5 New European Sleeper Trains To Ride This Summer

There was a time decades ago when overnight trains crisscrossed the European continent. Those were the glamourous days of rail travel, celebrated in thrillers like Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express and Graham Greene’s Stamboul Train. Alas, those night trains gradually fell out of favor as low-cost airlines like Ryanair and easyJet proliferated, doing short work of connecting European cities.

Fast forward to 2023, and the good news for those who love rail travel is that sleeper trains have not only returned, thanks to partnerships between national and private rail companies. They’re proliferating, with new trains and routes that have just started or are in the planning stages. Once considered unnecessary and outdated, overnight trains are now seen as intelligent, sensible, and even essential to combat pollution from air travel around the crowded skies of the continent.

Green travel considerations aside, one of the best reasons to take a city-to-city night train trip is that it allows you to travel efficiently from the center of one city to the center of another. There are no airport transfers, no need to arrive at an airport many hours ahead of time, and none of the all-too-typical airport delays. One more financial benefit: when you’re tucked into your sleeper berth, you’re not paying for a hotel room for that night. Here are five new sleeper trains to take in Europe this summer.

Good Night Train Sleeper: Brussels to Berlin

The Good Night Train from European Sleeper was initially scheduled to start service in 2022, and delays ensued, but now May 25, 2023, is their firm launch date. This overnight route will run from Brussels to Berlin, with stops in Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Better yet, the new train service is scheduled to connect to Eurostar in Amsterdam, enabling travelers to travel from London to connect to this train to Berlin. The Good Night Train service will extend to Dresden and Prague in 2024. The company has further ambitions to link Amsterdam and Barcelona by night train sometime in 2025.

NightJet: Germany to Croatia

Austrian Federal Railways has been the leader in establishing new routes and reestablishing classic routes that had been discontinued. Starting in the German city of Stuttgart, this new NightJet service travels through Austria, Hungary, Slovenia, Italy, and Croatia, with stops at Vienna, Budapest, Venice, Ljubljana, and finally, Zagreb.

Canopus: Czech Republic to Switzerland

Czech national rail operator ČD is restoring a sleeper route from the Czech Republic to Switzerland, with stops in Germany along the way. The new CD Night route, named Canopus after its previous incarnation, connects the heart of Central Europe. The train will speed from Prague to Zurich, with stops in Dresden, Leipzig, Frankfurt am Main and Leipzig.

NightJet: Germany to Italy

NightJet has another service for those seeking to link Germany and Italy. There are two departure points for this new sleeper train. You can leave from either Vienna or Munich, and the two trains connect at the border with Italy. Then you travel through the night into Milan, Verona, and Genoa and end at La Spezia on the Ligurian coast of Italy, not far from Cinque Terre.

SJ EuroNight: Stockholm to Hamburg

The SJ EuroNight started service in late 2022 with a daily, year-round sleeper train service from the Swedish capital of Stockholm, with multiple stops down to Malmö, before crossing to the Danish cities of Copenhagen and Odense. It arrives the following day in the German port city of Hamburg. The train runs on 100% renewable energy, and SJ will inaugurate an extended service to Berlin this summer.