The Moscow Metro is a rapid transit system in the Moscow metropolitan area of Russia. It serves the capital city of Moscow and the neighbouring cities of Krasnogorsk, Reutov, Lyubertsy, and Kotelniki. Opened in 1935 with one line and 13 stations, it was the first underground railway system in the Soviet Union.
, the Moscow Metro has 309 stations and of route length, making it the 8th-longest in the world, the longest in Europe and the longest outside China. It is also the only system in the world with three circle lines. The system is mostly underground, with the deepest section underground at the Park Pobedy station, one of the world's deepest underground stations. It is the busiest metro system in Europe, the busiest in the world outside Asia, and is considered a tourist attraction in itself, thanks to its lavish interior decoration.
The Moscow Metro is a world leader in the frequency of train traffic, as intervals during peak hours often do not exceed 90 seconds. In February 2023, Moscow was the first in the world to reduce the intervals of metro trains to 80 seconds.
Name The full legal name of the metro has been Moscow Order of Lenin and Order of the Red Banner of Labour V. I. Lenin Metro () since 1955. This is usually shortened to V. I. Lenin Metro (). This shorter official name appears on many stations. Although there were proposals to remove Lenin from the official name, it still stands. During the 1990s and 2000s, Lenin's name was excluded from the signage on newly built and reconstructed stations. In 2016, a Metro representative stated that Lenin's name would remain on station name plates as it aligns with the official name of the company, unchanged since the Soviet era.
The first official name of the metro was L. M. Kaganovich Metro () after Lazar KaganovichMetro.ru Original order on naming the Metro after Kaganovich. Retrieved 19 October 2007 (see History section). However, when the Metro was awarded the Order of Lenin, it was officially renamed Moscow Order of Lenin L. M. Kaganovich Metro () in 1947. When the metro was renamed in 1955, the Okhotny Ryad station was renamed as "Imeni Kaganovicha" in honor of Lazar Kaganovich. In 1957, the original Okhotny Ryad name of the station was reinstated.
Logo The first line of the Moscow Metro was launched in 1935, complete with the first logo, the capital M paired with the text "МЕТРО". There is no accurate information about the author of the logo, so it is often attributed to the architects of the first stations – Samuil Kravets, Ivan Taranov and Nadezhda Bykova. At the opening in 1935, the M letter on the logo had no definite shape.
In 2014, the Moscow Metro adopted a standardized logo of the network as part of a broader rebranding of the Moscow Transport.
Operations The Moscow Metro, a state-owned enterprise, is long and consists of 17 lines and 309 stations organized in a spoke-hub distribution paradigm, with the majority of rail lines running radially from the centre of Moscow to the outlying areas. The Koltsevaya Line (line 5) forms a long circle which enables passenger travel between these diameters, and the new Moscow Central Circle (line 14) and even newer Bolshaya Koltsevaya line (line 11) form a and long circles respectively that serve a similar purpose on middle periphery.See this image as an example Most stations and lines are underground, but some lines have at-grade and elevated sections; the Filyovskaya Line, Butovskaya Line and the Central Circle Line are the three lines that are at grade or mostly at grade.
The Moscow Metro uses , like other Russian railways, and an underrunning third rail with a supply of 825 volts DC, except line 14, which being directly connected to the mainlines with 3000V DC overhead lines, as is typical. The average distance between stations is ; the shortest ( long) section is between Delovoy Tsentr and Moskva-City, and the longest ( long) is between Krylatskoye and Strogino. Long distances between stations have the positive effect of a high cruising speed of .
The Moscow Metro opens at 05:25 and closes at 01:00. The exact opening time varies at different stations according to the arrival of the first train, but all stations simultaneously close their entrances at 01:00 for maintenance, and so do transfer corridors. The minimum interval between trains is 90 seconds during the morning and evening rush hours.
As of 2017, the system had an average daily ridership of 6.99 million passengers. Peak daily ridership of 9.71 million was recorded on 26 December 2014.
Free Wi-Fi has been available on all lines of the Moscow Metro since 2 December 2014.
Network
Lines
Each line is identified by a name, an alphanumeric index (usually consisting of just a number, and sometimes a letter suffix), and a colour. The colour assigned to each line is its colloquial identifier, except for the nondescript greens and blues assigned to the Bolshaya Koltsevaya, the Butovskaya and Troitskaya lines (lines 11, 12, and 16, respectively). The upcoming station is announced by a male voice on inbound trains to the city center (on the Circle line and the Bolshaya Koltsevaya Line, the clockwise trains), and by a female voice on outbound trains (anti-clockwise trains on the Circle line and the Bolshaya Koltsevaya Line).
The metro used to have a connection to the former Moscow Monorail, a , six-station monorail line between Timiryazevskaya and VDNKh which opened in "excursion mode" (i. e. as a low-frequency service used primarily by tourists) in November 2004 and started providing regular passenger services in January 2008. From 2017 the monorail switched to "excursion mode" with less frequent trains, before being shut down on 27 June 2025.Moscow monorail closes Tramways & Urban Transit issue 1053 September 2025 page 330
Note: Line 13 is the former Moscow Monorail that was disestablished in 2025. The lines are still numbered as if the line were there.
