Ok so it's my first time taking the train in Germany. Now obviously the tickets are the ones in green but what's that other option? For a moment I thought "wow what a steal" but quickly realize that that was something else. I just want to know what its

by Fluffy_Letterhead246

7 comments

  1. It’s just the reservation of a specific seat. In case you bought your ticket without one and later decide to get a seat too.

  2. “Reservation only” means “Only reservation” here, if that makes sense. The 5.20 is only for the seat reservation, not the actual ticket.

  3. You don’t have a guaranteed seat in an ICE or IC. You’ll have to reserve a seat for 5,20 when you don’t want to search for a free seat in the train.

    I would highly recommend to reserve a seat. But a little tip to avoid a reserved seat: just sit in the Bistro on the train and have a drink or a meal. There you don’t need a reservation.

  4. You only buy the seat, but not the trip.
    This can be used if you already got a ticket without a seat reservation, and later on see/fear, that the train will be crowded and you’ll end up without a seat.

    Another usecase is having the Bahncard 100, which let’s you travel for free on ICE, but again, you want a seat.

  5. It’s just a seat reservation. Essentially an add-on to a previously purchased ticket.

    See how the expensive ticket option says “Unrestricted choice of trains”? If you buy that ticket, you can use any train to get from your departure city to your destination city on that day.

    Say you weren’t super sure of your schedule a week ago when you booked, so you bought the flexible ticket. On the day of your trip, you decide you’ll hop on ICE123 after lunch. You want to be sure you’re guaranteed a seat, so you pop into the app and reserve a seat for that train. You just need a seat reservation, not a ticket (since you bought the ticket a week ago).

  6. Protip if a normal price ticket at a given time is too expensive look if the flex price at a less peak time is actually cheaper.

    You can then still take that train and even when fully booked there’s likely someone (see many) didn’t board or it’s showing fully booked in error.

  7. A friend of mine took the ICE from Bonn to Amsterdam without seat reservation. They forced her to leave the train inbetween because it was full!!!

    Keep this in mind! DB is playing with their clients a bad game on the ticket prices.

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