European Sleeper experience

BRX · 27 Jul 2026

MattSGB said:
I would argue that a last-minute notification of an early departure is potentially more disruptive than a late arrival.

I agree. And especially for anyone starting in the UK and connecting via a Eurostar service.

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rvdborgt · 27 Jul 2026

MattSGB said:
I appreciate ES running diversions rather than just cancelling services, but I would argue that a last-minute notification of an early departure is potentially more disruptive than a late arrival.

ÖBB also often have early departures from Brussels or Amsterdam during engineering works. With DB Infrago not having details about infrastructure availability until 3 weeks in advance (and sometimes less), late changes are inevitable.

FormerBritInMe · 27 Jul 2026

Those statistics are very interesting, thanks for posting them.

Personally delays wouldn't bother me so much on an overnight journey especially ones less than an hour. Maybe its because I'm used to Amtrak here where one is grateful if a long distance train arrives within a couple hours of the advertised. :rolleyes:

Cancellations and significant downgrades e.g. sleeper to couchette, or worse to a seat or rubber tired transport, would be more of an issue. I guess it is hard to get statistics on downgrades.

danshrimp · 27 Jul 2026

FormerBritInMe said:
Cancellations and significant downgrades e.g. sleeper to couchette, or worse to a seat or rubber tired transport, would be more of an issue. I guess it is hard to get statistics on downgrades.

Agreed. I'd be interested to know if downgrades have reduced by a significant amount since they switched from using the old AB30 sleepers to the ex-NJ AB33s on the Brussels-Prague route (in addition to Paris-Berlin). I certainly hope so. Personally I think a downgrade from a sleeper to a private couchette isn't the end of the world (granted that I prefer the private couchettes on ES in any case) but there have been many stories of downgrades to shared couchettes or even seats which is really not good.

Rumour has it the AB30s will reappear on the Brussels-Milan route when it starts in September though...

Krokodil · 27 Jul 2026

MattSGB said:
Of the many problems that I have encountered with European Sleeper, delays is not one of them. I got significantly delayed once, but it was understandable. However, I have had several instances of ES making very short-notice amendments to their timetable, including multiple instances of early departures, and at least one planned late arrival. I would assume that this kind of short-notice timetable change would help their punctuality stats, where perhaps other operators would just arrive delayed? I appreciate ES running diversions rather than just cancelling services, but I would argue that a last-minute notification of an early departure is potentially more disruptive than a late arrival.

That's not something unique to ES though. I took the sleeper from Stuttgart to Budapest (so one operated by a combination of national railway companies, the traditional way) a couple of years ago - or at least I tried to. It departed 20 minutes early without us. Also without a group of French women who were supposed to be on the Zagreb portion and god knows who from the Venice portion. We had to chase it on an ICE to Augsburg, then run under the subway to the relevant platform - with no hold arranged so that we could be sure of making it.

StephenHunter · 27 Jul 2026

danshrimp said:
Well that's one interpretation of the unreliability, and I'm not saying it's wrong. The other is that they're operating challenging routes (into France for example) that others are unwilling to operate, and are attempting to run their services in some form every day come hell or high water unlike others who will cancel at the drop of a hat. This makes for a messy operation, and perhaps it would have been best for their long term reputation if they took a more risk-averse approach, but it is a commendable commitment to providing a much-needed service.

The Berlin-Dresden-Prague section is also a challenging route due to the lack of an electrified diversion.

SephenWorceste · 28 Jul 2026

BRX said:
This website offers some statistics. The latest set they have covers 2025 so doesn't include the Berlin/Paris service but it does cover a year's worth of the Brussels/Prague one. You can only filter the data in certain ways, but perhaps a sort-of meaningful way to do a comparison is to look at trains that pass through Germany. After all, we know that Germany is currently a major source of delays, so we can look at how a number of operators do when trying to run long distance trains through the country.

You can order the results by Average delay, cancellation rate or punctuality. I think the first two are the most meaningful for night trains - as you say yourself, an expectation of the possibility of delays is part of night train travel.

Ordered by "Average delay" the worst service they list is EN 345 Stockholm-Berlin with an 84 minute average delay. It's followed by a couple of Nightjet services at around 60 minutes. You can choose to display 50 results per page. The top 50 results are mostly a mixture of NJ, ICE and IC and EC services. The average delays range from 84 to 37 minutes. Are the ES services in that top 50? No - in fact you have to go to page 6 of the 26 pages of results to find ES 452 Prague - Brussels with an average delay of 25 minutes and page 11 to find ES 453 Brussels - Prague with an everage delay of 20 minutes.

