The Istanbul Atatürk Airport is the main airport serving the Turkish capital Istanbul. The airport handels over 60 million passengers a year making it one of the busiest airports in the world. The airport was named Yesilköy Airport but was renamed to Istanbul Atatürk Airport in honor of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder and first president of the Republic of Turkey.
Istanbul Atatürk Airport is one of two airports serving Istanbul, the other one is Istanbal Sabiha Gökçen Airport. Both airports are reaching their maximum capacity while their main user, Turkish Airlines, is still growing rapidly. To accommodate the future growth a third airport is currently being build which will become, eventually, the largest airport in the world. The first fase will open in February 2018.
Most flights from Istanbul Atatürk Airport are to Jeddah and to Amsterdam but there are many more flights to other destinations as well, most of them by Turkish Airlines. Every day there are flights to 20 destinations from Istanbul Atatürk Airport. Here are the most popular destinations:
The airport has three runways and two terminals. The older and smaller one is the Domestic Terminal, the other one the International Terminal, which was opened in 2000 and has a capacity of 50 million passengers a year.
Istanbul Atatürk Airport is located on the European side 25 km west of the city center.
Several buses depart from the airport. There is the Express Bus Service (Havatas) which departs every half hour (except at night) for several destinations in Istanbul, one-way fare is TRY 11. You can also take one of the several (cheaper but slower) public bus line 96T (TRY 5).
The airport is also connected to the metro or light rail system of Istanbul. The station is a ten minute walk away. Trains depart all day, except at night and it takes 45 minutes at a fare of TRY 4 to get into central Istanbul. You would need to transfer though to get close to your destination and the metro system can be complicated to understand. So best to check and get informed about metro lines and tickets before your departure flight.
A taxi into the city from Atatürk airport would cost about TRY 60 to Taksim Square.
All prices quoted here were found in June 2017
