Ferries from Athens to Santorini: Piraeus vs Rafina, Blue Star vs SeaJets, and How Tickets Actually Work

Most people who travel from Athens by ferry to Santorini will leave from the Piraeus port. All ferries along this route arrive at the same dock on Santorini, which is called Athinios Port. The main aspect to consider when choosing a ferry is which boat you want to take. In order to determine which boat is best, you should first look at the schedule for the date of your trip and compare how long each type of boat takes to complete its journey from Athens to Santorini. For example, Ferryhopper’s route timetable lists a 5-hour high-speed ferry and a 7-hour 45-minute standard ferry that both departed from Athens on the same morning (September 21, 2026), as well as two other afternoon departures that had a difference of only 10 minutes in their crossing times.

When making your choice about a ferry, you should be aware of other factors that might affect your experience. For example, a large conventional ferry is less likely to tip when winds blow against its side compared to a high-speed ferry. Additionally, you can stand up and go outside on the deck when taking a large conventional ferry, whereas you are expected to remain in your assigned seat for the duration of your trip when riding on a high-speed ferry. Also, the high-speed ferries are usually the first services affected by rough weather conditions in the Aegean Sea. Lastly, in addition to the fact that many ferry lines require payment before you receive confirmation of your booking, once you have received this confirmation via email, you will need to print your boarding pass before boarding the ferry. So, before comparing prices, it may be beneficial to have a basic understanding of the various port locations listed on the booking website.

What the Athens–Santorini Ferry Route Actually Includes

The search results for this crossing will produce 4 to 5 different names. One search engine may list the endpoint as “Santorini,” while a second search engine will list it as “Thira,” a third may list it as “Athinios (new),” or “new port.” All of these names refer to the same working ferry terminal located on the southwestern coast of the island, as all passenger ferries that operate from the mainland dock there. In addition, Santorini’s second port (the Old Port below Fira) is exclusively used for cruise tenders and excursion boats. Also, none of the information listed on this page is a constant as it will be based on information that was gathered on September 20th, 2026. All the prices, schedules, and bus times will change by either the ferry operators or Santorini’s own bus operator at any given time, so the only place to find accurate sailing information will be on the website of the operator you are using for your trip.

From Athens you can choose between two different ports to travel to Santorini, but that is the only place where you have the option of taking one route or the other. The Port of Piraeus operates year-round, so it handles the vast majority of all sailings to Santorini, while the Port of Rafina offers seasonal fast ferries to Santorini only during certain parts of the year. What difference it makes to you will depend entirely upon where you begin your travel day, which will be covered in the next section of this article.

Why does one route have no single crossing time?

The Athens-Santorini ferry does not exist in a traditional sense, as you can find ferry booking engines that do not have a distinction of ferry companies. While Direct Ferries lists three different companies that operate ferry routes from Athens to Santorini, the listed crossing times fluctuate from approximately five hours and thirty-five minutes to ten hours and thirty-five minutes. Direct Ferries makes it simple to see that you will not sail for an average of six and one-half hours.

The time to sail between Athens and Santorini varies because two separate items determine the time. The hull class establishes the minimum crossing time, because high-speed vessels cross in close to five hours, and large conventional vessels do not. In addition, the hull class does not establish a maximum crossing time, because the number of Cycladic islands that are included on the route affects the actual time it takes to cross to Santorini. With more stops, there are additional opportunities for delay, and as the port and route information provided by Santorini Dave demonstrates, the stops each operator makes will impact the overall crossing time significantly. For example, on September 21, 2026, Direct Ferries lists two separate blue star operators with scheduled departures from Athens to Santorini on the same date; one blue star was scheduled to take seven hours and forty-five minutes and the other was scheduled to take six hours and twenty minutes.

The logic behind the money works the same way. A deck seat on a conventional slow ferry and a business seat on a high-speed ferry are two completely different products that are priced differently, so any single price quoted for this specific crossing is for either a deck seat on a slow ferry or a business seat on a high-speed ferry.

