Layover in Cairo International CAI: what to do hour by hour

3 hours: stay airside and lower the bar

Three hours on a single ticket through a single terminal is comfortable at Cairo. Budget 30 minutes for deplaning and finding your gate, then head for a lounge rather than the concourse, because the public food options are thin. Terminal 3 reviewers complain about narrow departure corridors and few places to eat, and they are not wrong. The good news is that the lounge floor compensates: the Ahlein Premium Lounge on the departure level, left after immigration toward the F gates, runs around the clock and takes Priority Pass, so a 3 hour layover can pass in an armchair with hot food rather than on a bench hunting for a kiosk.

Three hours with a terminal change is a different animal. Moving between Terminals 2 and 3 is the gentle version, a footbridge walk plus a fresh security screening. Anything involving Terminal 1, separate tickets or a bag recheck routes you through transit desks and shuttle waits that answer to nobody. With 3 hours, skip every distraction, complete the transfer first, and only relax once you are holding a boarding pass airside in the right building.

5 hours: lounge rotation and the bridge walk

Five hours is lounge territory, and Cairo is more generous here than its reputation suggests. In Terminal 3, Priority Pass opens both the Ahlein Premium Lounge near the F gates and the CAC Lounge by Plaza Premium on the third floor in Zone E, though the CAC Lounge caps Priority Pass visits at 2 hours. Terminal 2 has its own Ahlein lounges on the card as well, listed as open around the clock. A workable 5 hour play is two lounges back to back: eat and shower in one, sleep in the other. The full picture, including paid entry, is in the CAI lounge directory.

Between lounge sittings, the pedestrian bridge to Terminal 2 is the best walk in the airport, air conditioned and flat. Do not plan a Cairo layover around shopping or food crawls the way you might at Istanbul or Doha. The duty free is ordinary, the restaurants are functional, and the smart move is to treat CAI as a place to rest rather than a place to explore.

8 hours: the pyramids, if the math works

Eight hours puts Giza on the table, and the visa math decides whether it is a gift or a trap. If both your flights are on EgyptAir, Air Cairo or Nile Air and your layover runs 8 to 96 hours, Egypt issues a free transit visa at the airport: find the carrier transit desk, present your passport and onward boarding pass, and the stamp costs nothing. The program has been extended through April 2027. Everyone else from an eligible country buys a visa on arrival for 30 US dollars at the bank kiosks before passport control, a fee that rose from 25 dollars in March 2026. Bring cash.

Then the time math. The pyramids sit about 40 km from the airport, and the drive runs anywhere from 45 minutes on empty morning roads to two hours in real Cairo traffic. Budget an hour for immigration and the visa queue, the drive each way, and a return to the terminal 3 hours before an international departure. On a clean 8 hour layover that leaves perhaps 2 hours at the plateau, which is enough to stand in front of the Great Pyramid and not much more. The honest verdict: 8 hours works only with a morning landing, carry on luggage and an Uber or Careem booked the moment you clear customs. With 10 or more hours it becomes a genuinely great layover, and the Grand Egyptian Museum beside the plateau gives you a single indoor stop if the heat or the hustle wears you down.

Overnight: the footbridge is the answer

The terminals stay open all night and overnight stays are tolerated, but Cairo offers no rest zones, no sleep pods and no quiet rooms, and airside access requires a valid boarding pass. Travelers report the padded seating airside in Terminal 3 near gate E5 as the most workable free spot, with Terminal 2 near gate F3 calm after midnight. Expect bright lights, announcements and security walking past your bench.

The grown up option is unusually good for this airport: the Le Meridien Cairo Airport connects directly to Terminal 3 by a link bridge, so you can walk from the concourse to a bed without going outside, and a hotel shuttle covers Terminals 1 and 2. For the full sleep map, terminal by terminal, read the guide to sleeping at Cairo airport.