Places in this article: Samarkand · Bukhara · Khiva · Tashkent
Uzbekistan tours from Sweden and Finland: visa-free entry, flights from Stockholm and Helsinki and the best weeks of 2027
In the Gotland Museum in Visby lies the Spillings hoard: 14,295 coins hidden under the floor of a Viking-age building, and 14,200 of them are Islamic silver dirhams. Coins like these were struck more than a thousand years ago in Samarkand and in al-,Did you know? Tashkent means “Stone City”, but it was long called Chach Al-Biruni explained the name as Turkic tash, “stone”, plus Persian kent, “city”. The area was earlier known as Chach, written ash-Shash by the Arabs, and Chachkand became Tashkand only after the 11th century. In 2009 the city marked 2,200 years. Read more → today’s Tashkent. The journey they took for decades now takes a day: from Stockholm or Helsinki with one change, and on a Swedish or Finnish passport without a .Entry rules depend on your passport. Once you are here, each stay must be registered within three days, and hotels do it for you; customs and registration rules are in our guide. Read more → We are a tour operator in Tashkent, and this is our guide to Uzbekistan tours from Sweden and Finland: entry rules, connections, the best weeks around sportlov, hiihtoloma and midsummer 2027, and the Nordic travellers who came here before you.
Entry for Swedish and Finnish citizens: 30 days without a visa
Citizens of Sweden and Finland enter Uzbekistan without a visa and can stay for up to 30 days, counted from the day they cross the border. Both countries have been on the visa-free list since 1 February 2019, and so have Norway and Denmark, so Norwegian and Danish passports get the same 30 days. For a longer stay, or to work, you need a visa before you travel.
Travel on your passport. It must be valid for the whole trip, and we recommend at least six months left on the day you fly. Keep it at hand: you need it at hotels, when you buy train tickets and when you change money.
Every foreign visitor is registered within three days of arrival. Hotels do it at check-in through the national E-mehmon system, so in a hotel you do nothing yourself. For a night in a village home, we check in advance how it is done there. Keep the registration slips until you fly home. Details are in our article on registration and customs and in our visa guide.
Take out travel insurance that covers medical treatment in Uzbekistan for every day of the trip; our article on travel insurance explains what to look for. While you travel, our office in Tashkent is reachable 24/7.
From Stockholm and Helsinki: one change
There are no nonstop flights from Stockholm or Helsinki to Tashkent in the current timetable. Three connections work well:
- Through Frankfurt. Lufthansa and Condor fly from Stockholm Arlanda in about 2 h 10 min; Finnair and Lufthansa City Airlines fly from Helsinki in about 2 h 40 min. From Frankfurt, Uzbekistan Airways, Qanot Sharq and Centrum Air fly nonstop to Tashkent in about 6 h 20 min.
- Through Istanbul. Turkish Airlines and Pegasus fly from both Stockholm and Helsinki, and AJet also from Stockholm, in about 3 h 30 min to 3 h 50 min. From Istanbul, Turkish Airlines, Uzbekistan Airways, Centrum Air and Qanot Sharq continue to Tashkent in 4 h 20 min to 4 h 50 min.
- Through Riga. airBaltic flies to Riga in about an hour from both cities, and so do Ryanair and Norwegian from Stockholm and Finnair from Helsinki. From Riga, Uzbekistan Airways flies to Tashkent on certain days in about five hours.
Days and times change between the winter and summer timetables, so check yours when you book. More routes are in our guide to flights to Uzbekistan.
Tashkent is on UTC+5 all year, with no summer time: four hours ahead of Stockholm and three ahead of Helsinki in winter, three and two in summer. Many flights land late in the evening or at dawn, so we plan the first night around your arrival. We can also arrange fast-track passport control and a car to your hotel.
Silver from Samarkand, Hedin in Bukhara, Mannerheim in Samarkand
Scandinavian museums hold almost 500,000 dirhams, more than anywhere else in the world, and more than 350 dirham hoards have been recorded on Gotland alone. Many were struck by the Samanid emirs in Samarkand and al-Shash and reached the Baltic along the rivers of Eastern Europe, valued above all for their silver. The same dynasty gave its name to the brick Samanid Mausoleum in Bukhara, where the bricks stand at different depths and the pattern shifts as the sun moves: flat at noon, deep in the low light of morning.
In September 1890 the young Swedish geographer Sven Hedin, who had gone to Persia as interpreter to a Swedish legation, set off from Tehran along the caravan road through Bukhara, Samarkand and Tashkent to Kashgar, and was home in Stockholm in March 1891. He described the journey in Genom Khorasan och Turkestan, in English Through Khorasan and Turkestan.
In 1906 Carl Gustaf Mannerheim joined a French scientific party in Samarkand and set off from Andijan, in the Fergana Valley, on a journey across Asia that lasted two years. He collected almost 1,200 objects for the National Museum of Finland and took about 1,500 photographs. Today the Uzbekistan's high-speed train: Tashkent to Samarkand in about 2 hours 10 minutes, Tashkent to Bukhara in about 4 hours. Tickets are tied to your passport. Read more → high-speed train runs from Tashkent to Samarkand in a little over two hours; see our article on getting from Tashkent to Samarkand.
Uzbekistan tours from Sweden and Finland: routes for 5 to 12 days
You book the flight, and we arrange everything on the ground: hotels, train tickets, guides and transfers, timed to your arrival. Your guide speaks your language, and that is included in the price: tell us when you book whether you want Swedish, Finnish or English.