To determine if taking a ferry from Athens to Santorini offers the best option, you must first understand that if maximising your time is of the utmost importance, you will find the flight to be the fastest mode of transportation as it takes less than one hour to fly to Santorini. If time is not your highest priority, then you may be better off taking the ferry; it will take longer in actual air travel time, but there are many advantages you have when riding the ferry as opposed to flying. Some of these advantages are that the ferry departs from Piraeus which is closer to central Athens than the airport is, you do not have to check in your baggage on the ferry as you will carry your own onto the ferry with you, and you are able to view the caldera from open deck space on the ferry (which you cannot do when you arrive at Santorini the traditional way of taking a flight). If you plan to stay on Santorini for two nights and arrive in Athens in the afternoon, taking a flight will be the best option. If you have a free day on Santorini and have actual luggage with you, then the ferry becomes a viable option, because it no longer feels as if you are taking the longer route.

What is being purchased is a sea crossing service that goes to one port sold by multiple companies (which operate ships of different speeds), and there are many ships that carry passengers to different destinations. When researching the ferry options, consider each result you see as containing three facts instead of simply one price: Where are you going to depart from in Athens? How will long will this specific sail take? What class of vessel is this particular ferry? You may figure out the first fact before you ever look at a timetable.

Piraeus or Rafina: Which Departure Port Fits Your Day

The destination for the third stop is clearly Piraeus, which is not coincidentally very far. It happens that there is a third port option for this crossing, although one that is considerably more remote than people are often led to believe by Amsterdam ferry schedule guides; and furthermore, although it is a much more remote port than most ferry schedule guides let you think, there is an additional reason it is much further away.

Almost every other source tells you that Rafina is the port to fly into Athens. Rafina is located on the same side of the Attica peninsula and therefore provides easy access to the city with a short drive across the peninsula. This makes sense for general guidance on making ferry routes to Mykonos, Tinos and Andros as this is the primary route to reach these islands from the mainland. However, this is not true for Santorini; this assumption does not apply to Santorini because the times of operation for Rafina are not actually compatible with those for Santorini. On the Rafina to Santorini page from Direct Ferries, as of 20 September 2026, the ferry service only had one sail, which was scheduled to be operated by Golden Star Ferries at 07:20 and listed as both the first sailing and the last sailing of the day. This sailing will run approximately six times a week and is expressly subject to seasonal variation.

The exception will be closed if the flight arrival time is compared to the ferry’s time of departure. If you are in Rafina and want to take a ferry at 07:20, you will need to have already arrived at Rafina, as the airport metro does not start until around 06:30, and the ferry service from Rafina operates only during peak travel time. If you arrive at the airport in the afternoon, there is no ferry sailing back to Santorini until the next day. Conversely, there are approximately 29 sailings per week on ferries from Piraeus to Santorini, operated by three different companies, between 07:00 and early evening. Therefore, the frequency of ferry service is key; having only one ferry per day from a port offers you limited options, while having up to four ferries per day provides travellers with greater flexibility.

How long does it actually take to reach Piraeus?

Getting from Athens to Piraeus takes a relatively short amount of time, with the metro growing from Syntagma to Piraeus in approximately 22-25 minutes, with Monastiraki to Piraeus taking about 20-25 minutes using either Line 1 or Line 3 (Santorini Dave’s updated statistic as of August 2026). You can also take a taxi to Piraeus, which can take between 25 to 50 minutes depending on traffic. The time difference, rather than the average, is what needs to be considered for planning purposes.

When you arrive at the airport, everything will likely change (such as transit time). According to an airport guide, Metro Line 3 takes approximately 60 minutes from the airport to Piraeus (€9), runs an airport train every 30 minutes, and has services approximately between 06:30-23:30, while the airport service will take 60-90 minutes (€5.50) and operates around the clock. Taxis take between 40-75 minutes and are between €55-€75, with no fixed fare on this route as the fixed airport fare only covers the central ring.

