Your Travel Guide to Thailand
All information & tips to prepare your trip in Thailand
Bangkok floating markets free bus
Advice and recommandations
Free shuttle bus to Bangkok floating markets
The floating markets in Bangkok or Bangkok suburbs are famous and certainly must see places during your journey in the Thai capital. They are held on weekends and holidays. If it's not always easy to get there by transport (although I've been explaining for a long time how to visit 3 of them by regular bus and then a cheap boat tour ;)), there is since the beginning of 2023 a free electric bus service that leaves from an MRT metro Bang Khun Tan station then connects the 4 most famous floating markets on the outskirts of Bangkok: the Song Khlong Floating Market, the Taling Chan Floating Market, Klhong Lat Mayom Floating Market and Wat Saphan Floating Maket.
These free electric buses, which have WIFI, only run on weekends and public holidays which are the opening days of the floating markets. I put here the timetables for information. They can be subject to modification and obviously, the buses are not exactly on time except from the departures for MRT station as I could note when I tested the service.
Advice and recommandations
Be careful, these buses are more minibus tan normal buses and the closer you get to 11 am to start your tour of Bangkok's floating markets with them, the more crowded they will be with the risk of not being able to get in and having to wait for the next one (and when I'm writing this page, the waiting time between 2 buses is around 20 minutes). The same, to leave the last markets and go back to the city especially from the market floating from Lat Mayom, the longer you are after 1pm, the more passengers will be willing to take them. Personally when I tested the service, I was always able to get in but in overcrowded buses which left passengers on the sidewalk in Taling Chan (a few people), in Lat Mayom (a dozen people) and no one got off at Wat Saphan Floating Market fearing of struggling to get back on a bus afterwards, so people who were planning to take the bus at this market simply couldn't get in. It's an interesting solution as it is free but there are not enough buses so but don't necessarily plan to do your whole journey with them because it could greatly spoil your experience by making you struggle to get in these buses between the different markets. I find the solution I explained on Thailandee.com for years to go to Taling Chan by regular line bus and then walk to Son Khlong Market and take the local songtheaw to Lat mayom and a boat tour on the khlongd there that goes to Wat Saphan Floating Market a lot friendlier and very very cheap. Sometimes looking for free service is not always the best option ;)
NOTE the Taling Chan Floating Market is at a 7 minutes walk from Song Khlong so no need to bother taking the bus between the 2.
Practical information
Bangkok buses run from 5 am à 11 pmBangkok bus hotline: 1348
Website: www.bmta.co.th
Other public transport in Bangkok
Don Muang-Bangkok
There are two bus lines connecting Don Muang Airport to Bangkok city. They allow you to go to BTS Mo Chit station or to join Bangkok Northern Bus Terminal (Mochit) or Victory Monument in central Bangkok.
Bangkok skytain
The Bangkok Skytrain is called BTS. The trains have air condition and let you go over the heavy road traffic in the capital but you can not go everywhere even if connected to the Chao Phraya Express baots, it can let you go to major temples in Bangkok.
Bangkok bus lines
Taking the bus to get around is clearly not the easiest mean of transportation to use for a foreign tourist in Bangkok neither the fastest one but it's the cheapest one. Bangkok bus network is wide and you can go almost anywhere but just need to be patient.
Transports Bangkok
Only Thai city for the moment to have a metro (there is metro project in Phuket), Bangkok is the city in Thailand that offers more choices of public or individual transport (metro, bus, boats, tuktuks...). No, there are not just tuk-tuks and pink taxis to get around Bangkok !
