most overlooked saving in the system. A valid Metrolink ticket covers unlimited rides on all Metro Rail services in Los Angeles County plus Metro Rapid and Metro Local buses. An additional fare may be required on express or other non-local bus services, but the rail and local-bus legs at each end of your Metrolink trip are already paid for.

How far in advance should I buy a Metrolink ticket?

Later than you would expect. A one-way expires five hours after purchase and a SoCal Day Pass expires at 3:00am the day after you buy it, so buying the previous evening can leave you with a dead ticket. There is no way back either: all Metrolink fares are non-refundable and cannot be transferred to another rider.

Can I take the train from Los Angeles to San Francisco?

Not on a single train. There is no through rail service up the Central Valley — Amtrak’s Gold Runner runs only as far south as Bakersfield, with Amtrak Connection buses covering the gap to Southern California. The Coast Starlight does head north daily, but it is a long-distance train taking 35 hours to Seattle rather than a fast link to the Bay Area.

Sources

Fares, journey times and operating rules on this page were checked against these sources on 11 September 2026. Authorities change fares and timetables without notice — confirm anything time-critical on the operator’s own site.

• LA Metro - fares, daily cap and 7-day cap
• LA Metro - fare capping rules and eligibility
• LA Metro - how to pay, TAP and contactless
• LA Metro - Link Union Station run-through tracks
• LA Metro - D Line subway extension status
• Amtrak - Los Angeles Union Station LAX, hours and lounge
• Amtrak - Pacific Surfliner route and frequencies
• Metrolink - fares, SoCal Day Pass and L.A. Zone Day Pass
• Metrolink - ticket types, expiry and refund rules