DART
Rail · electrified suburban · 32 stations · Greystones – Howth
About the DART
The DART is electrified suburban rail — Dublin Area Rapid Transit — running along the coast of Dublin Bay. The trains are heavy rail, run by Iarnód Éireann, and share tracks and stations with the commuter lines in the city centre.
Its full name is Dublin Area Rapid Transit.
The DART is the electrified core of Dublin’s suburban railway — 32 stations strung along the bay, from Malahide and Howth in the north, through the city centre, to Greystones in County Wicklow. Two route patterns share the middle section, Malahide to Greystones and Howth to Greystones, and they come together at Howth Junction and Donaghmede, which is why trains are twice as frequent south of there. End to end is scheduled at 74 minutes. This is heavy rail running on the surface: Dublin has no underground railway and no metro, and a DART is a train, not a tram. The network covers 53 route kilometres of electrified track, 46 of them double and 7 single, and carries up to 23 million passengers a year.
Stations on the DART
32 stations in running order, 13 of them an interchange.
Malahide to Greystones
Main route, 29 stations
A ring on the dot marks a station where you can change line, either on the spot or by a short walk to a separate station. The small name under each one is its official Irish name.
Timetable and frequency
| Day | First – last | Trains a day | Timetable date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mon–Thu | 05:32 – 00:22 | 201 | 2026-11-18 |
| Friday | 05:32 – 00:22 | 201 | 2026-11-20 |
| Saturday | 06:12 – 00:19 | 141 | 2026-11-21 |
| Sunday | 08:51 – 00:24 | 83 | 2026-11-22 |
| Bank holiday | 00:04 – 00:08 | 138 | 2026-10-26 |
| Whole route | Scheduled time |
|---|---|
| Malahide – Greystones | 74 min |
| Howth – Greystones | 74 min |
First and last departure anywhere on the line, from the NTA’s published timetable for a representative week. Nothing on this line runs through the night.
How often trains run
| Time of day | Departures | Typical gap | Longest gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Before 07:00 | 4 | every 19 min | 21 min |
| Morning peak 07:00–10:00 | 19 | every 9 min | 13 min |
| Midday 10:00–16:00 | 37 | every 10 min | 11 min |
| Evening peak 16:00–19:00 | 18 | every 10 min | 11 min |
| Evening 19:00–22:00 | 17 | every 15 min | 20 min |
| After 22:00 | 4 | every 16 min | 19 min |
Departures in one direction at Howth Junction and Donaghmede, the busiest stop on the line, on a Monday to Thursday. Other stops are quieter; the branches are served by part of the service only.
Things to know before you travel
- Two routes share the central section: Malahide – Greystones and Howth – Greystones. They join at Howth Junction and Donaghmede.
Where you can change
In Dublin a change between tram and train is a walk along the street: the Luas stop and the railway station are different places with different names.
| Stop | Other lines here | On foot to |
|---|---|---|
| Malahide | Northern | — |
| Portmarnock | Northern | — |
| Clongriffin | Northern | — |
| Howth Junction and Donaghmede | Northern | — |
| Dublin Connolly | Northern South Eastern South Western Western | Connolly (2 min walk); Busáras (4 min walk) |
| Tara Street | Northern South Eastern South Western | Abbey Street (4 min walk); Marlborough (5 min walk); Trinity (6 min walk) |
| Dublin Pearse | Northern South Eastern South Western | Dawson (7 min walk); St. Stephen's Green (11 min walk) |
| Grand Canal Dock | South Eastern South Western | — |
| Lansdowne Road | South Eastern | — |
| Blackrock | South Eastern | — |
| Dun Laoghaire (Mallin) | South Eastern | — |
| Bray (Daly) | South Eastern | — |
| Greystones | South Eastern | — |
History
The railway the DART runs on is older than almost anything else in Irish transport. The stretch between the city and Dún Laoghaire was laid out as the Dublin and Kingstown Railway, the first railway in Ireland; it was later joined to the Belfast main line in the north and the Wexford line in the south, and met the Harcourt Street line at Shanganagh Junction. The views over Dublin Bay from this section have been compared with those on the Gulf of Naples, and day trips out to Killiney Hill and Greystones were a draw long before the electric trains arrived.
By the late 1970s the service had become an embarrassment. It was worked by 1950s CIÉ 2600 Class railcars, converted in the early 1970s to push-pull operation behind a 201 Class locomotive with a driving trailer at the far end — an arrangement intended as a stopgap that had reached the end of its life. Spare parts were hard to find, and the trains were uncomfortable, unreliable and overcrowded. Córas Iompair Éireann’s answer was to electrify, and the DART opened in 1984. A far larger electrification has been in planning since February 2018 under the DART+ programme, with permission granted for the western project in July 2024 and the south western one in November 2024.
The service
Trains run about every ten minutes on weekdays over the central section, with a thinner service at weekends. The published timetable has 201 DART trips on a Monday to Thursday, the first away at 05:32 and the last at 00:22; Saturday has 141, from 06:12, and Sunday 83, starting much later at 08:51. North of Howth Junction and Donaghmede the service divides between the Howth branch and Malahide, and the Malahide side is reinforced by Northern Commuter trains. Nothing runs through the night. Every train in the Dublin suburban area, DART services included, is regulated from the Suburban Central Traffic Control at Dublin Connolly, which is staffed at all hours. Our timetables page gives first and last trains station by station.
The trams and trains
The DART is worked by a mixed fleet of electric multiple units. Forty two-car 8100 Class units were bought for the original network, two of which were destroyed in a depot fire in 2001. Growing demand brought four 8500 Class sets in 2000, three 8510 Class in 2001 and ten 8520 Class in 2003 and 2004. The two families ran coupled together until the 8100s were refurbished in 2007, and have been kept apart since. Peak trains are four, six or eight cars; off-peak and at weekends the sets are shorter.
Frequently asked questions
No. Dublin has no metro and no underground railway at all. The DART is an electrified suburban rail service run by Iarnród Éireann, using full-size trains on the national network, with stations rather than street-level stops. The trams are a separate system, the Luas.
No. There is no railway station at Dublin Airport and no tram line reaches it either, so no DART, commuter train or Luas will take you there. The connection is by road from the city centre or from a station on the network — our airport transport guide sets out the options.
Because the line forks. North of Howth Junction and Donaghmede one branch runs out along the peninsula to Howth and the other continues up the coast to Malahide. Services are split between the two, so check the destination on the front of the train and on the platform display.