The boat from Largs does not go to Millport. It lands at a slipway on the east side of Great Cumbrae, and the island's only town is four miles further on by road. Everything about planning this trip follows from that one fact, including which sailing you choose.
Summer timetable 27 March – 18 October 2026 and winter timetable 19 October 2026 – 25 March 2027, both as published by CalMac. Read on calmac.co.uk and checked day by day against CalMac's sailing data on 1 October 2026: every date matched. CalMac — Largs–Cumbrae summer and winter timetables (PDF) · 2026-10-01
Four miles. That is the distance CalMac gives between Cumbrae Slip, where the Largs ferry lands, and Millport, the island's only town, and it decides how the trip works. Walkers and cyclists can cover it, but most day visitors without a car take the connecting bus, service 320 in Strathclyde Partnership for Transport's network, which runs from a stop five metres from the slipway.
The crossing lasts ten minutes, and that shapes the timetable too. Until 18 October CalMac runs a boat every 20 minutes across the middle of the day, 36 departures each way from Monday to Saturday and 33 on Sundays, with two more on Friday nights. From 19 October the winter timetable thins that to 22 on weekdays and Saturdays and 19 on Sundays, still starting before seven on weekdays and still finishing with the 20:30 off the island.
Nobody books a sailing here. You buy a ticket for the season rather than for a boat, turn up at least ten minutes before a departure and get on, which also means there is nothing to amend if you change your plans by an hour.
£2.30 takes an adult across and £4.60 brings them back, because every return here is exactly two singles. A car costs £8.70 each way on top of its occupants, so a driver and one passenger pay £13.30 one way and £26.60 for the round trip.
The catch is how long a ticket lasts. CalMac sells Turn Up and Go tickets here: the date you choose online is only a preference, it is accepted on any sailing within the same timetable period, summer or winter, and it cannot be changed or refunded. A summer ticket bought today is therefore no use from 19 October, and the same goes for CalMac's 10-journey tickets.
| Adult, 16 and over | £ 2.30 |
| Child, 5 to 15 | £ 1.15 |
| Adult with SPT Ferry Card | £ 1.15 |
| SPT companion | £ 1.15 |
| Under 5 | Free |
| Bicycle | Free |
| Car | £ 8.70 |
| Motorcycle | £ 4.35 |
| Motorhome up to 6 m | £ 8.70 |
| Motorhome 6.01–8 m | £ 21.75 |
| Motorhome 8.01–10 m | £ 26.10 |
| Motorhome 10.01–12 m | £ 30.45 |
| Caravan up to 6 m | £ 8.70 |
| Caravan 6.01–8 m | £ 13.05 |
| Baggage trailer up to 2.5 m | £ 4.35 |
| Trailer 2.51–6 m | £ 8.70 |
| Trailer 6.01–8 m | £ 13.05 |
Summer 2026 fares, valid from 27 March 2026. CalMac had not published winter fares on 1 October 2026 CalMac — Largs–Cumbrae fares, summer 2026 (PDF) · 2026-10-01
Measured slip to slip across the water, Largs and Cumbrae are 2 kilometres apart, a little over one nautical mile; the timetable allows ten minutes for the crossing. The slip is on the side of Great Cumbrae facing Largs; Millport sits on the island's south coast, and the bus from the slip reaches it along the B896 and Marine Parade. NaPTAN, the Department for Transport's register of public transport stops, still lists Millport Pier as a ferry point, but CalMac's car ferry does not call there.
The Largs end is built for people arriving without a car. Largs station, with trains to Glasgow, is about five minutes' walk away, and so are the stops for McGill's buses towards Greenock and Gourock and Stagecoach services to Ayr and Irvine; taxis wait outside the station. At the Gourock end, those buses stop outside the station beside the terminal for the Kilcreggan foot ferry, another CalMac crossing of the Clyde. The ticket office is on the left of the terminal building, with a waiting room, toilets and baby changing inside. Until 18 October the office opens at 6.30am and closes at 8.45pm, or 10.45pm on Fridays, and 8am to 8.45pm on Sundays. CalMac has not yet confirmed its winter hours.
