Layover in Delhi Indira Gandhi (DEL): What to Do Hour by Hour

Delhi runs three terminals. Terminal 3 is the big one: every international flight uses it, along with Air India's domestic network and IndiGo domestic flights numbered 6E 5000 to 6E 5999. Terminals 1 and 2 are domestic only. Terminal 2 closed for refurbishment in April 2025 and reopened on 26 October 2025, when IndiGo moved its 6E 2000 to 6E 2999 series there, so guides written during the closure send people to the wrong building. Terminal 1 carries the bulk of IndiGo's remaining domestic flying plus Akasa Air. Allocations shift, so trust the terminal printed on your boarding pass over any pattern, including this one.

There is no airside link between terminals: every terminal change happens landside on the free inter terminal shuttle, which runs 24 hours a day at roughly 20 minute intervals from outside arrivals. Terminal 3 to Terminal 2 is a short ride of about 15 minutes, while Terminal 3 to Terminal 1 can absorb 45 minutes once the wait and the loop through airport roads are counted. You need a boarding pass or itinerary to ride, and you clear full security again at the next terminal.

The connection type decides your whole layover. International to international inside Terminal 3 is the easy case: follow the international transfer signs, pass the transfer security screening, and you stay in the airside bubble with no visa needed for under 24 hours on a single ticket to a third country. International to domestic always means entering India, even on one ticket: immigration, baggage claim if your bags are not tagged through, customs, a walk or shuttle to the departure terminal, then check in and security from scratch. Delhi's official guidance and most airlines treat 3 hours as the minimum for that sequence, and the late evening bank of long haul arrivals can push immigration alone past an hour. Book 4 hours if you control the booking.

Leaving is realistic from about 8 hours of layover, and documents decide everything. India has no visa free entry window for layovers: airside transit under 24 hours on one ticket needs nothing, but the moment you cross immigration you need an e visa or a transit visa, and both are issued before travel, not at the desk. The e visa suits most eligible nationalities and usually processes within days; the 15 day transit visa exists for shorter stops. Verify visa rules before travel, every single time, because eligibility lists and processing times change without much notice.

The city itself is close. The Airport Express metro covers Terminal 3 to New Delhi station in about 20 minutes for Rs 60, which puts Connaught Place within an hour of leaving the gate area if immigration cooperates. The minimum safe layover for going out is 8 hours: an hour to clear arrivals, an hour of travel out and back combined, 3 hours of airport buffer before an international departure, and 3 hours in the city to justify the visa effort. Evening arrivals should think twice, since the monuments close, traffic peaks and the metro stops around 11:30 pm. Through checked bags stay with the airline on a single ticket; carrying bags means the landside storage counters, whose details are to be confirmed.