10 Asian cities with the longest commute time to work

Across Asia’s rapidly expanding cities, traffic is no longer just an inconvenience, it is a defining feature of urban life. As populations grow faster than infrastructure, the time spent getting to work, school, or essential services has quietly become one of the most telling indicators of a city’s liveability. Using user-contributed data compiled by Numbeo, the Time Index offers a snapshot of how long commuters spend travelling one way each day, measured in minutes.
The Time Index measures average one-way commute time, but its implications go further.
Because these figures are based on user-contributed data, they should be read as indicators rather than precise measurements. Still, they highlight a shared reality across Asian megacities: time lost in traffic is becoming one of the region’s most significant urban challenges. As cities continue to grow, reducing commute times may prove just as important as building new roads or skylines.
Here’s how ten Asian cities rank when it comes to daily commute time, and what those numbers reveal. Data sourced from Numbeo.

The worst is Dhaka, whose residents spend over an hour getting to work and back again each way. Chronic congestion, over-population, multi-mode traffic comprising buses, cars and rickshaws and limited road space make daily commute a challenge to endure. It is just another fact of life in one of the world’s most densely populated capitals, for many residents.

Due to its coastal location, Colombo prevents development from spreading north and south, so it forces the traffic into a bottleneck network of roads. Driven by rapid urbanisation and an expanding fleet of privately owned cars, commute times have been pushed to almost an hour despite the city’s narrow geography.

Aging infrastructure, narrow streets, and high population density add up to long commutes. Suburban rail and the metro system serve millions, but surface traffic is slow, particularly during rush hours and monsoon months.

Despite possessing one of Asia’s largest metro systems, Delhi suffers from severe congestion. Urban sprawl has resulted in longer commute distances and road traffic is heavy as people keep switching between cars, buses and last-mile connections.

The ranking of Sharjah is inextricably linked to massive daily commutes from Sharjah to Dubai. Inter-emirate commuting between daily work and residence has meant that the major highways are often well above what you should expect for a city of this size.

Mumbai’s geography, sandwiched between the sea and a cluster of hills, channels traffic into narrow passageways. Millions may ride the suburban trains daily, but overcrowding on them and the lengthy travel distances have made commuting a reality for huge swaths of the workforce.

Frequently referred to as India’s tech capital, Bengaluru has grown much faster than its road network. Office hubs throughout the city have made peak times into almost nonstop gridlock even as the metro system grows.

Jakarta has been notorious for its traffic woes. Even though new mass transit systems such as the MRT have started to alleviate the burden, its vast size and reliance on road transport continue to keep commute times long.

Traffic in Tehran mirrors a crisis due to sudden motorisation and lack of substitutes for private cars. Worries about air pollution and congestion charges have had some effect, but daily travel is still slow for many residents.

Straddling two continents, Istanbul’s distinctive geography forces traffic across bridges and through tunnels that connect Europe with Asia. Even with ferries, the metro and buses, cross-city commutes often clock in at nearly an hour.