On the island side there is a slipway, a bus stop five metres from it and public toilets across the road, and not much else. CalMac staffs the slip from 7am to 8.30pm Monday to Saturday and from 8.30am on Sundays, and sends you to Millport for shops and cash. The local taxi number it gives is Millport Taxis, 01475 530555. Until the end of October there may also be a single-lane closure on the road just south of the slip, where roadworks began on 31 August.
Strathclyde Partnership for Transport lists service 320, Millport Pier to Cumbrae Slip, operated by Millport Motors, whose telephone number is 01475 530555. Until 18 October the CalMac timetable marks the sailings that meet a bus with a C: from Largs, the early departures and then every other boat, the 09:50, 10:30, 11:10 and so on to 19:10, plus the evening ones. The winter timetable carries no such marking. SPT's own leaflet dates from 2018, so this page does not reproduce its times.
CalMac's cut-off is short because the turnaround is: foot passengers and drivers alike must be at the slipway with a ticket ready to scan at least ten minutes before departure. You cannot reserve a particular sailing, although CalMac says staff may still take you if you arrive without one.
If one online purchase covers several people, the whole party has to take the same sailing in both directions. Buy separately if you might split up. Cyclists in a party of six or more are asked to phone the port ahead.
When a vehicle with restricted cargo is booked, CalMac may limit passenger numbers on the 09:50 from Largs and the 13:50 from Cumbrae during the summer timetable, and on the 09:40 from Largs and the 15:00 from Cumbrae in winter, Monday to Friday.
The route's SMS code is 07. Texting CALMAC SUBSCRIBE 07 to 60030 signs you up to service messages for six months.
Largs and Great Cumbrae both belong to North Ayrshire, and the route sits inside the SPT area, which is why the SPT Ferry Card and companion card halve adult fares. Since October 2015 fares have been set under Transport Scotland's Road Equivalent Tariff, which reached Largs–Cumbrae in the same round as the Rothesay and Mull crossings; Transport Scotland's own evaluation names Cumbrae, with Bute and Mull, as an island close enough to the mainland for cheaper crossings to draw shoppers off it as well as visitors on.
The summer is shared between two ships. MV Loch Shira, launched at Port Glasgow in 2006, is the largest of CalMac's Loch class; MV Loch Riddon, a drive-through ferry built at Hessle on the Humber in 1986, works this route in summer and CalMac says she spends the winter relieving other vessels around the network.
No. It lands at Cumbrae Slip, which CalMac puts four miles from Millport. The connecting bus is SPT service 320, run by Millport Motors from a stop beside the slipway; a taxi is the other option, and CalMac lists Millport Taxis on 01475 530555.
Until 18 October CalMac's timetable marks them with a C. From Monday to Saturday that means 06:40, 07:20, 08:05 and 09:10, then 09:50 and every 40 minutes after it until 19:10, then 20:10; on Sundays 08:15, 09:20, then 10:00 and every 40 minutes until 19:20, and 20:05. The winter timetable does not mark bus connections.
Not if it is a summer ticket. Turn Up and Go tickets, 10-journey tickets included, only work within the timetable period they were bought for, and summer validity runs out after 18 October. Buy a winter ticket for travel from 19 October.
The 20:30 from Cumbrae Slip on most days, both before and after the timetable change. The exceptions are summer Sundays, when the last one is the 20:25, and summer Fridays up to 16 October, when a 22:30 runs; drivers wanting that late Friday boat must book the vehicle with the Largs office on 01475 674134.
£26.60 at summer 2026 fares: £8.70 per crossing for the car, and £2.30 per crossing for every adult on board, driver included.
No. Neither day has a sailing. Boxing Day and 2 January run the winter Sunday timetable instead: 19 departures each way, the first at 08:15 from Largs.