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I'm looking at a Turkish Airlines booking from London to Jakarta. I see a one-night stopover in Istanbul, the Istanbul to Jakarta leg leaving at 01:50. So I arrive Monday, get a hotel for the night, have Tuesday in the city and then have to get back to the airport for the 01:50 Wednesday flight.

I'm wondering about the practicalities of taking that late night/early morning flight.

My concerns come from taking late night flights from other aiports. My experiences were not fun - few food outlets open, sparse publc transport to get me to the airport, some lounges not open.

What's the situation in Istanbul? My guess is that as there are quite a few flights heading in that direction at that time Istanbul aiport might be a lot better that my experience elsewhere.

What have folks who have done this found? How did you get to the airport?

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    How long is the layover that you're concerned about public transport? Generally, you'd arrive London-Istanbul, then hang out at the airport until you depart Istanbul-Jakarta. Food & nap locations are reasonable considerations, but the public transport is baffling to me...
    – FreeMan
    Commented Feb 28 at 15:09
  • @FreeMan I'm using the Turkish Air stopover facility so spending an extra night in Istanbul, hence heading from City to airport for a 01:50 flight.
    – djna
    Commented Feb 29 at 16:07
  • You may want to edit that into the question itself, as this isn't particularly obvious to those who aren't familiar and are confused by this...
    – FreeMan
    Commented Feb 29 at 16:15

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I took a Turkish Airlines flight that departed from Istanbul to South-East Asia past 1 AM last year. It was fine: it's a large, busy airport that's open 24 hours and has many flights in the middle of the night, and while some places obviously close, there's plenty of food and shopping options. The rather epic Turkish lounge was open as well and had a range of food and drinks, although some of the dining stalls (fresh pide etc) were closed.

Since there were four of us with luggage, we took a fixed-fare taxi arranged by our hotel to the airport, but if you're traveling solo, metro line 11 also operates until midnight.

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    Thanks, that's encouraging.
    – djna
    Commented Feb 27 at 11:36
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    Yeah, Istanbul is the gateway to half of the world, for the other half of the world. (And vice versa.) It caters to all time zones. Doha and Dubai are similar.
    – Sneftel
    Commented Feb 27 at 13:30
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    @djna Please click the check mark if this answered your question!
    – lambshaanxy
    Commented Feb 27 at 22:23
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    @lambshaanxy I always like to see whether other answers arrive before selecting a "winner" ;-)
    – djna
    Commented Feb 28 at 10:40

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