Germany’s Rail Giant Is Finally Letting Italy’s Fastest Train In

Deutsche Bahn put its 2027 long-distance timetable on sale on October 14, and the headline addition is a guest from Italy. From summer 2027, Trenitalia’s Frecciarossa will run one daily train pair from Munich to Milan and a second from Munich to Rome, the first time the red high-speed trains serve Germany. The timetable itself takes effect on December 13, 2026.

Behind that sits a bigger international push. DB says it will run more than 320 cross-border long-distance services per day, about 20 percent more than five years ago, connecting more than 200 cities in 14 countries with Germany. Stuttgart to Paris rises to 12 daily trains, two more than today, while Frankfurt, Nuremberg and Vienna get 14 trains a day after the Nuremberg to Passau corridor renewal finished.

Travelers heading north benefit too. Hamburg to Copenhagen gets seven trains per direction each day from March 2027, running roughly every two hours from the morning. Inside Germany, the ICE Sprinter network grows to about 70 services daily, including a new Hamburg to Munich Sprinter that stops only in Hanover and Nuremberg and takes 5 hours 20 minutes, three times per direction.

DB is also folding more rail partners into its own booking tools. Tickets from ÖBB, SBB, Trenitalia, SNCF, Eurostar, SJ and National Rail are being integrated through the OSDM standard, which the railway says opens more than 10,000 additional European destinations in its website and app. The half-hourly Berlin to Hamburg service also returns once construction limits ease.

Sources: RailMarket, Deutsche Bahn