Abu Dhabi to Fujairah

Until 30 June 2026 there was no intercity passenger train anywhere in the United Arab Emirates. Etihad Rail was set up in 2009 and built its network freight first — sulphur out of the interior, aggregate, containers, running to the ports — and only once the line had reached the east coast did it begin selling seats. The service it opened with crosses the whole width of the country: Abu Dhabi Station, in Mohamed bin Zayed City, to Fujairah Station at Al Hilal City, the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, in one hour fifty-four minutes.

What makes it worth riding is the change of ground rather than the novelty. The train leaves the industrial southern edge of Abu Dhabi, runs east across open sand and gravel past the rock stacks at Mleiha, then reaches the Al Hajar mountains and goes straight through them — nine tunnels, 6.9 kilometres of them in total, on the last run down to the coast. The trains are diesel push-pull sets built by CAF and CRRC, rated at 200 km/h, carrying up to 400 passengers in two classes, and the passenger operation is run by Etihad Rail Passenger Services, a joint venture with Keolis. Three trains go each way, every day. The network is still opening in stages — Dubai and Al Dhaid are due at the end of September 2026, Sharjah in March 2027 — so what follows describes the two-station railway as it actually runs today.

Abu Dhabi Station is not on the Corniche. It stands out at Mohamed bin Zayed City, on the mainland behind the island, among the warehouses and workshops of Mussafah — which is where the railway already ran, because this was a freight line before it was anything else. Gates close two minutes before departure and the platform is a short walk from the concourse, so ten minutes is genuinely enough.

The first half-hour is the Emirates most visitors never look at: sand flats, pylons, camel fencing, the occasional ghaf tree holding its own patch of shade. Then the ground begins to lift into the long red dunes that run north-east towards Sharjah. Somewhere out to the left is Al Faya; to the right, low limestone stacks weathered into shapes that have given them their tourist names. The line skirts the southern edge of Dubai — Jebel Ali, then the newer suburbs — without stopping at any of it, because Dubai's own station has not opened yet.

Mleiha, and the first sight of rock

Around the hour mark the horizon hardens. Mleiha, inland Sharjah, is where the dunes break against the first outcrops of the Hajar, and it is the most interesting stretch of the run: pale fossil-bearing rock standing clear of orange sand, with the mountains behind it going from haze to outline. This is old country. The tombs and settlements excavated here run back through the Umm an-Nar period and into the Stone Age, and the modern Emirates — the towers, the ports, the railway itself — is about fifty years deep on top of several thousand.

Through the Hajar

The last section is the one the engineers had to fight for. Building the 145 kilometres from the Dubai–Sharjah border to Fujairah took 35 bridges, 32 underpasses and fifteen tunnels totalling sixteen kilometres, blast-driven through the Al Hajar. Nine of those tunnels, 6.9 kilometres of them, are on the passenger route. Between them the train runs in wadi bottoms with the ridges close on both sides — grey and ochre gabbro, dry watercourses, the occasional walled date garden at a village like Bithnah, where a fort has guarded this pass for close to three centuries.

Then the mountains open and the light changes. Fujairah sits on the Gulf of Oman, not the Persian Gulf, and the difference is obvious from the window: deeper water, a working anchorage offshore, green in the wadis. Fujairah Station is at Al Hilal City, a few minutes from the Corniche and about ten from the fort and the museum. Trains are diesel throughout — the line was built with electrification in mind but has not been wired — and the sets are push-pull, a power car at each end, so nothing shunts round at either terminus.

Three trains run each way, every day, and the pattern does not change between weekdays and the weekend — the times below were identical on a Friday and the following Monday. Every service is direct and takes 1 h 54 min. Times are as of September 2026, taken from Etihad Rail's own booking engine and its live schedule board.

A day return works in either direction. From Abu Dhabi, the 08:19 gives about seven hours in Fujairah before the 17:28 back; from Fujairah, the 05:34 out and the 18:39 home gives a very long day in the capital. The 18:39 from Abu Dhabi runs the mountain section in the dark for much of the year, so take one of the daylight departures if the Hajar is the reason you are going.

Etihad Rail warns that schedules may vary during Ramadan, at weekends and on public holidays, and the network is opening in phases — Dubai and Al Dhaid were announced for 30 September 2026, Madinat Zayed and Liwa for 30 November, the remaining Al Dhafra stations for 30 December and Sharjah for 30 March 2027. Check the operator's live schedule (opens in a new tab) before travelling.

Arrive at least ten minutes before departure. Ticket gates close two minutes before the scheduled time and there is no grace on it.

Etihad Rail sells its own seats through its website, its app and vending machines at both stations. A valid reservation is required to board — there is no walk-on fare — although seats can still be bought up to five minutes before departure if any are left. There are two classes, Comfort and Premium, and three fare types within each: Saver (seat assigned for you, no changes, non-refundable), Value (choose your seat, changes allowed, non-refundable) and Flex (choose your seat, changes allowed, refundable).

An introductory 50 % discount was still running in September 2026, which is why the price you pay is half the standard fare. Children under 18 travel on their own fare with a seat, infants under two travel free on a lap, and there is a senior fare from 60. Figures below are Abu Dhabi to Fujairah, one way, checked in the operator's booking flow in September 2026.

There is no rail pass for the United Arab Emirates, and no regional pass covers it. Interrail and Eurail stop at Turkey; the Gulf has no equivalent scheme, and the long-discussed GCC network that would one day link Etihad Rail to Saudi Arabia and Oman does not carry passengers.

Etihad Rail sells only its own point-to-point tickets, by class and fare type. There is no season ticket, no loyalty scheme and no multi-journey card at the time of writing; the operator says any such product will be announced when it exists. Tickets can be bought only through Etihad Rail's own channels — the app, the website, station vending machines and the contact centre — so Dubai's nol card and Abu Dhabi's TAMM app will not buy you one.

For a two-station railway that is the right answer anyway: there is a single fare to pay and nothing to amortise, so buy the ticket you need and no more. If you are combining the train with city transport, budget separately for a nol card in Dubai or a Hafilat card in Abu Dhabi, which the train has nothing to do with. Checked against the operator's own conditions in September 2026.

Fujairah is the only one of the seven emirates that faces the Gulf of Oman rather than the Persian Gulf, and it is the reason the train is worth taking as more than a novelty: the east coast has mountains, old stone, water in the wadis and a shoreline that looks nothing like the west. Almost everything below is within half an hour of Al Hilal City by taxi.

The two ends are very different problems. Abu Dhabi Station sits out at Mohamed bin Zayed City, well south of the island, and Etihad Rail lists a shuttle transfer with pick-up points at ADNEC Center – Al Rawdah, ADNOC Headquarters – Corniche and Reem Mall – Al Reem Island, so a hotel near one of those is the least trouble. At the Fujairah end the station is a few minutes from the city centre, but the resorts are strung along the coast north of it at Al Aqah and Dibba, thirty to forty minutes by road — worth it for the beach and the diving, less so for a single night.

Both stations have parking — the operator suggests booking it through the app — and both have cafés, restaurants and shops inside the concourse.