Is your bus really late, or does it just feel like it? Inside Singapore’s bus network

How was that? Was the waiting time for your bus too long or too unpredictable?

Why are some of us happy – and others unhappy – about how long we wait for the bus? In the 2025 Public Transport Customer Satisfaction Survey, the biggest satisfaction gap was linked to waiting times: 87 per cent of MRT commuters were satisfied with waiting times, compared with 77 per cent of bus commuters.

Trains arrive every two to seven minutes, while buses arrive on an average frequency of 12 to 14 minutes, according to ST's calculations.

As a result, some passengers may feel that it takes a long time for buses to arrive.

A bus reliability framework that includes tracking long waiting times and how closely buses stick to scheduled frequencies may not perfectly suit Singapore. The Republic’s bus model is one where buses are dispatched constantly at short intervals and do not follow strict timetables. This is in contrast to scheduled services, which refer to buses that run at fixed timings; for example, every 30 minutes.

Theseira says: “There is hardly any service in Singapore that runs on a scheduled basis. Even during off-peak hours, the frequency is not like every half an hour.”

The truth is, despite the drivers’ best efforts, buses may get delayed. More than 70 per cent of delays are caused by traffic conditions, SBS Transit says.

In 2016, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) introduced the bus service reliability framework, which tracks whether buses arrive at their stops in line with the scheduled timetables.

This is how it works.

• For high-frequency services that are required to arrive every 15 minutes or less, the authorities record the average of all the extra time passengers wait when a bus arrives later than it should.
• Lower-frequency services, which arrive in intervals of more than 15 minutes, are assessed by looking at how close bus arrival times stick to the scheduled frequencies.

The LTA did not provide details on what time frames are used to assess that a service is on time, nor the percentage of buses marked as being on time.

However, the authority said it works with public transport operators to set targets for each bus service. Factors such as route design, traffic conditions, road works and the time spent at a bus stop are taken into account.

It added that most services had exceeded targets each year between 2021 and 2025. Targets are also reviewed regularly amid changing operating conditions.

It did not provide specific figures.

Despite these efforts, why do some commuters feel frustrated waiting for the bus?

Five years ago, public servant Gerald Tan, 47, took the bus to work daily from Stevens to Newton. He had the option of taking four different bus routes, but switched to driving after the Downtown Line opened and the number of direct buses to his office dropped to one.

Bus routes that overlap with new MRT lines can be modified, rerouted or dropped to avoid duplication. Experts say efficient route design can have unintended drawbacks.

Theseira says: “A system that maximises cost-effectiveness can have undesirable results, such as commuters feeling that the new route adds to their journey time and introduces elements they generally dislike, like transfers.”

When he took the bus to work, Tan often left the office after evening peak hours. Even if he used the bus arrival app and got to the bus stop on time, the bus could be five minutes away one day and 25 minutes away on another, especially if he had missed the previous bus, or if he had worked overtime and was going home during evening off-peak hours.

The unpredictable waiting times made him switch to driving.

When he worked overtime and finished at about 8.30pm, Tan sometimes had to wait about 25 to 40 minutes for service 972M – more than double the peak-hour waiting time.

The planned waiting time for 972M was about 25 minutes during off-peak hours, according to the LTA’s data. The 25-minute wait can feel longer if you’re waiting for the bus alone in the warm night air, after a long day at work.

Tan says: “The drive to work takes about 10 minutes, compared with the 15 to 20 minutes it took to get on one of the four direct buses that went to my office. So, it wasn’t much faster to drive. Definitely more stressful, though.”

Researcher Henry Tan, 59, commutes from Toa Payoh to the Civic District for work every day. His most direct route to work is bus 145.

“I’m okay with transferring buses and I’m not so stubborn that I will wait for only one bus. If there are alternative routes, I will just take whichever bus comes first,” he says.

Henry is usually “quite satisfied” with the bus arrival times because he has never needed to wait for more than 10 minutes.

Most commuters The Straits Times spoke to checked bus arrival times on apps like the LTA’s MyTransport.SG before heading out. For instance, university student Aloysius Ng, 25, says he checks to see if it is worth waiting for the bus.

Bus arrival information systems are reliable, but when there are outages or timings are inaccurate, commuters get frustrated.

There were issues with the bus arrival timing system for about a month from Jan 10 to Feb 12, showing inaccurate bus timings and long waiting times at bus stop displays and apps.

Commuters complained about not being able to plan their journeys accurately and waiting much longer than expected at bus stops.

The problem was solved after the LTA cleared the memory cache and manually updated the firmware for transmitters on 4,000 buses.

There were glitches on other occasions as well.

Homemaker Esther Tang, 60, once got angry after waiting 40 minutes for bus number 3 from Pasir Ris to Tampines, when the Buses SG app had indicated it would be a 20-minute wait.

She decided to wait because the bus was the easier, more direct option, instead of taking a bus to Pasir Ris MRT station and switching to another bus from Tampines MRT station.

After waiting for 20 minutes, the waiting time on the app reset to another 20 minutes, and there was still no bus in sight.

But the 40-minute wait was a one-off occurrence and has not happened again, she says.

Tang continues to rely on the bus arrival timings on the app when planning her journeys, whether by bus or MRT.

Commuters make these types of decisions daily.

Transit planners suggest that some trips on public transport can feel longer than they actually are because of the added inconvenience built into the journey.

Even a short walk to the bus stop

Even a short wait for the bus to arrive,

An ST analysis found that half of all bus trips in Singapore are less than 2.4km. In some cases, waiting and walking times can be longer than the trip itself.

But sometimes, short bus waits are not all that matter to passengers.

There are similarities in the way Kylie Tay, finance manager, and Tim M., corporate communications executive, commute to work. Both of them take bus service 190 from Bukit Panjang and get on the train at Stevens MRT to reach their offices in Bugis and Napier.

Tay, 34, says she waits five minutes for the bus – a short wait. Tim, on the other hand, says his bus arrives in seven-minute intervals, which he finds a little too long.

“I think it’s fast, although the bus is always packed,” says Tay of her wait. By and large, she is satisfied with the weekday peak service for bus 190 and feels that waiting times of up to 10 minutes are acceptable, though she would like buses to arrive more frequently on weekends.

Tim gets annoyed when he sees buses bunching together – or multiple buses showing up at the same time after a long wait. Buses should arrive every four to five minutes during peak times, he says. He is not satisfied with the bus timings, but his two- to three-minute walk to the bus stop trumps walking 10 to 15 minutes to the MRT station.

To prevent bunching, bus drivers are instructed to slow down, wait a little longer at bus stops or skip one stop, says Theseira. For a few long routes, more buses can be grafted onto the route midway during peak hours.

Theseira says: “The longer the bus route, the more opportunity there is for delays. Bus bunching is one key reason for extraordinarily long waiting times.”

A short wait for the bus is not the only part of a good commute for civil servant Genevieve Koh, 36, whose two young children – aged one and four – are often in tow when she takes public transport.

A good bus ride for Koh means ample space, as well as bus drivers who move at a safe speed and wait for people to sit before moving off. She also prefers buses with two doors instead of three, as she finds the latter buses’ steps too steep and the aisles too narrow.

Buses will boost first- and last-mile connectivity as the MRT network continues to expand, says the LTA.

Some examples are peak-hour limited-stop bus services with more direct routes to MRT stations. Peak-hour express bus services can also be an alternative option for residents to travel to and from the city.

Resources are limited, adds the LTA, so regular feeder and trunk bus services that help offer first- and last-mile coverage are accorded higher priority.