Due to the mountainous terrain in Tajikistan and the underfunding of the national train company, taking the train in Tajikistan is not popular. It’s scenic, but very slow. Improvement in the relations with Uzbekistan does open up avenues for international travel in the near future, but for now, trains to Uzbekistan and Russia are a complicated venture.
For more on what to expect while traveling by train in Central Asia, check out the overview page on the Silk Road by train, which includes more info on seats, route planning and timetables.
About railways in Tajikistan: two separate networks exist that are not connected to each other. The northern network joins Khujand with Uzbekistan, and a southern network spreads from Dushanbe to Kulob, Qurgonteppa, to southern Uzbekistan and to the border with Afghanistan at Nizhnij Pyanj.
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Timetable info
To avoid going to the train station to check the timetable, you can double-check with the people from the rail office. Try any of these numbers (start with +992 37):
- 227-21-77
- 227-10-53
- 933-55-39-96
There is also a website that even claims to have online booking. No reports yet.
Buying tickets
You can buy tickets at the train station or at a kassa in central Dushanbe that sells rail and air tickets. Online, you can try Tutu.ru. It’s user-friendly and in English, but the price is likely to be higher than what you pay offline, and you may still have to get the actual ticket printed for you in a station in Russia.
International rail routes
Rail routes to Uzbekistan
Routes from Tajikistan to Russia have stops in Uzbekistan (see the To Russia chapter). Beyond those, there is now also the Dushanbe – Tashkent train.
Dushanbe – Samarkand – Tashkent
Since 2022, there is a Tashkent – Samarkand – Dushanbe train, for the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. It currently runs once a week and takes 18 hours.
Some good reports have been written on the booking process and the train experience in the Tashkent – Samarkand – Dushanbe train thread.
To Russia
A Tajikistan – Russia by train forum topic tracks changes and trip reports of routes to Moscow.
Dushanbe – Moscow: It has become a lot easier to take this train since it no longer passes Turkmenistan, and onerous visa requirements have been abolished for many nations. The train previously did not have stops in Uzbekistan – it does now, though.
Currently, trains to Moscow do not actually end in Moscow due to infrastructure works, instead stopping in Volgograd or Samara.
Do check out this mini-documentary on the labour migrants taking this train – well worth your time.
Khujand – Samarkand – Moscow: Pre-pandemic, if stopping at Samarkand, you could only buy tickets online for this train on Russian booking sites like Tutu and on the Uzbek Railways website, but not on the train station. This might no longer be the case. Updates welcome here.
Domestic routes
Dushanbe – Khujand – Konibodom: Trains 367 & 368 plying this route have become seasonal, only running in summer. The journey takes around 25 hours, normally departing at 20:00 and arriving the next day somewhere around 21:00. Updates welcome in the Dushanbe – Khujand forum thread.
Other domestic routes: There are some very slow, very cheap routes domestically in the south. Kulob – Qurghonteppa – Dushanbe takes 8 hours, for instance. Shaartuz – Qorghanteppa takes around 3,5 hours.
This is clearly for lovers of slow travel and train geeks – check the Youtube video. We keep track of domestic train routes in Tajikistan in this forum topic.