Sailing times

Read from Stena Line’s own timetable feed, the one that fills the table on its route page, sampled across July 2026 to January 2027. The durations are not symmetrical: every eastbound sailing is booked at 2h 22m (03:30 arrives 05:52, 07:30 arrives 09:52) and every westbound one at 2h 15m (03:30 arrives 05:45). Scottish Citylink’s printed 923 timetable shows exactly the same figures, so this is a real scheduling difference rather than a website glitch. Add it up and the route runs 40 crossings a week in each direction. Stena’s route page rounds all of this to “12 daily sailings” and “from 2 hours 15 minutes”, which is true on four days out of seven.

Ticket prices

Stena Line does not publish a tariff for this route. There is no page anywhere on the site listing what a bicycle, a campervan or a lone foot passenger costs on an ordinary sailing — those numbers exist only inside the booking engine, and they move with the date and the sailing. Everything in the table above is a price the operator prints somewhere in public, with the page it came from cited in our notes. Two live contradictions worth knowing about: the Stena Plus Lounge is “from £20 per person” on the Short Stay by Car page and “from £22 per person” on the Ireland lead-in fare page, both current on 30 July 2026; and the Rail & Sail price list carries the line “valid for travel from 1 June 2025”, so it has not been restated for 2026. One genuine saving that is easy to miss: an Interrail, Eurail or BritRail pass gets a discount on this route — Stena excludes only Liverpool–Belfast — and you have to show the pass at check-in or it is taken back off.

Route map

Out of Belfast Lough and across the North Channel to the eastern shore of Loch Ryan: Victoria Terminal 4 on the Belfast Harbour estate to Loch Ryan Port, a mile north of Cairnryan village on the A77.

Two operators, one crossing

Three sea crossings leave the Belfast area for Britain, and they are not interchangeable. Two operators, and the choice usually turns on where you start from on land rather than which boat is quicker. Coming from the Antrim coast, our page on the Larne to Cairnryan ferry has the P&O side of it in detail.

Getting to the pier

Two terminals, two entirely different problems. Belfast’s is Victoria Terminal 4 on West Bank Road, deep inside the working harbour estate off Junction 1 of the M2. Cairnryan’s is Loch Ryan Port on Belfast Way, a lay-by off the A77 with a village shop and a couple of B&Bs for company. Neither is walkable. What the operator publishes about reaching them is thorough on one side and, on the other, silent about the one bus that stops at the door.

• Belfast, by bus: Translink Metro service 96 runs from Upper Queen Street beside the City Hall into the terminal in about 22 minutes, and drops you at Donegall Place on the way back. Stena states it serves the 07:30, 11:30, 15:30 and 19:30 departures. Four of the six. Our guide to buses in Belfast sets out how the Metro network fits together.
• The 96 is really a factory bus. Read its published stops and you get Musgrave Cash & Carry, Auto Trader, Powerteam, Bretland House: the Duncrue industrial estate, with the ferry terminal as the end of the line rather than the point of it. On Translink’s current timetable it reaches the terminal at roughly 06:21, 06:51, 07:28, 07:48, 08:25, 08:55, 09:25, 10:00, 14:00 and 18:49 on weekdays, and leaves it at 07:05, 10:15, 14:15, 16:05, 16:35, 17:05, 17:35, 18:15, 19:05 and 22:15.
• At weekends the 96 does not turn up until mid-morning. Saturday and Sunday, the first arrival at the terminal is around 10:01–10:03, which serves the 11:30 sailing and nothing earlier. Foot passenger on the 07:30 boat on a Saturday? There is no bus.
• The 19:30 is the tight one. The last weekday 96 into the terminal arrives about 18:49. Check-in for a 19:30 departure closes at 19:00 on the operator’s published rule and at 18:45 on the figure its own timetable widget displays. Under the second of those the bus reaches the port after the desk has shut. Take an earlier one, or a taxi.
• Belfast, otherwise: a black-taxi share scheme operates from outside the terminal building into the city, covering Lanyon Place railway station, and taxis can be pre-booked through FonaCAB. There is no railway station at the port, and Stena says so in as many words, although rail tickets are sold at the terminal.
• Belfast parking: over 300 spaces in front of the building, blue-badge bays included. First 30 minutes free, then £1.50 for an hour, £5 for 2–4 hours, £10 for 8–24 hours and £10 for each further day. A week costs £45 pre-paid or £55 paid on exit. A lost ticket also costs £55. You can settle it at the guest services desk on board before you dock.
• Cairnryan has no shuttle and no station. What it does have is a stop on the A77 right at the terminal building, served by Stagecoach West Scotland 358 and 360 between Ayr and Stranraer and by Scottish Citylink 923. Stena’s own Cairnryan port page mentions none of them: under Train and Bus it lists the pre-booked Rail & Sail coach and the pre-booked Express coach, and stops there. Plan from that page alone and you would conclude no service bus calls at the terminal. One does. The 923 is the useful one, timed off the ferry, leaving at 10:15, 14:15 and 18:15 for Ayr and Glasgow and at 10:40, 14:40 and 18:40 for Stranraer.
• Then there is the stop name. The stop at the Loch Ryan Port building is “Cairnryan, at Ferry Terminal”, logged in the bus data as on the A77 near Stena Line. A second stop 2.3 km south carries exactly the same name and serves the P&O berth. Nothing in the name tells you which is which, so check the coordinates and not the label.
• Nothing meets the 23:30 or the 03:30. Stena admits this itself, in the small print of its own day-trip product: “there is no public transport connection with the 23.30 sailing”. Two of the six daily crossings in each direction are car-and-lorry sailings in practice.
• Cairnryan parking: 300-plus spaces, number-plate recognition, no ticket to lose. First 30 minutes free, £1.00 to an hour, £2.50 for 2–4 hours, £6.00 for 8–24 hours and £6 a day after that, roughly 40% cheaper than Belfast. Stays over seven days must be paid through the Horizon Spaces app, location ID 51212. Campervans are allowed, but only into one designated space, and not if you are towing.
• Terminal hours: Belfast 06:00–22:30, Cairnryan 06:00–22:00, seven days. Both have a travel centre, a coffee shop, a passenger lounge, free wi-fi, baby changing and accessible toilets; Cairnryan adds electric car chargers, Belfast a lost property office.

