How to get to Latakia: flights, buses and the Kessab crossing

You cannot fly into Latakia today. The city’s airport passed to civilian management in August 2026, but no flight date has been announced, so everyone arrives by road. Buses from Damascus and Homs pull into the Pullman garage in the city centre. On the road from Aleppo, a closed stretch of the M4 motorway near Latakia changes the route. From Turkey, the Kessab crossing is open only to some passports. Fares and timetables are left out of this page; both changed in 2025 and 2026.

Can you fly to Latakia?

No. As of March 2026, Latakia International Airport was closed to civilian traffic and no airline flew from it. On 9 August 2026 the General Authority of Civil Aviation and Air Transport took over its management and said flights would follow once technical and operational work was complete. On 13 August a delegation from the authority met the Russian side at the airport to finish the handover. No date for a first flight has been given.

The nearest scheduled arrival is therefore Damascus or Aleppo, and the airlines page lists who flies there. Until 2024 the airport’s official name was Bassel al-Assad International Airport, and older maps still carry it.

By bus from Damascus and Homs

From Damascus the road follows the M5 motorway to Homs, turns west to Tartus, then runs north along the coastal motorway to Latakia. Damascus to Homs is about 160 kilometres, roughly two hours; Tartus to Latakia is close to 90 kilometres. Company buses arrive at the Pullman garage in the centre. From the garage it is 700 metres in a straight line to the Roman Arch and 1600 metres to the National Museum. If you are staying centrally, you can walk from the bus.

Tickets work as in other cities: buying at the garage the day before secures a seat on the first morning bus. Minibuses and shared taxis run the same route, and the intercity transport page explains how each works.

From Aleppo: the M4 closure and the old road

The shortest road from Aleppo to the coast is the M4 motorway. It leaves the M5 at Saraqib and descends to Latakia through Ariha and Jisr al-Shughur. In July 2025 a 6-kilometre section inside Latakia governorate closed for bridge repairs, and traffic moved to the old Aleppo–Latakia road. The transport minister visited the site on 20 January 2026, when at least a partial reopening was planned before the tourist season.

Whether that happened could not be confirmed when this page was written in September 2026. The practical answer is simple: before leaving Aleppo, ask the driver or the bus company which road they will take. The old road winds more, so allow extra time.

From Turkey through the Kessab crossing

The Yayladağı–Kessab crossing is the shortest way from Hatay to the Syrian coast. The mountain road from Kessab down to Latakia is close to sixty kilometres, an hour and a half by car. But the crossing is not open to everyone. Turkey–Syria land crossings take only Turkish citizens, Syrian citizens and dual nationals of the two countries; a Syrian visa in a third-country passport is not enough. The rules and the list of crossings are on the Turkey to Syria page.

For those who can use it, the crossing works: figures from Syria’s General Authority for Borders and Customs show 121,000 travellers passing through Kessab in the first half of 2026. In June 2026 Latakia hosted the first Syrian–Turkish tourism forum under the slogan “From Antakya to Latakia”, with TÜRSAB, the Turkish travel agents’ association, taking part. Its recommendations included studying a return of passenger services between Latakia and Antakya. So it is too early to rely on a regular service between the two cities; plan the ride to the crossing and the ride after it separately.

Is there a train?

No. Freight trains run on Syria’s rails today; passenger trains do not. The two daily Aleppo trains still listed in the English Wikipedia article on Latakia date from around 2005. The current picture is on the trains page.

Once you arrive

Service taxis and minibuses run inside the city. In November 2025 Latakia’s Passenger Transport Directorate cut fares on city and intercity service-taxi and minibus lines; after the fuel price rise of 13 September 2026, fares are changing again. That is why no figures appear here: agree the fare before you get in. Where to stay, and how the centre compares with the beach strip to the north, is on the where to stay in Latakia page; the city itself is on the Latakia page.