These numbers may seem easy. The majority of people will not be able to calculate the time buffer they have on top of these numbers. In an r/GreeceTravel thread about a year before I checked this, a person who landed at 06:00 and had a ferry leaving from Piraeus at 09:15, received many suggestions from commenters telling him that it would not be advisable for him to take a taxi into the morning rush. The person eventually changed to a later ferry instead, left the airport around 07:15 and used Metro Line 3 to reach Piraeus by 08:30. They later stated that they could have caught the earlier ferry – “We were just lucky that everything worked out for us.” The rationale behind this is simple. The train takes a set amount of time to reach its destination and runs every thirty minutes after that. Missing a train means that you will lose a half-hour but if you travel on the same road at peak hours, you could potentially lose up to two hours.

The weight of the final decision is less than what appears at first glance. On the night before your departure from Athens, do you sleep in Athens? If so, start your schedule search with Piraeus and stop agonizing over what to do. If you want to arrive by air and leave by ferry the same day, you should search your scheduled departure date from Rafina before making any other arrangements; if nothing comes up in the search results, or your only result is a ferry that leaves around breakfast time, that’s your answer — and plan to get to Piraeus early enough for a comfortable connection. Either way, it has been established that you are going to Piraeus, but it has not yet been established which ship you are going to take.

Blue Star vs SeaJets: Conventional, High-Speed, and When Slower Wins

Three companies provide services on the Piraeus crossing, each providing a distinct product. One company sells time back to its customers; one company provides customers with a chance to explore the ship; and one offers the lowest fare and is the most time-consuming way to cross the water. The challenge is determining what you need based on the date of travel since the difference in sailing options can change before each departure.

The following comparison illustrates how these three companies compare based on the Piraeus-Santorini routes, as of September 20, 2026. The sailing times and starting fares shown are taken from the available schedules for each route during the months of September, October, November, and December 2026.

Listen carefully to the first two rows, together, and the average fare for SeaJets disappears completely into thin air. The cost is just shy of the ticket cost (again), and what does it buy you on a good day – about an hour and a half – it was on a very bad day just like the pair at ten minutes in the introduction; that is a clean option for a Short Trip to Santorini, where every second of the sun is a factor in your stay. On the contrary, if you were buying the word “fast”, it is not a good option. The third row is the best budget alternative and actually a cautionary option for the traveller: a Fast Ferries option is not that far over Blue Star and can arrival at Athinios near midnight. It is important to note that although the company lists Fast Ferries on its own site, there are many search engines that list these identical sailings under Cyclades Fast Ferries and the best way to check is check the ship name instead of the brand if you are comparing two options.

Why the same crossing feels different to two people

The size of the hull can change the likelihood of a rough trip, but it does not determine whether or not the trip will be uncomfortable. Large conventional vessels are built much deeper and therefore will tend to roll slower than high-speed catamarans (for that reason, motion-sensitive passengers are often advised to take the largest ferry available). On the same r/GreeceTravel discussion where this message is posted, a message from four weeks ago states “I just spent four hours vomiting from Athens to Naxos on SeaJets.”

Don’t put all your faith in any blanket statement. I know a traveler who is, by his own admission, very susceptible to seasickness, yet he took a large SeaJets ship on this exact route without any problems at all. On the other hand, I know a traveler who stated that he “felt way more sick on the big, slow ferry than he did on the small fast ferry.” What do all of these accounts have in common? They do not have anything in common in regard to the travel company. They do, however, share similarities in relation to the actual sea state on the day they were sailing and the specific size (length) of the hull that they were on. This is the reason why the SeaJets’ fleet is made up of a variety of different types of boats and why simply booking a “high-speed” ferry tells you little about how that particular boat will ride. Therefore, if this is important to you, the best way to determine how a boat will ride is to search for the specific boat name in your search results, rather than just searching by the company operator, and always book the longest (largest) boat available. A decision about whether or not to take medication for motion sickness is best left to a pharmacist or your physician, and not addressed in a travel guide.