You might say that the most critical statistic is "cancellation rate" because of course cancellation of a night train usually causes you a much bigger problem than a delay does. You can order by cancellation rate too, and the worst performer is an ICE with 35.6%. ES 452 Prague-Brussels is on page 20 of 26 with a cancellation rate of 2.4% and ES 453 is on page 24 of 26 at 1.1%.

For the worse of those two, ES 452's cancellation rate means that if you travelled on it once every week, you could expect your train to be cancelled once a year.

You may say that comparing cancellation rates with day trains is a bit meaningless because of the magnitude of the consequences and I'd agree, so it is fairer to compare with other night trains. Here are all the night trains that are listed as passing through Germany:

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Train no. From To Average
delay (mins) Cancellation
rate (%) Punctuality
(%)
ES 452
Praha hl.n.
Bruxelles Midi
25.6 2.4 52.0
ES 453
Bruxelles Midi
Praha hl.n.
20.6 1.1 63.4

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*************

*************

*************

EN 346
Berlin Hbf
Stockholm Central
12.8 5.2 81.1
EN 345
Stockholm Central
Berlin Hbf
84.4 4.4 29.1
EN 13485 Stockholm Central Berlin 77.8 5.7 29.8

*************

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*************

*************

*************

EN 40459
Zürich HB
Praha hl.n.
37.8 1.7 48.5
EN 40458
Praha hl.n.
Zürich HB
36.3 0.9 55.2
EN 40476
Budapest-Nyugati
Berlin Hbf
19.2 1.8 58.3
EN 407
Warszawa Wschodnia
München Hbf
18.4 1.0 37.8
EN 414
Zagreb Glavni kolodvor
Stuttgart Hbf
16.2 0.4 68.5
EN 40457
Berlin Hbf
Budapest-Nyugati
14.7 1.8 70.7
EN 40237
Stuttgart Hbf
Zagreb Glavni kolodvor
11.8 3.1 78.4
EN 406
München Hbf
Warszawa Wschodnia
6.9 1.2 79.9

*************

******************

******************

*************

*************

*************

EN 50462
Budapest-Keleti
Stuttgart Hbf
16.2 0.4 67.1
EN 50237
Stuttgart Hbf
Budapest-Keleti
11.4 2.1 79.8

*************

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******************

*************

*************

*************

NJ 40424
Berlin Ostbahnhof
Paris Est
26.1 9.4 55.4
NJ 479
Bruxelles Midi
Mannheim Hbf
30.2 7.4 38.6
NJ 424
Berlin Ostbahnhof
Bruxelles Midi
31.6 6.7 55.0
NJ 40425
Bruxelles Midi
Wien Hbf
42.5 6.0 40.8
NJ 40469
Paris Est
Berlin Hbf
27.4 5.9 55.2
NJ 425
Bruxelles Midi
Berlin Hbf
41.8 5.9 44.8
NJ 468
Wien Hbf
Paris Est
28.6 5.2 36.3
NJ 40468
Wien Hbf
Bruxelles Midi
38.8 5.0 47.7
NJ 402
Zürich HB
Amsterdam Centraal
23.8 4.8 56.9
NJ 478
Mannheim Hbf
Bruxelles Midi
26.4 4.5 41.9
NJ 403
Amsterdam Centraal
Zürich HB
42.8 3.6 33.8
NJ 421
Amsterdam Centraal
Innsbruck Hbf
51.7 3.0 38.4
NJ 40421
Amsterdam Centraal
Wien Hbf
54.8 2.9 31.1
NJ 40295
München Hbf
Milano Lambrate
7.3 2.6 76.3
NJ 40490
Wien Hbf
Amsterdam Centraal
62.9 2.5 20.3
NJ 295
München Hbf
Roma Tiburtina
8.8 2.2 75.9
NJ 40491
Hamburg-Altona
Innsbruck Hbf
45.8 2.1 60.7
NJ 237
Stuttgart Hbf
Venezia Santa Lucia
12.3 2.1 75.6
NJ 470
Zürich HB
Hamburg-Altona
28.9 2.1 43.9
NJ 471
Hamburg-Altona
Zürich HB
26.6 2.0 63.4
NJ 469
Paris Est
Wien Hbf
36.4 1.9 33.3
NJ 408
Berlin Hbf
Zürich HB
32.5 1.7 61.3
NJ 420
Innsbruck Hbf
Amsterdam Centraal
64.0 1.7 25.0
NJ 409
Zürich HB
Berlin Hbf
39.3 1.6 46.8
NJ 491
Hamburg-Altona
Wien Hbf
54.2 1.4 55.7
NJ 490
Wien Hbf
Hamburg-Altona
51.6 0.9 46.8
NJ 40420
Innsbruck Hbf
Hamburg-Altona
52.5 0.9 47.7
NJ 456
Graz Hbf
Berlin Hbf
20.5 0.8 56.7
NJ 236
Venezia Santa Lucia
Stuttgart Hbf
32.4 0.8 34.1
NJ 457
Berlin Hbf
Graz Hbf
15.1 0.8 70.1
NJ 294
Roma Tiburtina
München Hbf
24.5 0.7 56.1
NJ 40235
Milano Lambrate
München Hbf
28.5 0.0 55.9

