There is no direct train from York to Whitby. The all-rail way takes TransPennine Express north to Middlesbrough, a little under an hour, then Northern’s train down to Whitby, an hour and a half more. Door to door that comes to roughly three hours, and the catch is the second train: on the weekday timetable we checked, the departures from York that connected with it were the 05:32, 08:42, 12:39 and 18:39.
Going east instead is faster. TransPennine’s Scarborough trains leave York about once an hour and take under 50 minutes; from Scarborough, Arriva’s X93 or X94 bus reaches Whitby bus station an hour later. Allow two hours, or a little more if the connection is loose. Because both halves run hourly, a missed connection costs you an hour rather than the afternoon, which is the real argument for this route on a day trip.
The price is an hour on a bus that makes 48 stops along the way. If you would rather keep your luggage on a train rack the whole way, the Middlesbrough route does that with a single change.
The wait at Middlesbrough on the all-rail route was about 20 minutes on the quickest run and about 35 on a typical one in the timetable we looked at, so a few minutes’ delay on the TransPennine leg does no harm. Missing the Whitby train is a different matter: with so few of them, build the day around the 12:39 or the 18:39 from York rather than counting on a later one.
Whitby station is about seven minutes’ walk from the swing bridge in the middle of town, and the bus station is six, so whichever way you come you step off within a short walk of the harbour.
Journey times and changes below come from the rail and bus timetables for Tuesday 1 December 2026. Weekend and holiday timetables differ, so check the day you travel.
From York on the weekday we checked: 05:32, 08:42, 12:39 and 18:39.
From York on the weekday we checked: about hourly between 06:18 and 21:10.
By road it is about 50 miles from York to Whitby, mostly via the A64 — roughly 1h 31m with clear roads. Car parks in Whitby are listed on the Getting Here page.