The classic week, 8 days. Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva on our 8-day classic tour. How we lay out such a week is in Uzbekistan in 7 days.
On foot, 8 days. For those who spend their holidays walking, our hiking tour of Chimgan, Nuratau and Samarkand combines a day hike in the ,Did you know? Wild walnut and apple forests, now World Heritage Since 2016 the Western Tien Shan, shared by Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its lower slopes hold wild walnut and apple forests and the wild relatives of apricot, pear and cherry. Read more → two nights with families in the Did you know? The Nuratau ridge protects a rare wild sheep The Nurata Nature Reserve was set up on the Nuratau ridge in 1975 to protect wild walnut groves and Severtsov's argali, an endemic wild sheep on the Red List. Golden eagles and bearded vultures are protected here too. Read more → villages and a yurt camp by .Did you know? Lake Aydarkul appeared by accident in 1969 In the flood year of 1969 the Chardara reservoir on the Syr Darya had to release so much water that it was sent into the Arnasay depression in the desert. The water stayed, and Lake Aydarkul is now a large lake with fish, birds and yurt camps. Read more → More in our guide to hiking in Uzbekistan.
With a camera, 12 days. Our Uzbekistan photo tour goes through Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva and is planned around the light, with free afternoons.
The far west, 5 days. From Khiva, our tour of Karakalpakstan and the desert fortresses of Khorezm adds a night in a yurt camp and the Savitsky Museum in Nukus; see also our Karakalpakstan guide.
In winter, 8 days. From December to February our winter Silk Road tour takes the train through Tashkent, Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkand, with each day planned around the short daylight and, if you wish, a last day on the snow at Amirsoy.
Two additions that work on almost any route: a mountain hike with a guide and a picnic near Tashkent and, from spring to autumn, a night in a yurt camp by Lake Aydarkul. Not sure which route fits your dates? Try our tour finder.
When to go: sportlov, hiihtoloma, Easter and midsummer 2027
School holidays in both countries are set locally, so check your own calendar. The examples below come from official municipal calendars for the 2026/27 school year.
Sportlov and hiihtoloma. In Gothenburg sportlov falls on 15–19 February 2027 and in Uppsala on 22–26 February. In Finland, Helsinki, Espoo and Turku have their winter holiday on 22–26 February, Tampere and Jyväskylä on 1–5 March, Oulu and Rovaniemi on 8–12 March. Tashkent afternoons average 9.5 °C in February and 16 °C in March, with nights around zero in February: a mild winter, quiet museums and short queues. If you want snow, there is our ski weekend in the mountains near Tashkent. More in Uzbekistan in winter and Uzbekistan in February.
Easter and spring. Easter Sunday falls on 28 March 2027, and Good Friday and Easter Monday make a long weekend in both countries; påsklov runs from 26 March to 2 April in Gothenburg. Tashkent averages 22 °C in the afternoon in April and 28 °C in May: the most comfortable weeks of the year for the cities and for walking. Ascension Day, Thursday 6 May, makes another long weekend. See April and May.
Midsummer and the summer holidays. Midsommarafton and juhannusaatto both fall on Friday 25 June 2027, and the school year ends on 5 June in Helsinki and on 10 June in Gothenburg and Uppsala. We will be honest: an Uzbek summer is hot. Tashkent averages 33.6 °C in the afternoon in June and 35.9 °C in July, so in summer we plan the cities for mornings and evenings and add days in the mountains, where Mountains of the Western Tien Shan about 80 km from Tashkent: hiking in summer, skiing in winter, the Charvak reservoir nearby. Read more → averages 26.2 °C in July. See June and July.
Autumn. Höstlov falls in week 44 in Gothenburg and Uppsala, and syysloma in week 42 in Helsinki and in week 43 in Oulu. September afternoons in Tashkent average 29.5 °C and October afternoons 22.2 °C. See September, October and when to go.
Money, plugs, food and your phone
- Cards. Visa and Mastercard work at most terminals in city hotels, restaurants, shops and stations, and many ATMs give out so’m on them. Bazaars, villages and small shops often take cash only.
- Euros, not kronor. On 20 October 2026, 14 Uzbek banks listed buying rates for the euro, from 12,000 to 13,700 so’m; the Swedish krona is not among the currencies the banks list, so bring euros or dollars. Change money only at banks and official exchange offices, with your passport. See where to exchange currency and cards, cash and tipping.
- Plugs. Sockets are types C and F at 230 V, the same as in Sweden and Finland, so you need no adapter.
- Food. Uzbek cooking is built around bread, rice, vegetables and meat. If you eat no meat or follow another diet, tell us in advance and we will take it into account; our guide for vegetarians in Uzbekistan has the words to use.
- Phone. Roaming works, and a local SIM card is issued against your passport; read bringing a phone to Uzbekistan first.
- Water. Drink bottled water: it is sold everywhere, in many brands.
In short
- Swedish and Finnish passports, and Norwegian and Danish ones too: up to 30 days in Uzbekistan without a visa; your hotel registers you.
- From Stockholm and Helsinki, one change: in Frankfurt, Istanbul or Riga.
- The most comfortable weeks are in April and May and from September to October; summer is hot, winter is mild and quiet.
- Bring euros rather than kronor; your plugs fit.
- Your guide speaks your language, included in the price.
