Heydar Aliyev International Airport (GYD) — Airport Guide 2026

🏢 Terminals & Layout

GYD has two passenger buildings. Terminal 1 — opened April 2014, 65,000 m² — handles all international traffic. Terminal 2 handles domestic routes (Ganja, Lankaran, Nakhchivan) and some short-haul regional flights. A free shuttle connects them, but the walk is short enough that most travellers ignore it.

The layout has one practical consequence worth flagging early: bank counters and SIM kiosks at GYD are landside, before security. If you want a BakıKart for the bus, a local SIM (Bakcell, Azercell, or Nar), or manat from an ATM, handle all of it before you pass passport control on the way out. Once airside, those options are gone.

🛂 The E-Visa You Must Sort Before You Fly

Azerbaijan operates its own electronic visa system, entirely separate from any Schengen, UK, or US arrangement. The official portal is evisa.gov.az (the ASAN e-visa). If you hold an EU, UK, US, Canadian, Australian, or New Zealand passport, you need one before departure. It is not available on arrival.

Costs and timing:
– Standard processing: $25, up to three working days
– Urgent processing: $60, three hours
– Single entry, 30-day stay

The visa itself is straightforward. The complication is the raft of look-alike agency sites that charge $45–75 for the same document. The fee above is the government fee; any site charging more is a middleman. Apply directly.

Who skips the e-visa: Citizens of Turkey, Russia, Kazakhstan, and Georgia get 90 days visa-free. Chinese passport holders get 30 days. A handful of other nationalities are covered — check the current ASAN list before assuming.

Entry Requirements by Passport — 2026

Keep a printed or offline PDF of your e-visa; the airline checks it at check-in, and Azerbaijani border control checks it again on arrival.

🚌 H1 Aero Express, BakıKart & Taxis

There is no metro or train line to GYD — that misconception is common enough to name directly. The airport link into Baku is the H1 Airport Express bus: Neoplan coaches with luggage racks and air-conditioning, running 24 hours a day.

Key numbers:
– Fare: ₼1.30 (~$0.75)
– Frequency: every ~20 minutes daytime; every ~45 minutes overnight
– Journey time: ~30 minutes
– Terminus: 28 May metro station and central railway station (also stops at Koroglu transport hub)

Once you have the BakıKart, the H1 is one of the cheapest airport links anywhere, and the route is fast enough. If you’re travelling with bulky luggage late at night, a taxi is easier.

🚕 Taxis

Bolt and Uber both operate in Baku and give you a metered price before you book. Official metered cabs in purple livery are the ground alternative. A ride to the centre runs ₼17–22 ($10–13) in 20–25 minutes.

On currency exchange: the bureau-de-change counters in arrivals carry a meaningful markup. Change enough to buy a BakıKart and cover the first hour — that’s a small amount — then use a bank ATM or pay by card in town for everything else. Cards are accepted across Baku.

🛋️ Lounges — Including a Landside Trap to Know

GYD’s lounge offering in Terminal 1 covers three options: Salam, Absheron, and Baku Club. Terminal 2 has the Mugam Lounge. Priority Pass is accepted across the range. Walk-in access at the Salam Lounge starts at around $38 per person, with hot food, showers, and Wi-Fi.

The Absheron and Baku Club lounges are also in T1; check current access terms against your Priority Pass tier, as walk-in pricing and card entitlements shift. The Mugam in T2 serves domestic and short-haul passengers.

🍽️ Azerbaijani Food Worth Eating

The airport’s T1 has cafés and a couple of sit-down restaurants, landside and airside. The food is fine and priced like an airport. If you have time in the city, eat there instead.

Azerbaijani cooking sits on the Silk Road seam between Turkish, Persian, and Central Asian kitchens. The dishes:

Plov — saffron-stained rice pilaf with lamb, chestnuts, and dried fruit. The celebratory centrepiece; a good plov takes time.

Qutab — thin flatbread folded and griddled with greens, pumpkin, or minced lamb. Cheap, fast, and worth eating at every opportunity.

Dolma — vine leaves or vegetables stuffed with spiced mince and rice.

Dushbara — tiny lamb dumplings in broth, fiddly to make and satisfying to eat.

Lavangi — chicken or fish stuffed with a walnut-and-plum paste. A Caspian-coast speciality, harder to find in Baku’s tourist restaurants.

Pomegranate (nar) runs through the cuisine: pressed into juice, or reduced into narsharab, the dark tart sauce poured over grilled sturgeon and kebabs.

💡 Baku on a Layover — Honest Viability Math

The Old City is about 25–27 km from GYD. A taxi runs 20–25 minutes each way. The round trip plus a walk is feasible — but only if the numbers work.

What to see if you have the time:

Icherisheher — the Old City. The walled medieval core is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Inside: the 12th-century Maiden Tower (Qız Qalası), a stone cylinder on the seafront whose original purpose is still genuinely debated among historians; and the 15th-century Palace of the Shirvanshahs, the seat of Baku’s medieval rulers, with its mosque, mausoleum, and divankhana courtyard. The lanes are flat and dense — the headline sights take about 90 minutes on foot.

The Flame Towers and the waterfront. The three Flame Towers — LED-skinned skyscrapers above the Old City — are Baku’s skyline signature, most photogenic after dark. Below, Baku Boulevard runs along the Caspian for kilometres. The wind off the sea is frequently brutal; “Baku” is popularly tied to the Persian for “wind-pounded,” and on most days the association is earned.

Heydar Aliyev Center. Zaha Hadid’s white-wave building is about 15 km from the airport, closer than the Old City. If you’re in a taxi heading towards the centre anyway, it’s worth a stop.

❓ FAQ

📊 At a Glance — GYD 2026