Taking The ADO Bus From Mexico City To Puebla
If you are traveling to Mexico City, you should also consider spending some time in nearby Puebla. The city’s beautiful colonial center is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. And Puebla is very famous for its cuisine. Because it only takes two hours to travel from Mexico City to Puebla, you could visit on a day trip or spend several days. We stayed a week in Puebla and loved it!
So then, how do you get to Puebla from Mexico City? The most convenient and comfortable way to travel between these two cities is by ADO Bus – which is exactly what we did. Here’s a thorough look at our experience taking the ADO Bus from Mexico City to Puebla.
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ADO Bus Company
Bus is the ideal method for long distance travel in Mexico. While we love traveling by train, Mexico does not have a train network for public transport (other than Tren Maya which travels across the Yucatan). But we don’t mind bus travel and have used it for long distance travel in Crete, Spain, and Bosnia. And our experience riding the ADO bus from Mexico City to Puebla now actually outranks those various journeys. ADO buses in Mexico are great!
ADO is the largest bus company in Mexico with over 4000 buses in their fleet. And their buses are nice! The most common bus offered in this ADO fleet is the ADO Primera Clase Bus. These buses have cushy seats with good recline, decent leg room, overhead TV monitors, and a bathroom.
For longer journeys, they have the option for even nicer buses called ADO GL and Platino. These buses have fewer seats inside (for more personal space and recline), multiple bathrooms, food, and personal TV monitors. (Here’s a more detailed look at the types of ADO buses.)
So as you can see, using the ADO bus for long-distance travel in Mexico is not an uncomfortable experience at all.
Bus Stations You Should Know
As you plan to take the bus from Mexico City to Puebla, you should know that Mexico City has several bus stations. Buses leave for Puebla from both the TAPO bus station in the eastern part of the city and the Autobuses del Norte station in the north. You can also travel to Puebla directly from the Mexico City airport if you wish.
You should also be aware that Puebla has two bus stations. One is called CAPU and is located in the northwest part of the city. The other is called Paseo Destino and it’s located in southwest part of the city. These two Puebla stations are equidistant from the city’s historic center (about 20 minutes by taxi or Uber).
So as you prepare to book your tickets, you’ll want to plan your stations based on your lodging location. We traveled from TAPO in Mexico City to CAPU in Puebla. This is the best route for tourists staying in central Mexico City. And conveniently, this particular bus leaves TAPO for Puebla every 20-30 minutes (depending on the time of day).
Booking Your Tickets
Booking tickets for the ADO bus from Mexico City to Puebla is easy. I booked mine on my phone using an App called Busbud. While you can book directly through the ADO website, I found Busbud much easier to use. The App design is very slick and it’s all in English. You will pay a very small service fee, but it’s worth it.
Busbud will show you all your various route options, departure times, and travel times. Once you choose your route, you will also have the option to choose your own seats. After you’ve purchase your tickets, you’ll be sent a pdf copy of your ticket. Plus a version will be stored within your account on the app. At the time of boarding, you simply show the QR code to your driver. Our fare was 20 USD per person each way (including the service fee).
Alternatively, you can purchase your tickets at the bus station if you wish. ADO has its own ticket counter at the various stations and an agent will assist you. Because the ADO bus from Mexico City to Puebla leaves so often, it’s unlikely you’ll have difficulty getting a seat around your desired departure time. However, because I’m The Thorough Tripper, I always prefer the assurance of a ticket booked ahead. I bought our ADO Primera Clase bus tickets via Busbud about one week in advance.
At The TAPO Bus Station
The TAPO bus station is huge! I’ve been in airports that are smaller. As I mentioned earlier, it’s located in the eastern part of Mexico City – in between the historic center and the airport. TAPO is connected to the city’s Metro system, but we used Uber to get there. (I have a blog post all about using Uber in Mexico City. It was our primary form of transportation in the city.)
Once you enter the terminal’s main building, you’ll see lots of ticket counters for the various bus companies, a large central waiting area, and a food court. You’ll also find plenty of bathrooms. But these do charge a small fee via an automatic gate, so you’ll want to have some loose change handy.
The food court at TAPO offers a wide selection of fast food restaurants. So if you travel around mealtime (like we did), you’ll have plenty of options to choose from.
Near the ADO counters of the bus terminal, you’ll find a departure board for ADO buses on the wall. This is where you’ll find your exact departure gate information.
You’ll want to be aware that ADO offers an economy 2nd class bus option called AU, and the AU buses share this same board. AU buses will be departing for Puebla too. So be sure you choose the correct departure gate. On the board above, our bus was the ADO bus to Puebla CAPU leaving at 12:00pm from Gate 3 in the ADO GL hall.
(AU buses aren’t as nice, take longer, and only cost a little less than the ADO Primera Clase bus. They aren’t worth the savings in my opinion.)
