Olsztyn sits in the middle of the Warmia-Masuria region and is reached most easily by train. Direct services from Warsaw take about 2½ hours; from Gdańsk around 3 hours. The Olsztyn Główny station is a fifteen-minute walk east of the old town.
The small Olsztyn-Mazury airport, 60 km south near Szymany, runs seasonal flights to Krakow and a handful of European cities; for most international visitors the practical airports are Warsaw or Gdańsk. Long-distance buses serve the surrounding lake region and run to Vilnius and Kaliningrad.