Ferries from Kauppatori

Helsinki's Market Square pier runs a boat to a UNESCO World Heritage site on an ordinary tram ticket. The Suomenlinna ferry is part of the city's public transport network — same fare, same card, same integrated system — and it goes to a sea fortress begun in 1748.

The crossing

Kauppatori to Suomenlinna takes about 15 minutes, with 79 sailings in our timetable, operated by HSL as a regular public transport service. It runs year round, including through the winter ice.

⚠ It is public transport, not an excursion boat

An HSL travel card or a standard Helsinki ticket covers the crossing. Buying a separate "island tour" ticket from an operator on the quay gets you a different, more expensive boat to the same place.

Several private services also leave from this square in summer, and they are not the same thing. Look for the HSL branding.

Where the pier is

Kauppatori is the Market Square on the eastern edge of the harbour, in front of the Presidential Palace and beside the market halls, with trams stopping directly alongside. It is one of the shortest walks from a city centre to a ferry berth anywhere in Europe.

The square itself has the fish market and the food stalls, which makes waiting for a boat here better than most.

Winter

The service does not stop when the sea freezes — the ferries work through ice, and the crossing in January with the harbour frozen and steam rising off the open channel is a different experience entirely from the summer one.

Dress for it. Fifteen minutes on an open deck at minus fifteen is longer than it sounds.

What is on the other side

Suomenlinna is a working residential community as well as a monument — several hundred people live there, which is why the ferry is a transit service rather than a tourist boat, and why it runs at six in the morning in February.