I don't think you can look at these figures and say that compared to other night train services, European Sleeper is some kind of major outlier when it comes either to delays or cancellations. In fact I'd say they compare pretty favourably and appear to be better than average.

I don't know anything about how these data are collected or how reliable they are. And there may well be ways in which things are reported that distorts reality in some ways but this appears to be the best there is in terms of objective numbers. I think I'd pay much more attention to this than to a general feeling from social media or youtube trip reports.

A couple of years ago I did something similar on the Caledonian Sleeper thread, comparing the sleeper to Inverness with flights, looking at delay and cancellation rates. Because so much more attention is given to problems with the sleeper than the airlines, it would be easy to get the impression the sleeper was terribly unreliable. But the real world statistics didn't seem to bear this out at all - it was no worse than the flights and if I remember correctly actually a bit better. And it looks to me like the same is probably true here - because of the nature of the operation ES gets a lot of attention and what gets published (including in reviews) is heavily biased towards the times when things go wrong.

Perhaps next year we'll be able to look at a similar set of numbers that includes the Paris/Berlin ES services.

Thank you for putting these statistics together. It is appreciated. I am away at the moment so I will look more when I have my big screen. I understand that sleepers often run across boarders, on different railway systems, at times of the day when support is limited and maintenance work may be being done. All this adds to the complexity and difficulties for all operators.

Thank you again.

Best wishes, Stephen.

BRX · 29 Jul 2026

SephenWorceste said:
Thank you for putting these statistics together. It is appreciated. I am away at the moment so I will look more when I have my big screen. I understand that sleepers often run across boarders, on different railway systems, at times of the day when support is limited and maintenance work may be being done. All this adds to the complexity and difficulties for all operators.

Thank you again.

Best wishes, Stephen.

From your previous posts it sounded like you have a fair bit of experience travelling on night trains so understand they are always at higher risk of delay. I think it would be a shame if you didn't give ES a go, if it was based on a distorted picture of how unreliable they are. For sure, there's a risk of things going wrong but I don't believe they are really dramatically worse than other operators. I think you get the best value out of ES if you find a cheap fare and don't have expectations of a luxury experience. If like me you enjoyed night trains in the days when couchettes were the standard way to travel across europe, you'll probably love it. If you're a twenty-something social media influencer unaccustomed to this way of travelling, then it might be different...

SephenWorceste · 30 Jul 2026

BRX said:
From your previous posts it sounded like you have a fair bit of experience travelling on night trains so understand they are always at higher risk of delay. I think it would be a shame if you didn't give ES a go, if it was based on a distorted picture of how unreliable they are. For sure, there's a risk of things going wrong but I don't believe they are really dramatically worse than other operators. I think you get the best value out of ES if you find a cheap fare and don't have expectations of a luxury experience. If like me you enjoyed night trains in the days when couchettes were the standard way to travel across europe, you'll probably love it. If you're a twenty-something social media influencer unaccustomed to this way of travelling, then it might be different...

Thank you for your perspective. I do not mind delays as I rarely book another train after my sleeper. Cancellations, incomplete journeys and changes of accommodation are more my concern.

Definitely not a twenty something social media influencer. I have enjoyed a few sleepers. As you say not luxury. They are cost effective and save time. Travel overnight compared to hotel, travel during the day, hotel. There is also something wonderful about sleeping and eating on the move. I do not fly so travel to me means trains and ships.