+Lines of Moscow Metro Icon Line Name First opened Latestextension Length(km) Stations Avg. dist.EnglishRussian Sokolnicheskaya Сокольническая 1935 2024-09-0543.4 271.61 Zamoskvoretskaya Замоскворецкая 1938-09 201843.0 241.86 Arbatsko-Pokrovskaya Арбатско-Покровская 1938-03 201245.9 222.15 Filyovskaya Филёвская 200614.5 131.24 Koltsevaya (Circle) Кольцевая 1950 195419.3121.61 Kaluzhsko-Rizhskaya Калужско-Рижская 1958 199037.6 241.63 Tagansko-Krasnopresnenskaya Таганско-Краснопресненская 1966 2015-0842.3 231.92 KalininskayaKalininsko-Solntsevskaya Line currently operates as two separate sections, between Novokosino and Tretyakovskaya and between Aeroport Vnukovo and Delovoy Tsentr. Калининская 1979 201216.3 82.36 Solntsevskaya Солнцевская 2014 2023-0128.3 142.02 Serpukhovsko-Timiryazevskaya Серпуховско-Тимирязевская 1983 200241.5 251.72 Lyublinsko-Dmitrovskaya Люблинско-Дмитровская 1995 202344.0 261.77 Bolshaya Koltsevaya (Big Circle) Большая кольцевая 2018 202357.6 291.98 Butovskaya Бутовская 2003 2014-0210.0 71.67 Moscow Central Circle(MCC) Operated by Moscow Metro, though the service and the rolling stock are outsourced to Russian Railways. Uses the same fares and tickets as the metro system, allowing for free transfers between the Moscow Central Circle and other lines of Moscow Metro proper. Московское центральное кольцо 2016 201654.0 311.74NekrasovskayaНекрасовская2019 202013.9 81.75TroitskayaТроицкая2024-09-06 2025-09-06 23.9 112.17Rublyovo-ArkhangelskayaРублёво-Архангельская202620266.7 51.33Total541.9 3091.75Other urban rail linesParts of already existing suburban rail lines that have been integrated into the metro system within the boundaries of Moscow Central Diameters (MCD). The MCD lines use the same ticket system as the Moscow Metro proper but, unlike the rest of the network, the MCD has different fare zones and does not have free transfers onto other metro lines. Belorussko-Savyolovsky diameter Белорусско-Савёловский диаметр 2019 202052262.0 Kursko-Rizhsky diameter Курско-Рижский диаметр 2019 202380372.16 Leningradsko-Kazansky diameter Ленинградско-Казанский диаметр 2023 202485392.13 Kaluzhsko-Nizhegorodsky diameter Калужско-Нижегородский диаметр 2023 202386362.39 Total8454471.89
Additionally, from 11 August 1969 to 26 October 2019, the Moscow Metro included Kakhovskaya line along with 3 stations, which closed for a long reconstruction. On 7 December 2021, Kakhovskaya was reopened after reconstruction as part of the Bolshaya Koltsevaya line. The renewed Varshavskaya and Kashirskaya stations reopened as part of the Bolshaya Koltsevaya line, which became fully functional on 1 March 2023. Its new stations included Pechatniki, Nagatinsky Zaton and Klenovy Bulvar.
Renamed lines Sokolnicheskaya line was previously named Kirovsko-Frunzenskaya Zamoskvoretskaya line was previously named Gorkovsko-Zamoskvoretskaya. Filyovskaya line was previously named Arbatsko-Filyovskaya. Tagansko-Krasnopresnenskaya line was previously named Zhdanovsko-Krasnopresnenskaya
History
The first plans for a metro system in Moscow date back to the Russian Empire but were postponed by World War I, the October Revolution and the Russian Civil War. In 1923, the Moscow City Council formed the Underground Railway Design Office at the Moscow Board of Urban Railways. It carried out preliminary studies, and by 1928 had developed a project for the first route from Sokolniki to the city centre. At the same time, an offer was made to the German company Siemens Bauunion to submit its own project for the same route. In June 1931, the decision to begin construction of the Moscow Metro was made by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. In January 1932 the plan for the first lines was approved, and on 21 March 1933 the Soviet government approved a plan for 10 lines with a total route length of .
The first lines were built using the Moscow general plan designed by Lazar Kaganovich, along with his project managers (notably Ivan M. Kuznetsov and, later, Isaac Y. Segal) in the 1930s–1950s, and the Metro was named after him until 1955 (). The Moscow Metro construction engineers consulted with their counterparts from the London Underground, the world's oldest metro system, in 1936: British architect Charles Holden and administrator Frank Pick had been working on the station developments of the Piccadilly Line extension, and Soviet delegates to London were impressed by Holden's thoroughly modern redeployment of classical elements and use of high-quality materials for the circular ticket hall of Piccadilly Circus, and so engaged Pick and Holden as advisors to Moscow's metro system. Partly because of this connection, the design of Gants Hill tube station, which was completed in 1947, is reminiscent of a Moscow Metro station. Indeed, Holden's homage to Moscow has been described as a gesture of gratitude for the USSR's helpful role in The Second World War.
Soviet workers did the labour and the art work, but the main engineering designs, routes, and construction plans were handled by specialists recruited from London Underground. The British called for tunnelling instead of the "cut-and-cover" technique, the use of escalators instead of lifts, the routes and the design of the rolling stock.Michael Robbins, "London Underground and Moscow Metro," Journal of Transport History, (1997) 18#1 pp 45–53. The paranoia of the NKVD was evident when this secret police organisation arrested numerous British engineers for espionage because they gained an in-depth knowledge of the city's physical layout. Engineers for the Metropolitan-Vickers Electrical Company (Metrovick) were given a show trial and deported in 1933, ending the role of British business in the USSR.Gordon W. Morrell, "Redefining Intelligence and Intelligence-Gathering: The Industrial Intelligence Centre and the Metro-Vickers Affair, Moscow 1933," Intelligence and National Security (1994) 9#3 pp 520–533.
First four stages of construction