Within the terminal, different sections of gates have their own waiting area or hall (“sala” in Spanish). These surround the large round Central Hall, and are well-marked & easy to find. These side halls offer abundant seating for awaiting the arrival of your bus.
Boarding & Luggage
As I just mentioned, our bus from Mexico City to Puebla departed from Gate 3 at noon. However, it didn’t arrive until about 11:50. Once our bus pulled into its bay, we passed through a quick security check and out to the boarding area….
…where our bus was ready for boarding. The driver scanned our QR codes and we were allowed onto the bus.
But first, I dropped off our bigger bags with the luggage attendant. He placed a tag on each, and gave me a receipt.
Ahead of our ride, I could not find much clarity on ADO’s luggage allowance. There didn’t seem to be any sort of luggage policy spelled out on the company’s website. Various Redditors and bloggers indicated that there isn’t a policy or a limit. But confusingly, our Busbud ticket explicitly stated that we were allowed only one checked bag and one carry-on bag. And AI summaries were inconsistent (imagine that!)
So here’s what I personally found about checked luggage on the ADO Primera Clase Bus. The attendant didn’t seem to care or keep track. We checked in three bags of various weights and sizes (all typical for standard travel). We boarded with two backpacks and a third bag filled with left-over grocery items for our Puebla Airbnb. No questions asked.
Inside the bus, we found just enough room for our backpacks in the overhead storage spaces. These backpacks were filled to a medium-sized width. It unlikely that overstuffed backpacks will fit.
Also, unlike our experiences in Crete and in Spain, everyone seemed to sit in their assigned seats.
Inside The Bus
Here’s a look inside our ADO bus from Mexico City to Puebla. The floor was a faux wood. The seats are generous, though the fabric on a few of them was a little worn. Entertainment monitors are scattered throughout the bus. Overall the bus was clean (I saw a cleaning person exit the bus prior to our boarding.)
The seats on the ADO Primera Clase bus are really quite comfortable. They offered good lumbar support and were very cushy. They had plenty of leg room and recline too.
The bathroom is in the back of the ADO Primera Clase bus (so you may not want to choose to sit in those last few rows)
This bathroom was clean and larger than I expected – very similar to many of the train bathrooms we used in Europe.
The Journey Itself
Our bus from Mexico City to Puebla covered the 76 mile distance in exactly two hours. We departed on time and arrived on time. It took about 45 minutes to get through the vastness of Mexico City. As I have mentioned elsewhere on this blog, the traffic in Mexico City is no joke. But once we left Mexico City, we traveled on a toll road through a scenic mountain pass up and over to Puebla. The journey was direct without any stops.
The ride itself was comfortable with ample air conditioning. Unlike the two higher classes of ADO buses, there isn’t any food offered on board the ADO Primera Clase bus. However, prior to leaving the station, a few vendors jumped aboard and passed through.
As you can also see the photo above, a movie played on the TV screen during our journey. And that’s my only complaint about ADO Primera Clase bus experience. The sound plays at a very loud volume. I’d downloaded things to listen to on my phone, but the TV was too loud. So I simply gave up and watched the movie. It was great Spanish language practice (as I point out in my post about the Dreaming Spanish language learning program.)
Arrival at Puebla CAPU
Upon arrival to the Puebla CAPU bus station, we disembarked and collected our luggage. As you can see in the photo below, Puebla CAPU is also a big station. And the arrival terminal is deep within the complex of buildings.
Though I would have preferred to have taken an Uber to our Airbnb in Puebla’s historic center, it was not at all clear where to order one. However, in the center of the arrival terminal I saw the Taxi Seguro kiosk in the photo below. Rather than wandering around with our luggage looking for an Uber pickup point, I decided to use one of these “safe taxis” instead.
I simply showed the attendant the location of our Airbnb on Google Maps. He told me the fixed charge for that part of town, and I purchased my ticket with a credit card. I presented the ticket to the next available taxi driver at the nearby taxi stand (through the double doors in the right upper part of the photo). It was all very professional and safe. The cost was only 7 USD for the 20 minute taxi ride. Be sure to have some pesos in your pocket to tip the driver.
Is This Bus Ride Safe?
Also, let me mention safety on the ADO bus from Mexico City to Puebla. I never felt unsafe at any point during this journey. The bus stations were safe, the bus was safe, and the roads were safe. This is a very busy and common route along a toll road. You shouldn’t have any concerns for your personal safety. Furthermore, we never felt unsafe during our entire time in either Mexico City or Puebla.
Final Thoughts
As you can now see, taking the ADO bus from Mexico City to Puebla really is a breeze. It’s safe and convenient and comfortable. And I’m sure that if you are using ADO to move you across other parts of Mexico, your experience will be very similar. One day I hope to get the chance to ride the ADO Platino. And when I do, rest assured that I’ll tell you all about it.
If you would like to read more about our travels in Mexico then be sure to check out these posts:
The 9 Most Essential Things To Do In Puebla Mexico