I'm looking at a flight in June from IST-MXP on TK followed by MXP-EWR on UA. The connection time is only 45 minutes-- is this doable? I'd be in J so getting off the aircraft should be fairly quick.

On a single ticket?

If so (and barring all the usual issues with Covid and so on) then it might be doable, especially if on hand baggage only. Malpensa has 3 satellites connected with walkways to the main terminal. You're likely A, B and... B. You're likely to land in the latter of the lot and will depart from that one. Transfers have their dedicated security line, bypassing immigration. If you land in the latter of the B gates, transfers are on your left once you reach the main building. I'll get some screenshots if I can. There's normally no one transferring and the whole thing takes minutes. I've done it in 20' from landing to arriving.

Having said that, I don't know if transfers are open right now with Covid and everything, there's always a risk of a delay outbound in IST (old Atat�rk was always a bit of a lottery) and, while it's rare to have delays in taxiing in Milan, if you're in the unlucky position that a plane is reversing off-stand and you need to taxi past... you'll have to wait.

If you're doing it on a separate ticket, need to pick up o re-check bags, then the answer is no.

Definitely do not attempt this on a separate ticket.

On a single ticket, I wouldn't attempt this transfer as during IRROPS, unless you are able to enter Italy, most likely, you would have 24 hours to spend Malpensa's non-Schengen area which might be pretty boring.

Doable - yes. But don't expect any checked bags to make this connection - and, since the gates for flights to/from the US at MXP are located far away from everything else, there's going to be a fair amount of walking involved.

Almost a year later ... we'll be doing almost the same thing, except we're IST_MXP on TK and then MXP-ORD on UA. We have a 1:10 connection, booked on a single ticket via UA, and we're in Business.

This seems risky at best?

On a single ticket it's doable. I wouldn't check in any bags. Basically you'll land and most likely end up at the satellite formerly known as C, i.e. the northernmost one in the terminal (see photo below, is the one on top). If things haven't changed since 2020/2021 TK normally uses one of the gates where you see the two planes in that photo.



From there you walk down the bridge to the main building (some bright mind has put it all on Google Streetview!) and follow the green signs for Transfers (Transiti A/B).



Then you'll find yourself in a wide hall. To your right you have arrivals, which is where I believe most people are going to. Don't go there if you have your onward BP.



Go left instead, there's a barely-used security checkpoint and from there you'll end up airside and you'll be able to make your way to the UA flight. I'm not sure if UA flies out of the same satellite as TK or the middle one, but all in all the distance isn't huge. I think you'll have to walk about 5-600 metres.

Thanks for the pics!! We will need to check bags, but it's no biggie as we're on the way home and they'll just have dirty laundry in them. I'm now making a huge assumption that TK will check the bags through to ORD when we check in at IST.

If it's a single booking then they ought to. To be fair, TK even thru-checked my bag once when I flew standby with them! And it got there!

Thx. I forget to ask whether or not you need to claim and recheck your through checked bags at MXP - I assume not? What I mean is if TK at IST prints and attaches a baggage tag that says both IST and ORD, then the next time I'll need deal with bags will be at ORD.

Actually my hope is that the IST-MXP flight will be delayed enough that they'll just rebook me on the later non-stop IST-ORD flight.

No claim-and-recheck as far as I'm aware.

That was what I thought, and is typical for European airports, it's the US that has that crazy go to baggage claim, pick up your bags and then drop them 10 feet away.

If you are on a single ticket, they will for sure.

With all the recent travel restriction changes, I'm again a bit confused but I think I understand requirements for a IST-ORD flight connecting in MXP

USA passport holder who is fully vaccinated including two boosters.

[I will have all the Turkish paperwork enter the county so that's good.]

For the return flight, the best I can put together is:

Passport and us-issued Vaccine card will be adequate to get me onto the TK flight from IST-MXP

As the connection from TK to UA is all in T2 at MXP I do not need a transit Visa, nor anything beyond the Passport and Covid card I'll have anyway.

The flight to ORD has no paperwork required beyond my Passport and Vaccine card, and maybe a passenger locator card filled out at the airport.

Am I missing something?

Just closing the loop. The route is exactly as shown, We were bused to the terminal from a remote gate, and the escalator up took right the the start of the path. The security is right after you make that left turn, and there was no one in line at all up an escalator and our gate was a quick walk. The fact that we almost missed our flight was the fault of TK and had nothing to do with the MXP transfer process.

Bumping this to ask if the following connection would be the same as outlined above

Emirates flight from JFK-MXP landing at 11:55am connecting to an EasyJet MXP-Marrakech flight leaving at 2:55pm. Assuming we'll be able to do OLCI for EasyJet, but if not three hours should still give us enough time to exit and return?