What are the best ways to use public transportation to travel between World Cup host cities in the USA, Canada and Mexico? For many, it’s to fly with exceptions occurring for close-together city pairs and fans preferring more of an adventure with their journeys.

Here are some details about several of those options.

Read more: Welcoming the World Cup: 10 Things Every International Football Fan Should Know About Traveling to the United States

Short train trips

Travel between Boston, New York and Philadelphia can be done so seamlessly that it’ll remind Europeans of back home. That’s mostly because Amtrak connects those cities through its Northeast Regional and Acela services. Both serve all three and others between Boston and Washington with the main differences being that Acela is faster, makes fewer intermediate stops and has business class as its standard class.

If you took the first Northeast Regional train of a weekday from Philadelphia to Boston, your scheduled departure and arrival times would be 9:08 a.m. and 3:28 p.m. The corresponding times on Acela would be 6:37 and 11:44 a.m.

Another easy rail option is traveling between Seattle and Vancouver, British Columbia, also via Amtrak. Fewer trains are on this route, however, so if this interests you, make sure to get your tickets early. Trains departing Seattle at 8:30 a.m. and 6:15 p.m. daily will arrive in Vancouver at 12:30 and 10:15 p.m.

Longer rail journeys

Amtrak also offers cross-country trips, but those aren’t recommended unless you’d like the experience of spending a lot of time seeing beautiful parts of the country that are only visible from train windows. Also make sure to take into account that long-distance Amtrak trains often run hours late.

An option is the Southwest Chief, which would take you from Kansas City, Mo., to Los Angeles. It departs KC at 10:17 every night, arriving in LA two mornings later, at 7:57. Riding from Houston to Los Angeles on a Sunset Limited train could be done as well if being on it for more than 36 hours fits your itinerary.

Also, Silver Meteor and Silver Star trains transport passengers from Miami to both Philadelphia and New York in more than 26 hours.

Additionally, you could take Amtrak direct via its Coast Starlight trains that serve LA, the Bay Area and Seattle. Traveling from Los Angeles to San Jose would take 10 hours while a journey from LA to Seattle will last more than 30.

Another train option is taking the famous Via Rail-run Canadian between Toronto and Vancouver. However, note that this will take a large chunk of time from your World Cup itinerary as it requires more than four days of travel in each direction.

There are no train routes between the Mexican World Cup cities of Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara.

Bus travel

Greyhound’s the most known U.S. inter-city bus company, but the quality of its journeys, especially overnight excursions, can be lacking. FlixBus, which now owns Greyhound, provides nationwide coverage as well, mostly with shorter routes.

Megabus is another option. It offers service in the northern half of the USA and into Canada, but keep in mind that its routes are usually even shorter, rarely more than 10 hours.

Chinatown buses could be considered as well, especially for those traveling between Boston, New York and Philadelphia.

Various regional bus companies throughout the USA also provide service to numerous communities.

Note that there’s no direct bus route between Toronto and Vancouver.

However, there is quality and regular bus service that connects Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey. In fact, numerous bus companies serve those World Cup cities.

Flights

Of course, given the sheer size of North America and that most fans would prefer to focus less on traveling between World Cup cities and simply get to their next destination as fast as possible, flights will likely be the most used travel option.

Fortunately, air travel into and between these three countries is extensive, and several World Cup cities are even home to or near numerous major airports. For example, those flying to New York/New Jersey to attend games there can arrive at John F. Kennedy International Airport, LaGuardia Airport or Newark Liberty International Airport and be set.

If you’ll be taking advantage of World Cup transportation in the USA to fly from coast to coast, expect a several-hours trip. For example, flights from Boston to Los Angeles last almost seven hours. Meanwhile, NYC-to-Miami and LA-Seattle flights will be about three hours.

Fans wanting to minimize the time necessary to travel between Toronto and Vancouver can fly from the former to the latter in five hours. Also note that a flight from Toronto to Mexico City will take about that amount of time as well.

A partial list of the major airlines that’ll serve as the backbone of World Cup transportation in the USA, Canada and Mexico this summer includes:

• Aeromexico
• Air Canada
• Alaska Airlines
• American Airlines
• Delta Air Lines
• Flair Airlines
• Frontier Airlines
• JetBlue
• Southwest Airlines
• Spirit Airlines
• United Airlines
• Viva
• Volaris
• WestJet

Conclusion

The 2026 World Cup will be much more spread out than this event was four years ago. Then, it was held in the small country of Qatar, which is roughly the same size as Los Angeles County. However, there are several ways that you can travel between 2026 World Cup host cities with public transport, whether you want to go fast (e.g. fly) or would like to take a more leisurely pace (e.g. via a cross-country train trip).

Read more: FIFA World Cup – The Travel Distances Between World Cup Host Cities Across Canada, Mexico, and the United States

And, of course, keep in mind that while you’re traveling between cities, you can use Sofascore to keep you up to date on World Cup happenings, including scores, stats and news.