I enjoy all train travel. Though today is getting a bit tiring. Thirteen hours from hotel to hotel. London to Hamburg. With delays and diversions about ten hours of actual train travel. Not as long hopefully tomorrow only on to Malmo. Already been extended for time by about an hour so who knows.

riceuten · 8 Aug 2026

The adverts on youtube (and possibly also linear TV) for ES are very interesting - look nothing like the actual stock - probably not a bad thing...

jpl · 9 Aug 2026

riceuten said:
The adverts on youtube (and possibly also linear TV) for ES are very interesting - look nothing like the actual stock - probably not a bad thing...

AI generated content should be marked by now as new regulations require.

BRX · 9 Aug 2026

riceuten said:
The adverts on youtube (and possibly also linear TV) for ES are very interesting - look nothing like the actual stock - probably not a bad thing...

That's certainly in danger of setting some very wrong expectations.

AlterEgo · 9 Aug 2026

jpl said:
AI generated content should be marked by now as new regulations require.

We're in big trouble when people can't tell that is not a video made by GenAI.

Jealgu · 9 Aug 2026

The carriages being fake does not necessarily mean it is ai generated, in the pre I world video editing already existed.

riceuten · 9 Aug 2026

jpl said:
AI generated content should be marked by now as new regulations require.

It's obviously AI generated as the trains actually running and the carriages look spacious and well maintained

Gag Halfrunt · 9 Aug 2026

Nobody is saying that it is a real train. The question is whether it is AI or traditional computer graphics.

StephenHunter · 10 Aug 2026

Gag Halfrunt said:
Nobody is saying that it is a real train. The question is whether it is AI or traditional computer graphics.

No-one complains about unrealistic airline adverts though.

riceuten · 10 Aug 2026

StephenHunter said:
No-one complains about unrealistic airline adverts though.

To be honest, I've not seen any recently. Even the LNER ones accord to the usual train experience.

Krokodil · 10 Aug 2026

StephenHunter said:
No-one complains about unrealistic airline adverts though.

Or car adverts showing empty streets and clear roads

Amalie · 10 Aug 2026

StephenHunter said:
No-one complains about unrealistic airline adverts though.

I do think this advertisement is in some ways more misleading than those airline adverts. It’s common knowledge how an economy seat resembles and functions in real life.

A night train however is more novel and less common. I don’t think it would benefit European Sleeper to suggest themselves to be anything more than they are. And these fictional rooms seem to suggest themselves to be even more spacious than their most luxurious (actual) offerings. Not to mention that you’d most likely not be getting your own room in the first place.

The exile · 10 Aug 2026

StephenHunter said:
The Berlin-Dresden-Prague section is also a challenging route due to the lack of an electrified diversion.

Well - the Dresden - Decin bit at least. There are alternatives for the rest, I think.

BRX · 10 Aug 2026

Good luck to anyone who books themselves & their bike onboard, and tries to wheel it down the corridor to do a spot of maintenence in their couchette compartment.

StephenHunter · 10 Aug 2026

riceuten said:
To be honest, I've not seen any recently. Even the LNER ones accord to the usual train experience.

I can't say I've seen many dancing puppets on my commute.

riceuten · 11 Aug 2026

StephenHunter said:
I can't say I've seen many dancing puppets on my commute.

Works for me

gysev · 17 Aug 2026

Passengers on the Prague–Brussels train have no reason to complain about not getting enough sleep: the train that left Prague on August 16 didn’t depart from Dresden until 8:34 this morning, instead of 8:33 p.m. last night. The train wil terminate in Amsterdam.

D6130 · 17 Aug 2026

gysev said:
Passengers on the Prague–Brussels train have no reason to complain about not getting enough sleep: the train that left Prague on August 16 didn’t depart from Dresden until 8:34 this morning, instead of 8:33 p.m. last night. The train wil terminate in Amsterdam.

Do you know why?

gysev · 17 Aug 2026

I am not certain. It seems the locomotive had technical issues. Apparantly, due to the delay, the train remained in Dresden because by then the line was blocked by a work posession.

rvdborgt · 17 Aug 2026

They had to wait for a replacement locomotive. The faulty one could reportedly only do 40 km/h in Germany.

Krokodil · 17 Aug 2026

rvdborgt said:
They had to wait for a replacement locomotive. The faulty one could reportedly only do 40 km/h in Germany.

Some equivalent of AWS failure?

rvdborgt · 17 Aug 2026

Krokodil said:
Some equivalent of AWS failure?

I suspect so.

European Sleeper experience

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