Unfavorable weather, such as strong winds, can cause discomfort, but it can also affect whether a particular boat will sail on any given day. That will be discussed later regarding when to book a trip and how it may affect you months before you sail. Regardless of where you sit on any given day, strong winds will affect whether you have a smooth sailing or a more difficult experience.

Which seat you are actually buying

Unlike upgrades, fare classes on a conventional ferry are completely different experiences. An economy deck ticket allows the user to sit anywhere there is a spot available–indoor or outdoor–and provides access to the entire ferry. A numbered airplane-style seat has an allocation made in the customer’s name with luggage storage accessed from the front of the vehicle. Business-class and VIP-class fare customers have access to a private lounge on the upper deck with its own bar. The types of fares available are explained in Go-Ferry’s Blue Star guide and are responsible for the difference in price for a reserved seat on this route and for a reserved seat on a shorter route. Six hours spent in an unreserved lounge in August offers a totally different day than did six hours spent sitting in a seat reserved for your name.

Cabins can be reserved easily and for the wrong reasons. It is simple to justify paying the cost of a cabin for a long ferry journey that occurs overnight or at a time when the passenger will be very tired and will arrive at the destination late at night. A customer who purchases a cabin at the time of an early departure (07:25) will usually have purchased a room that he will not use. In addition to a cabin not being available on a high-speed ferry travelling from Athens to Santorini, the trade-off for that ferry is an assigned seat that is in an enclosed area for the duration of the trip, no access to the deck of the ferry, and the view of the caldera from the window.

The decision is really two parts. The first part is to determine whether or not the potential time savings on your chosen day justify the additional cost incurred by booking on that date as opposed to other dates. The second part is to determine whether or not you would be willing to sit outside for the final 30 minutes before boarding (if applicable). Once you have a date in mind based on the above two considerations, the next step is to resolve the actual issue that keeps passengers from boarding – how do I take the payment made and turn it into something the crew will be able to scan?

How Athens–Santorini Ferry Tickets and Boarding Passes Actually Work

The payment made for a crossing with a crewmember does not provide the item as outlined in the scanned information. What one receives when making a payment is the ability to make a reservation (or a booking) to be taken on board the vessel during the scheduled journey and to pay for that journey (or “fare”). When using a Greek operator for travel on this route, the email received immediately following the option selected is not a valid boarding pass or (the same as) the “eTicket.” The ticket that you present to the attendant for boarding is sent to you (the traveller) at a later date, from the ferry company itself, within two days of your scheduled journey. Ferryhopper’s help pages say it about as plainly as a booking site can: the confirmation email “is not your e-ticket.”

That window is the single most useful thing to know about this route. Blue Star states that its web check-in runs from 48 hours up to 2 hours before scheduled departure. SeaJets publishes the same window on its own check-in site. Fast Ferries runs a check-in page on the same pattern. All three were checked on 20 September 2026, and the convergence is genuinely useful: one rule covers whichever boat you settled on in the last section.

The process for filling out a reservation on a company’s website differs between different companies. For example, Blue Star requires inputting a Reservation Number and an Access Code to get your reservation. SeaJets and Fast Ferries require the Booking Reference, as well as either the Passenger’s Surname or the Phone Number, when you fill out their Reservation form. Be sure to locate the above information in your Booking Confirmation Email prior to your check-in window opening; finding it at the port can be difficult if you’ve made an input error (correcting an error due to incorrectly entering your email address when booking).

What you are actually holding at the ramp

Regardless of which provider you use, you will ultimately receive a Boarding Pass containing a QR Code. However, this is where the confusion begins. SeaJets calls their document “e-Ticket” in some areas of their site and “Boarding Pass” in others. A respondent on the TripAdvisor Cyclades Forum went through the process and experienced the same confusion when he was not able to access his Check-in page until after his Check-in Window opened. Eventually, he concluded that “the e-Ticket that Seajets refers to is actually the Boarding Pass.” In other words, while they refer to the document in different ways, they are still one and the same. Therefore, if your provider has provided a Boarding Pass or e-Ticket option, you have not missed anything.

