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Amsterdam to København / Copenhagen by train
All that’s good to know about taking the train from Amsterdam to Copenhagen
It's been more than a decade since direct trains connected the Dutch and Danish capitals, but is an entirely feasible journey
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Routes
From Amsterdam Centraal / Amsterdam CS to København H /Copenhagen H
Journey Summary
from 10hr 33min
Daily
Travel Information
At face value this will probably seem a long and complicated journey by train, but it's more than likely to be stress-free.
Our top tip for those travelling with heavy luggage, small children etc, is to seek out and use the lifts/elevators, that will be available at all four stations; in Amsterdam, Osnabruck, Hamburg and Kobenhavn.
Change trains in: Osnabruck and Hamburg
The connection between trains at Osnabruck is around 17 - 19 mins
This matters if you depart Amsterdam at 07:00, because if the train arrives in Osnabruck too late to connect into the train on to Hamburg, you won't then make the optimum connection on to Kobenhavn - you will then have to spend more than two hours in Hamburg awaiting the next departure on to Denmark.
Depart Amsterdam by the 09:00 train and your end-to-end journey will be slower by at least an hour, but you will be more likely to make the connections.
Make the connection in Osnabruck and you'll be spending over two hours in Hamburg between trains (if you don't take the train heading to Arhus and make another connection in Kolding).
But there will be contingency against the possibility of missing that connection in Osnabruck.
Depart Amsterdam at 11:00 and the journey will be faster, but making the connections into what is the final train of the day on Kobenhavn will be far from guaranteed.
You will be relying on making an 18 min connection in Osnabruck and a 39 min connection in Hamburg
If you depart Amsterdam at 07:00 or 09:00 and train delays cause you to miss booked connections, tickets/reservations etc can be transferred free of charge to later departures.
2 x connections per day
Tickets
Book in advance and save: YES
Online bookings open: Three months ahead of the travel date
On NS International look for the journeys that have 'x2' and 'Intercity Berlijn > IC > Eurocity.
How to buy tickets on NS International (PC version) – follow this GUIDE
Where to book
| Ticket Provider | Approximate Cost | |
|---|---|---|
| NS International | from €39 (approx) |
Train 1
Journey Features
Good to Know
Final Destination: Berlin
You may not see Osnabruck on the departure screens at Amsterdam's central station, so the train you will be looking for is the train going to Berlin.
Train also calls at: Amersfoort
A slightly odd feature of this rail journey is that you'll be travelling from west to east right across The Netherlands on a German train.
The train will pass through a sequence of Dutch and German towns, this is a heavily populated area of Europe, but those different townscapes are the only interesting aspects of this journey, so having something to read or watch with you is recommended.
Train 2
Travelling On
Journey Features
Good to Know
You will be travelling on an IC or ICE train between Osnabruck, but which train you will be travelling by makes no difference to the journey time, as there are no high-speed lines/routes between Osnabruck and Hamburg.
Final Destination: Hamburg-Altona or Kiel
You will almost certainly have to transfer between gleis (platforms/tracks) at Hamburg Hbf, where the better option is to head for the Wande-Halle concourse.
Most of the station's facilities are to be found there and the trains on Denmark usually depart from that end of the station.
From a scenic perspective this is an unexceptional journey across the flat farm land of northern Germany, so having something to watch or read with you is recommended.
Train 3
Travelling On
These trains used to be shunted on to a ferry for a sea crossing between Germany and Denmark, but the Danish part of that route is being affected by engineering weeks in preparation for the opening of the Fehmarn Fixed Link tunnel in around 2028.
Hence this train service between Hamburg and the Danish capital has been re-routed to travel overland
via the Jutland peninsular.
So a less fascinating journey than the previous route and scenically this route is uninteresting, but it does have three highlights, which you can't miss if you will be travelling when it's daylight.
(1) The spectacular crossing of the Kiel Canal on the Rendsburg High Bridge - the corkscrew descent into the town and its station is quite something.
(2) After departure from Kolding the train will cross the Little Belt Bridge, which connects Jutland to the island of Funen.
(3) Then around 15 mins after departing Odense, the train will cross the Great Belt Fixed Link between Funen and the island of Zealand.
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