Day trips

Yes, and unusually for an Irish Sea route the operator sells the day trip as a product rather than leaving you to reverse-engineer the timetable. From Cairnryan, the Day Trip to Belfast goes out on the 07:00, 07:15 or 07:30 sailing and comes back on the 15:30, 19:30/19:45 or 23:30, at £20 an adult Tuesday to Thursday and £32 Friday to Monday, with a Metro dayLink card for the Belfast buses bolted on for £4. Out of Belfast it works the other way: the 07:15/07:30 across, a coach transfer, the 19:30/19:45 home. That is £30 for six hours in Ayr, £35 for Glasgow, or £29 bike and rider if you would sooner spend the four and a half hours in between on the Galloway roads. There is also a non-landing option, the £19 Big Day Out, which sails Belfast 11:30, turns round at Cairnryan on the 15:30 and never lets you off — bingo and singalongs both ways. Assembling any of this yourself, on foot, is harder than it looks. The return coach and the last useful Metro 96 both stop well before the late sailings.

On the other side

Cairnryan is not a destination, and the operator is honest about that: its own port page calls the place a small village with a shop and a couple of B&Bs. A single row of houses on the A77, in other words, with Loch Ryan Port a mile north of it at the head of a sea loch. The town you actually want is Stranraer, ten minutes down the loch by bus, which lost its own ferry terminal when the crossings moved north to Cairnryan and Loch Ryan and has been rebuilding itself round the marina ever since. Past that, the A77 and A75 open up Dumfries & Galloway: Galloway Forest Park, the 7stanes mountain-bike trails, Threave Castle, the long coast road to Ayr. Stena’s own drive-time figures from the port are one hour to Ayr, two to Glasgow and three to Edinburgh. Elsewhere the same company markets this route as the Irish Sea’s fastest crossing. P&O’s Larne sailing is scheduled at two hours flat, so hold the two claims side by side before you take either at face value.

Booking

Three fare types, and the cheapest is the most brittle. Economy charges an amendment fee if you move the route, date or time: £20 a single journey with a vehicle, £5 on foot on this route, plus any difference in fare. Cancel an Economy ticket and you get nothing back. Flexi costs more, drops the amendment fee, and refunds in full up to 24 hours before departure and half up to two hours before. Premium refunds in full to two hours before and adds the Stena Plus Lounge, whose upgrade price Stena advertises as £20 on one of its own pages and £22 on another, plus a dedicated boarding lane that runs on this route and on Holyhead and Fishguard alone. The lane is closed to vans over 7 m and to anything towing. Booking by phone or at the travel centre attracts a fee, so book online. Kids Go Free runs on Economy and Flexi motorist fares for travel from 1 May 2026 to 5 January 2027, new bookings only and not combinable with anything else. On check-in, one figure overrides the rest: section 5.1 of the terms of business says you must check in no later than the time specified on your e-ticket, and that trumps every general number the website carries.

Sailing conditions

Stena’s terms of business are unusually specific about what happens when the North Channel misbehaves. Sailings “may be affected by weather conditions or port closures”, and you must be told about a cancellation or delay within 30 minutes of the scheduled departure time. If a departure is going to slip by more than 90 minutes you should be offered refreshments or a voucher and a place on an alternative crossing, or your money back for that leg. On a crossing of this length, under four hours, an arrival delayed by an hour entitles you to 25% of the fare for that leg, and two hours to 50%, paid in vouchers unless you ask for cash. Then comes section 6.11. None of the compensation applies when the delay is caused by weather that endangers the safe operation of the ship, and Stena spells out what it means by that: strong winds, heavy seas, strong currents. On the North Channel in winter that exclusion does a lot of work. Check the live route feed before you set off.