SeaJets offers both emailed and mobile boarding pass formats for successfully checking into flights, and Fast Ferries offers the option to simply show ticket information on the phone. However, a practical improvement came in the form of a suggestion to take a screenshot of the QR code after enlarging it on your phone so that it can be easily accessed from your photo gallery instead of digging through the email attachments to find it while standing in line. You should always bring your ID as well, as Fast Ferries requires an ID or passport to be presented at all times, and this is part of an operator requirement, not a border control related to the route from Piraeus to Santorini since it is still within the same country.

Two scenarios should be taken into consideration and planned for. Checking-in but not receiving your boarding pass due to incorrect email addresses, spam filters or companies only allowing one-time check-ins is straightforward: Ferryhopper’s policy states that if you do not collect a printed copy of your boarding pass or you will not be allowed on the ferry. The same fallback applies to not checking-in within two hours before the ferry departure cutoff time. Each ferry company has ticket office locations at their departing ports specifically for this reason, and according to a Destination Expert on Tripadvisor, pre-purchasing printed tickets is typically charged an extra fee of €1-2. This will add only a small amount of money to the overall cost of the trip, but waiting in line in August costs much more real money than this additional fee.

The same mechanics of reservation, followed by check-in, hold true on the way home via Ferry between Athens and Santorini. One clear difference is that the ferry terminal at Athinios has significantly less ticket desks than the one in Piraeus, resulting in gets very busy at times when there are multiple departures within a short period of time. If you have already checked in from your hotel the night before, then you have eliminated this issue, and the only remaining thing preventing you from boarding is locating the correct area to board a ferries. Since these ferry terminals resemble small cities, it may take some time to find the correct area, but with your pass on your phone, you will have all the necessary information to do so.

Getting to the Port, Finding Your Gate, and Boarding

You must arrive at Piraeus port at least 45 minutes to 1 hour before your ferry leaves, and you should be aware of why you need this amount of time. No security checks and no check-in baggage (no “airport-style” queues). You will need this time to walk to the correct gate. The port of Piraeus is a busy commercial port and has been set up for ferry boats, with a long quay that stretches for several miles, so if you arrive at the wrong end of the port when your ferry is leaving, it will most likely be too late to catch it. If you are returning to a ferry you have taken in the past, a half-hour is usually sufficient time; however, if it is your first time, you should give yourself an hour (see Santorini Dave‘s website for the most up-to-date port guide).

Why “the Santorini gate” is the wrong thing to search for

Vessels (ferries) have specific berths that are assigned to them by company, not by destination. Guides and travel agents commonly mislead passengers when listing berth locations as they assume that all ferries for a specific destination leave from the same berth. For instance, as of 20 September 2026, Blue Star Ferries has two different departure points from Piraeus for its Santorini sailings (from different ends of the quay). Blue Star Chios departs from Gate E1 at the entrance to the port, while Blue Star Naxos and Blue Star Delos depart for Paros, Naxos, Ios, and Santorini from Gates E6 and E7. All sailings are operated by Blue Star Ferries, one company, but on opposite ends of the quay, you have (theoretically) the same destination. (Piraeus port map)

While the guidebook can get you started, you will see nearly all other sources will refer to the same fixed gate for Santorini; typically, this is E9. In contrast, Blue Star’s own map shows that E9 is the location where its Aero high-speed boats actually leave the port for other destinations in the Saronic Gulf (Aegina, Poros, Hydra and Spetses). The fact that some guidebooks refer to just one gate to represent Santorini, and use photos of one operator’s berth on one day to classify this gate, is misleading. You should also keep in mind that your e-ticket is the only accurate source of information regarding your departure from Santorini; your e-ticket will provide you with the specific departure information about your sailing when issued by the check-in desk and confirmed by the electronic boards located at the port if for any reason you have to change ships, which occurs most frequently during high-season.

