Colombo Bandaranayake Airport (CMB) arrivals and departures Arrivals and Departures

For international arrivals, it usually takes around an hour to clear Colombo Bandaranayake Airport’s passport control and claim your baggage if you checked any in. Domestic arrivals to Colombo Bandaranayake Airport don’t need to pass through passport control, so take a little less time.

If you’re heading to Colombo Bandaranayake Airport arrivals to pick up a family member or friend, consider arriving half an hour after their flight is due to touch down.

We recommend you leave at least two and a half hours between your inbound and outbound flights, especially if you are self-transferring on an international flight. When you self-transfer, you may need to clear customs, claim any luggage, and then check it back in yourself for your next flight. Take into account that you might need to change terminals, or it could take longer than necessary to navigate Colombo Bandaranayake Airport’s departure lounge.

Check-in and baggage drop often close an hour before your scheduled departure time for domestic flights, and sometimes an hour and a half before for longer-haul international flights. As a rule of thumb, you should try to arrive at Colombo Bandaranayake Airport two hours before you fly, but check with the airline you’re flying with.

Don’t worry if there’s no information available on our live flight tracker. We try our best to pull it directly from each airline, but sometimes this might not work properly. Try contacting the airline directly or checking their website to see if you can get an update.

Don’t panic! If you are not already at Colombo Bandaranayake Airport, try contacting the airline directly to see if you can get on the next flight out, or a refund.

If you’re already inside Colombo Bandaranayake Airport Departures when you find out, head to the airline’s desk to speak directly with someone.

If there are no more flights to your destination with the same airline and you really need to get there soon, we recommend searching for a new flight with Skyscanner and booking as soon as possible. You can then try to claim a refund for the original canceled flight.