Flying from Riyadh to Cairo?
Add a departure date and see which side gets the sun.
Flying from Riyadh to Cairo?
Add a departure date and see which side gets the sun.
Flying from Riyadh to Cairo?
Add a departure date and see which side gets the sun.
Riyadh → Cairo
A medium flight from Saudi Arabia to Egypt. Your watch stays put on arrival.
The desert capital
Riyadh sits on a high desert plateau in central Saudi Arabia, a fast-modernizing capital of wide boulevards and an increasingly dense skyline. The Riyadh Metro's Yellow Line runs directly to all of King Khalid International's terminals, a fast and recent addition to what was, until 2024, a thoroughly car-dependent city. Summers are extremely hot and dry, regularly exceeding 45°C (113°F), with mild, pleasant winters. Outside the metro's reach, the city is still built primarily for cars, with wide highways connecting its sprawling districts.
Surrounding hubs
| 805 km / 500 mi | |
| 852 km / 529 mi | |
| 353 km / 219 mi |
The mother of the world
Cairo sprawls along the Nile in a metro area of more than 20 million people, one of the largest and oldest continuously inhabited urban areas on Earth, with the Pyramids of Giza visible from its western edge. The metro system doesn't yet reach the airport, although an extension is planned; taxis, ride-hailing, and buses cover the trip for now, and traffic can make it slow at peak times. Cairo's existing metro lines are some of the busiest in Africa and the Middle East, covering much of the city along the river. It runs hot and dry most of the year, with mild winters and very little rain.
Surrounding hubs
| 1,214 km / 754 mi | |
| 1,216 km / 756 mi | |
| 394 km / 245 mi |
Find out which side of the plane to sit on.
Pick your airports, set your departure time, and you're done.
We calculate the sun's position based on your flight path and departure time, then tell you which side of the plane gets direct sun and which stays shaded. No guessing, just math.
Enter your flight
Pick your departure and arrival airports and set your departure time at the departure airport. FlightSide estimates the duration and you can adjust it if you know the exact schedule.
We track the sun along your route
Your flight path is broken into hundreds of points. At each one we check where the sun is and which side of the plane it faces.
You get a recommendation
Which side of the plane to sit on, left or right, depending on whether you'd rather avoid the sun or enjoy it. The percentages and the map are there if you want to see why.
Want to go deeper? Accuracy, edge cases, polar routes — see the FAQ →
Notes from the product.
Small updates, route observations, and clearer explanations for how the app keeps evolving.
Type less, wait less, wonder more
Airport search now understands metro codes and old city names, FlightSide loads noticeably faster, and a new Feeling lucky button chooses a flight for anyone without one in mind.
A closer look at the route, not just the seat
FlightSide now shows the two cities and key details about the flight alongside the seat recommendation: confirm you picked the right airports, read the time change off two clocks, and check the return leg.
It's all about the sun (after all)
Not all sunlight reaches the side windows. FlightSide now weighs the sun’s angle to the cabin and shows twilight along the route.