Getting from the metro to the right quay

The main area of the Piraeus train station is directly across from the main entrance to the port at E5 and E6. You can access this area via the pedestrian overpass (which has elevators on either side). The distance between the entrances at E5 and E6 is very short; most people are able to walk between these two locations quite easily; although E9 and E10 are somewhat more distant, people are still usually able to walk. However, the distance between E1, E2 and E3 is so far that a person has a very difficult time trying to carry their luggage while walking to these gates. In addition, the port has a free shuttle to transport people who have trouble walking around the port. Taxis are also permitted to enter the port and drop passengers close to where their ships are docked, which is a very good option for anyone who is travelling with large amounts of luggage, young children or connecting with another ship.

Boarding procedures for vehicle/hybrid ferry vessels generally have a very low level of ceremony attached to them. You simply walk up the vehicle ramp at the stern alongside all the cars and lorries, have your QR code scanned by one of the crew members, and you are then onboard. As you enter the garage section, you should put your wheeled luggage onto one of the racks located directly inside the garage entrance instead of at your designated seat as this is the standard method of storing wheeled luggage, and it prevents you from having to carry it up several levels of stairs (note that anything you want to take with you on the journey and all your valuables must be taken with you when you board, as the garage is completely inaccessible and locked after you’ve boarded). If you wish to know which ships will be operating at which ports prior to actually arriving at them, you can find that information on the Piraeus Port Authority’s website, which maintains an arrivals and departures board for the port.

One of the most important things to remember is that you should always keep 15 minutes of your buffer time reserved for the final leg of your trip to ensure that you have enough time to get to your ship before it departs. Boarding generally closes a short time before the scheduled departure time, the vehicle ramp is generally very congested, and walking from the port’s main entrance to the berth is substantially slower with luggage than what the map indicates it would be. The next thing to consider once you are onboard and moving is where you will be when the ship arrives at its destination, as Athinios is not a place where you want to arrive without a clear plan.

After You Dock at Athinios: Bus, Taxi, or Pre-Booked Transfer

Before embarking on your voyage, you should determine how you will leave Athinios. The port is an active working port set below a steep cliff and only has a long winding road leading to town that has no other connection to any other place. The port bus company has a list of fares provided which clearly indicates that the distance from the town of Fira to the port of Athinios is 18 kilometers, which eliminates the option of walking to town from the port.

A public bus is the most economical way to leave and provides great value for money. The bus fare from the port to Fira is €2.70 (the same price applies for the return journey) according to the KTEL Santorini price list, which was last updated on 19th May 2026. For those coming to the port from the island, the rates are cheaper still; the bus fares from Messaria, Karterados, or Perissa to Athinios are each priced at €2.20 according to the KTEL Santorini price list. Buses will drop you off directly at the quay, where you will pay the bus conductor, not an advance ticket purchase, and the journey back will require climbing approximately 18 km of winding roads instead of taking a direct route; be aware that during the hours between 00:30-05:00 there is also a 25% night surcharge on the KTEL Santorini price list — this means that the cost to ride the bus back would increase from €2.70 to €3.40.

The main issue is just the number of people on board. A conventional ferry can unload a lot of people all at once onto one small area, but the buses waiting there are not manufactured to accommodate that many people for the first run. If you carry lots of luggage, have small children, or anyone who has difficulty standing up for an extended period, even if you could have boarded the first bus, you might want to wait for the second one.

If you dock after dark

This is why it’s imperative to develop an arrival plan — it’s no longer optional. KTEL’s published summer timetable for 2026 was published on May 18, 2026. Buses from Fira to Oia run approximately every 30 minutes with the last bus leaving at 21:00. Should a Fast Ferries vessel arrive around 11 p.m. and your accommodation is in Oia, you’ll probably reach Fira where you discover that the bus you would need to board has already departed for the night. There is a timetable of hourly departures for the village routes, but the bus timetable for each port is not structured in a manner (hourly) similar to that of village routes; it has been designed according to the time of ferry arrivals, not to what the advertising material indicated. Therefore, you must catch your bus based on when your ferry pulls into the port, rather than when it was supposed to pull into the port.