Practical notes

Accessibility

The accessible-travel section Stena publishes is a proper one, and it opens with a hard requirement: tell them at least 48 hours before you travel. That covers mobility aids, medical equipment, assistance dogs, travel companions and hidden disabilities, and if you booked through a third party the company asks you to ring its contact centre yourself so the request actually reaches the port. At the terminals there is a designated lane or parking area for passengers with accessibility requirements, ramps and dropped kerbs, a designated seating area for foot passengers, and staff help with boarding, luggage and walking aids if it is arranged in advance. Vehicles carrying passengers with accessibility needs are parked near lifts or step-free access where possible, though the company warns that boarding order follows operational and safety requirements rather than who arrived first. On board, most public areas are wheelchair accessible, with accessible toilets and cabins. Subtitles appear on screens on most routes, and large-print, braille and alternative-format safety information is available through Guest Services on some routes — the qualifier “some” is Stena’s, and it does not say whether the Superfast pair are among them. One catch belongs to this route alone: the Big Day Out cruise requires you to phone ahead if anyone in the party uses a wheelchair, walking frame or walking stick, because the number of places for passengers with additional mobility requirements is capped. Boarding may be by gangway or by bus transfer depending on the port and vessel. Stena does not publish which applies at VT4 or Loch Ryan Port.

Onward travel

• Rail & Sail is one connection a day. One. Southbound: ferry Belfast 11:30, Cairnryan 13:52; Rail Link coach Cairnryan 14:15, Ayr 15:30; train Ayr 15:35, Glasgow Central 16:26. Northbound: train Glasgow Central 11:00, Ayr 11:55; coach Ayr 12:45, Cairnryan 14:00; ferry Cairnryan 15:30, Belfast 17:45. Stena’s own wording, exclamation mark and all: “There are no Sail & Rail connections at any other times!”
• Rail & Sail does not run on 24, 25, 26 or 31 December or 1 January. Tickets are issued by thetrainline, and travelling out of Belfast you collect the rail portion when you reach Ayr station, not before you sail. The price list for it is still stamped “valid for travel from 1 June 2025”.
• The Rail Link coach keeps the same clock as Scottish Citylink 923 (Cairnryan 14:15, Ayr Sandgate 15:30), which also runs through to Glasgow Buchanan and, in the other direction, to Stranraer. Neither operator will say it is the same vehicle. Ulsterbus works the Belfast end, with the coach running Belfast Grand Central to the terminal in about 20 minutes.
• Coach & Sail with Ulsterbus covers Ayr, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling, Dundee and Aberdeen from £37 single, and the same ticket works inbound from Edinburgh, Glasgow or Ayr to Belfast or Derry~Londonderry.
• Hannon Coach is the only through-coach, and the difference is a real one: the same vehicle drives onto the ferry with you aboard and Hannon checks you in with Stena, so nothing is unloaded at either port. Belfast Stena terminal departures 06:45 and 14:45 on weekdays (10:45 and 14:45 at weekends), reaching Glasgow Buchanan at 12:00 and 20:00. Glasgow leaves 08:30 and 12:30 weekdays, setting down at the Belfast terminal 13:55 and 17:55 and Grand Central 14:15 and 18:15. It does not run on Christmas Day, Easter Sunday or the Twelfth.
• John McGinley adds a seasonal June-to-September service linking Girvan, Ayr, Kilmarnock and Glasgow with Donegal and Derry~Londonderry from €75 single.
• Dogs cannot travel on the Rail Link coach between Cairnryan and Ayr, and pets are barred from the Ayr and Glasgow coach day trips. Registered guide, hearing and assistance dogs travel free on all of them.

Vehicles on board

Stena publishes its vehicle bands rather than a price list. A low car is up to 4.7 m or up to 6 m long, 2 m high including anything on the roof, and 2.1 m wide; add a roof box that pushes you over 2 m and you must book the high car band, up to 3 m. Motorhomes, campervans, mobile homes and minibuses go up to 12 m long, 4 m high and 2.6 m wide on this route, and the vehicle has to be registered as a motorhome with the licensing agency to qualify; anything longer is booked as a 12 m vehicle plus a trailer to cover the difference. Trailers and caravans take the same 12 m limit. Motorcycles, mopeds, trikes and sidecars are all carried. So are bicycles, e-bikes, tandems and bike trailers, one per person, and it has to be a bike you can actually ride aboard; e-bike batteries must stay on the bike on the car deck and cannot come up into the cabins. A scooter is not a bicycle. Book as a foot passenger and carry it over the gangway.

Questions people ask