Frankfurt Airport Terminals

How Many Terminals Does Frankfurt Airport Have?

Frankfurt Airport (FRA), operated by Fraport AG, is Germany's busiest airport and one of Europe's largest hubs, handling 63.2 million passengers in 2025. It has three numbered passenger terminals — Terminal 1, Terminal 2 and Terminal 3 — though at present only Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 handle scheduled flights.

The two working terminals are very different in character. Terminal 1 is the historic heart of the airport and the home of Lufthansa and its Star Alliance partners. Terminal 3 is a brand-new building south of the runways that opened in April 2026 and now handles most other international, leisure and low-cost carriers. Terminal 2, in use since 1994, closed in June 2026 for a multi-year modernisation, and its airlines moved across to Terminal 3.

Not sure which terminal your flight uses? Always check your boarding pass and our airlines at Frankfurt Airport guide before you travel.

Terminal 1 — Lufthansa & Star Alliance

Terminal 1 is split into concourses A, B, C and Z and is used by Lufthansa, the wider Lufthansa Group and its Star Alliance partners (such as United, Air Canada, SWISS, Austrian and Singapore Airlines). Concourse A mainly serves Schengen flights, while concourses B, C and Z handle non-Schengen routes, so passengers on intercontinental services clear German passport control here.

Terminal 1 sits directly above the airport's two railway stations and is connected to the Fraport multi-storey car parks, the Hilton and Sheraton hotels and The Squaire office complex. It has the widest choice of check-in desks, shops, restaurants and lounges, including the exclusive Lufthansa First Class Terminal. Compare the options in our Frankfurt Airport lounges guide.

Terminal 3 — International & Leisure Flights

Opened in April 2026 to the south of the runways, Terminal 3 is Frankfurt's newest terminal, built for up to around 19 million passengers a year in its first phase. It is arranged into piers G, H and J and now handles the airlines that previously used Terminal 2 — mostly non-Star-Alliance and international carriers such as Delta, Emirates, Etihad, Korean Air, Qatar Airways, Saudia and Cathay Pacific — along with leisure and low-cost services.

Terminal 3 has its own security, passport control, shops, restaurants, lounges (including SkyTeam and Emirates lounges) and a large multi-storey car park. It connects to the rest of the airport by the free Sky Line train and shuttle buses, so rail travellers still arrive at Terminal 1 and continue to Terminal 3 from there.

Terminal 2 — Closed for Modernisation

Terminal 2, with concourses D and E, opened in 1994 and served non-Star-Alliance carriers for more than 30 years. Following the opening of Terminal 3, Fraport closed Terminal 2 to passengers in June 2026 for a comprehensive, multi-year modernisation of its technical and building systems.

All of its airlines have moved to Terminal 3, so if your ticket or an older guide still mentions Terminal 2, check the current terminal for your flight before travelling. The Sky Line still passes the Terminal 2 station, but there are no passenger services there while the works continue.

Getting Between the Terminals

The free, automated Sky Line elevated train is the quickest way to move between terminals. The trip between Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 takes around eight minutes, with total journeys across the system of up to about ten minutes. Free shuttle buses also connect the terminals — the operator names them alongside the Sky Line as a way into Terminal 3, and they are useful if you have a lot of luggage or need to avoid the train — but the only bus timetable it publishes is the overnight one below.

The Sky Line runs from 4:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m., every two to three minutes. It does not run overnight: the operator closes it between 11 p.m. and 4 a.m. for maintenance inspections. In its place a shuttle bus runs between 10:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. at regular intervals, so the two overlap by about an hour at each end of the night rather than leaving a gap.

One detail decides whether that night bus is any use to you, and it is easy to miss: the operator says its stops are in front of the terminal buildings, in the arrivals forecourt areas of Terminal 1 and Terminal 3. That is landside. If you are connecting between two flights and staying inside the secure area, reaching the night bus means leaving airside and clearing security again on the other side. On a late-evening connection that is the difference between a ten-minute hop and a queue, so if your inbound lands close to 11 p.m. it is worth checking whether you can make the last Sky Line rather than the first bus.

Two caveats on the eight-minute figure. It is the design specification, and the service has not been running at design speed: the Sky Line was suspended in late May 2026 after recurring technical problems and has been running again since 15 June 2026, with the operator describing up to eight vehicles at a maximum of 50 km/h against the 80 km/h the system was built for. Treat eight minutes as the best case and not a promise — and if you are working out a tight connection, use the journey-time displays in the terminals, which show time to the gate rather than time between buildings.

If you are connecting between flights, allow enough time — Frankfurt is a big airport, and you may need to clear passport control when moving between the Schengen and non-Schengen areas, and security again if you leave the airside zone. See our guides to arrivals and layovers at Frankfurt Airport, or arrange a door-to-door private transfer.

Is There a Terminal Map You Can Print?

No, and that is the operator’s deliberate choice rather than an omission. Frankfurt Airport publishes one map: an interactive map covering both working terminals, which is linked among the sources at the foot of this page. There is no downloadable PDF of the terminal levels and no printable layout plan of the car parks — a search that sends a lot of people in circles, so it is worth saying plainly. Gate signage and the journey-time displays inside the buildings are the intended wayfinding, and they are updated in a way a printed sheet cannot be.

What the interactive map is genuinely good for is the things a level plan would not tell you anyway. It has a navigation function and shows step-free routes, and you can search it for the regional station, the long-distance station, the bus station and the smoking lounges as destinations rather than hunting for them on a diagram. Terminal 1 covers gates A, B, C and Z; Terminal 3 covers gates G, H and J. If you want something to carry, what is worth writing down is not a map at all: it is your terminal, pier letter and gate number, because that is what every sign, display and announcement on site uses.

Rail Links, Parking & Facilities

Below Terminal 1 are two stations: the Regional Station for S-Bahn and regional trains into Frankfurt, and the Long-Distance Station for ICE and IC high-speed services across Germany and Europe. Full details are in our Frankfurt Airport train guide and our transport to the city centre guide.

Both working terminals offer the full range of passenger services — check-in, baggage, currency exchange, pharmacies, shops and dining — plus car-rental centres and multi-storey car parks. See our parking guide for rates and locations.