For those traveling to Santorini during the summer months, taxis may seem to be an option, but there are a lot of unknowns associated with them. Santorini’s cab count is so small, many travelers have said, that there are only around 40 taxis available to the island — which is an extremely small number when you consider how many people arrive at Santorini on ferry boats during the busy summer months. After the arrival of a large ferry, there is often a long wait, and for many people this is the least desirable time to be waiting for transportation, when they desperately need to get somewhere.

The third option for transportation is to pre-book a transfer. Our position is that Happy Day Turismo is a travel agency that arranges private transfers for our clients, so we are recommending this option with a financial interest. However, there are certain situations when a pre-booked transfer is well worth it — for instance, if you’re arriving on a late evening ferry, traveling with multiple suitcases, staying in Oia or Imerovigli or if you have reduced mobility, having a driver waiting for you when you get off the ferry is probably the only thing that will relieve the stress of your arrival. However, in many other cases, paying for a transfer is a poor use of money. If you arrive during the morning or early afternoon on a ferry, are traveling light and staying in Fira or close to it, you can take the bus ride from the ferry terminal into Fira for only €2.70, which is a much better value than booking a transfer to take the same trip. Alternatively, you could make arrangements directly with a local operator to book a transfer rather than going through an agency; the price is often comparable.

Make sure to book your tickets before leaving Athens; that begs another question about your travel plans overall. How many days in advance do you need to make reservations? What will you do if the weather causes your ferry not to operate?

When to Book, What Sells Out, and What Wind Does to Fast Ferries

For a ferry crossing from June to September, you should reserve your ferry 2-3 months before your cruise date. This is the timeframe that Go-Ferry has provided in its “Greek Ferry Guide” last updated 7/07/2026 for “peak season” ferry timetables for the most popular ferry routes during summer, including Athens to Santorini. However, this is a poor reason for making advance bookings. You should be paying attention to what you want to book on your ferry rather than when you need to book your seat on that ferry!

What sells out, and in what order

“Order” is where the useful information is. Typically, the conventional “ferry” is very large; therefore, it is unlikely that the economy deck tickets will fill up on a large conventional ferry because of the size of the ferry and the fact that there will be “unreserved” lounges on board to accommodate excess customers who cannot book a deck seat. Instead, the first type of ticket to disappear will be the tickets for Priority, then Vehicle Spaces, then Fast Seat tickets, etc. As mentioned in the Go-Ferry Guide, many of the discount prices for this route will be sold out by the end of February, so be sure to book earlier if you are intending to travel in August and want a cabin for a late arrival.

If you have already made your route choice and had settled on a conventional Blue Star ferry in a “deck class” seat and you wait to book this until a few weeks before your sailing, the waiting period may result in not having a viable alternative option available. If you want to guarantee yourself a reserved seat, a cabin for a late arrival, or a fast jet option on this route in August, the difference between booking in February and booking in June will be the difference between having an option and being out of a viable option.

What actually happens when the wind wins

The ferry company’s decision is not the ultimate authority in this matter, and it is this particular factor that is usually omitted from ferry travel guides. Greek port authorities can impose a prohibition on sailing, which is in turn applicable throughout the entire designated region, not just to the timetable of the specific ferry provider. A traveller posted to r/GreeceTravel an update on conditions in September of the previous year from a ferry operator which gave notice that a sailing ban had been imposed due to inclement weather, and that the ban applied to the entire Aegean Sea, including the Cycladic Islands.

