Indian Railways has introduced the facility of checking seat availability online to help passengers plan their journeys and book train tickets in advance. If you are planning to travel on an Indian railway train on a specific date, you can check whether there are seats available in that train for the date, quota, and travel category of your description. You can search for all trains running between your source station and the destination station, and get the benefit of seat availability in each train for all available classes and quotas.
The availability of seats offered by the Indian Railways gives you the availability of seats in the train in the exact hours and minutes of your checking. This changes as and when the seats are filled in the train.
Where to Check Seat Availability From?
Earlier, passengers had to visit PRS counters at railway stations to get details on train seat availability. However, these days you can do it online through your smartphone and computer without stepping out of the house. If you have an internet connection, the following online resources help you get the Indian Railways seat availability calendar:
Official website of IRCTC
Indian Railways Passenger Reservation Enquiry Site
The mobile app of IRCTC Rail Connect.
Third-party websites and apps like RailMitra using their feature of checking IRCTC seat availability
When to Check Seat Availability?
You can see the availability of seats in any Train Between Stations 120 days before the date of travel. For example, if you are planning a trip on 21 October 2020, the details of seat availability in all trains running between your source station and the destination station will be accessible to you from 20 June 2020. Similarly, you can check the number of seats available in all reserved travel classes and all quota except Tatkal Reserved Quota and Premium Tatkal Quota, which are made available to the passengers one day before the date of the journey.
How to Check IRCTC Seat Availability through RailMitra?
The official website of RailMitra offers easy steps to online check seat availability without a train number. You do not have to be a registered user for checking seat availability online. Here is a process to check the IRCTC seat availability calendar.
1. Go to the official website of RailMitra or download the RailMitra App, and choose the “Seat Availability” option.
2. Enter your travel details such as Train Name Number, name/code of source station, destination station name/code, and date of journey.
3. If you are looking for seat availability in a specific travel class, select it from the dropdown menu.
4. Click on 'Get Seat Availability'.
5. Now, you will get the list of all the trains which are running between the two stations for the date and journey class you specified. The train list also shows the departure time, arrival time, and travel duration of each train.
Abbreviations used in the seat availability calendar
The seat availability directory of the Indian Railways uses certain conditions and abbreviations to indicate the availability status :
Available - Seats/berths work on the train and the date you searched for
CURR_AVBL - Current booking is receivable
WL - Waiting list
RAC - Reservation Against Cancellation
REGRET/WL - No further booking is allowed for the train on the date you searched for
Not Available - Seats/berths are not comfortable under the class or quote you searched for
