Nairobi is one of the few African cities from which you can be in three different capitals before dinner. Most business travellers never use that properly.
The city is the hub
Jomo Kenyatta International is the country’s main international gateway and one of the busiest in the region, with dense connections across East and Central Africa and long-haul links to Europe, the Gulf, Asia and beyond. For a regional programme, that means something practical: Nairobi is often a better place to build an itinerary around than to simply pass through.
Leave earlier than the map suggests
The distance to the airport is short. The journey is not. Mombasa Road traffic is the single most common reason a well-planned trip starts badly, and it does not respect a calendar invitation. Build a buffer for the road, then build a second one for the queue.
Two airports, not one
JKIA handles international and most scheduled domestic services. Wilson Airport, on the other side of the city, handles much of the light aircraft, charter and safari traffic. They are not interchangeable, and the transfer between them takes real time. Confirm which one a domestic leg actually departs from before booking anything around it.
If colleagues are flying in
Kenya requires most visitors to hold electronic travel authorisation obtained in advance of departure, and airlines check for it at the gate. Apply early rather than at the airport, and confirm the current requirement for each nationality before travel — the rules in this region change more often than the guidebooks do.
Build connections that survive a delay
Minimum connection times are designed for a day when nothing goes wrong. On a route where a single delayed inbound flight can cost you an entire day, the extra ninety minutes is not wasted time. It is insurance you have already paid for.
A fifty-five minute connection is a plan. A three-hour connection is a strategy.
Use the layover
If your people are already transiting Nairobi, a scheduled day in the city can turn dead time into a client meeting, a supplier visit or a team session. The flight was going to stop anyway. The only question is whether the stop does any work.
Come and talk to us
Tell us where you need to be, and we will work out the best way to get you there — and back.