The class of vessel you choose affects your chances of being able to sail under a sailing ban, and most importantly, your chances of being able to sail under a sailing ban are affected by the size of the vessel you book. For example, smaller boats reach their operating wind limits much earlier than larger ferries do. This is the reason for the common advice to book with Blue Star Ferries if you have a vulnerable itinerary; according to the Go-Ferry guide, it is suggested that, in a sailing ban situation, you should book a larger vessel such as Blue Star and take your chances, rather than booking the smaller catamarans that are also frequently advertised. The same caveat applies, however: the larger vessel gives the customer a better chance of being able to travel than the smaller ones, and weather will ultimately make no reservation immune to it. One commenter commented, “Even Blue Star ferries can be cancelled or delayed due to weather conditions; however, it is less likely that they will be cancelled or delayed than the smaller ferries.” Another traveller commented further that they had continuously used SeaJets without any difficulty. Both comments have validity; however, just because you have a larger vessel, you have an increased probability of travelling, but you are not guaranteed to travel; regardless of what you book, you will always be at the mercy of weather.

Slack in your travel itinerary provides an additional layer of protection. Avoid scheduling the Santorini–Athens leg of your trip on the same day as your international flight back home; instead, schedule a night in Athens between the two legs. In the case of a ban being imposed on Ferries/Tourism routes, you will be able to receive a refund or rebook your ticket onto the next available sailing, so you typically will recover your funds even when no funds are available. Additionally, the one date to avoid if you can is 1 May, as mentioned in Piraeus Port guidance and associated Ferry/Public-Transport Strikes.

Your booking checklist

Run through these seven before you pay, in this order:

1. Fix the date and check the specific sailing, not the route average — crossing times on this route range from about five hours to more than ten.
2. Choose the vessel class deliberately. Conventional for stability, deck access and weather resilience; high-speed only where the time saving on your actual date justifies roughly double the fare.
3. Book two to three months ahead for June–September, and earlier still if you need a cabin, a vehicle space or a reserved seat in August.
4. Confirm the Athens port on the booking, since “Athens” in most search engines means Piraeus and a Rafina sailing may not exist on your date.
5. Complete the operator’s web check-in in the 48-hours-to-2-hours window and save the QR boarding pass to your phone — the payment confirmation alone will not board you.
6. Plan to reach the port 45 to 60 minutes before departure, or 60 to 90 minutes if you are bringing a vehicle, and check your gate on the e-ticket and again on the port screens.
7. Arrange your exit from Athinios before you sail, and if you are heading to Oia on a late ferry, check the last connecting bus of the evening before you rely on it.

Antes de Fechar a Reserva

When it comes down to it, all of this is about one quick action. Even if you select the correct port, ship, and seat, you could still be denied access to the boat when you arrive at the ramp — if your email is showing a reservation and NOT a boarding pass! After you have confirmed your sailing, set up a reminder for yourself one day in advance of your departure, log onto the ferry company website, check into the ferry online and print out your QR code within the 48-hour/2-hour check-in period, then store the QR code in an easily accessible place (ideally, so you can pull it out with only one hand while waiting in line) — if you do those things, then your entire day is nothing more than a boat ride!

Frequently asked questions

Do ferries from Athens to Santorini run in winter?

While you may find ferries from Athens to Santorini available all year long, there will be fewer of them during the winter months (approximately three to four ferries per week) compared to the summer months when they will run on a daily basis (conventional and speed boats) from April through October. It is best to call or check with Go-Ferry prior to your trip to be sure that you will have a ferry on the day you plan to travel.

Can I take a car or a motorbike on the ferry?

The conventional ferries and many of the high-speed ferries are capable of transporting a vehicle, but due to the limited space available for vehicles, you will need to arrange in advance for a berth with your ticket when purchasing your passenger ticket. You should provide a vehicle at the port for boarding 60-90 minutes in advance, instead of the normal 45 minutes before departure.

Where can I leave bags in Piraeus before a late ferry?

There is also a staffed luggage storage service available near the Piraeus metro and train station about three minutes from where passengers board at the passenger terminal. This can be helpful for travellers who check out of their Athens hotel at noon but still want to travel by ferry in the evening. It is advisable to reserve this service during peak travel months and to verify its hours of operation prior to checking out of your hotel.