Lack of clarity for seat reservations can make journeys on Danish trains uncomfortable.
Tania Korwin-Zmijowski and Gabriel Hilty
In Danish trains, it’s common to be displaced from your seat mid-journey. Occasionally, a younger passenger may ask an older one to move, even if no booking notice appears above the seat. Whether you’re asking or being asked, the interaction can be uncomfortable.
It stems from DSB’s system, where tickets don’t guarantee a reserved seat. Since seat updates occur only once—before departure—last-minute reservations aren’t reflected after the train has left.
Is securing a seat for 30 DKK the most effective booking system?
“The seat booking used to be different: There was a view where you could see where you were gonna sit. It is not available anymore, and not convenient at all. I miss that,” says Cecilia, a frequent rider from Copenhagen central station.
Although booking is affordable, disruptions like delays or cancellations make the system inefficient.
“We got moved the other day because the train was late by an hour and a half from Aalborg. They just deleted our seat reservation… people were kind of fighting for six hours on the train,” Cecilia said.
Switzerland and Germany have the same model, where seats cost extra. In Denmark, booking feels like a lottery—you never know how many passengers are on board. The unpredictability leaves some standing in the hallway for hours. In Germany, passengers can check train occupancy, helping them decide whether to reserve.
Cecilia sees room for another fix: “Sometimes I think about storage and how they could improve that, because people travel with bikes and big luggage. So mostly when I travel from Jutland there are not enough wagons.”
This article is for an international audience arriving in Denmark, potentially accommodating with the train booking system. Because of the topic and the proximity with European train model, it could be published in The Local, or Euractiv.