travel between Frankfurt, Prague, Vienna and Budapest

Unless you intended to spend time in Frankfurt I would suggest you fly on to Prague. Should be plenty of connections. Then I suggest you do Budapest last because its the most laid back of the three; while Prague is the most crowded and an be somewhat intense. If you want to go by train I would still suggest you just bite the bullet and take the long train haul from Frankfurt to Prague; but you will be trading an hour flight for 6 to 8 hours and a couple of transfers on a train.

Use the official German train website bahn.de to get train schedules. When you go to the site, choose UK English, not US English. For some reason, the US English site doesn't work well.

The train line from Budapest to Prague goes through Vienna. If you don't want to backtrack, Vienna should be visited between them. These cities are also connected by bus.

You don't say how you are arriving at Frankfurt or where you are coming from. You also don't say where you are going afterward. These things usually need to be taken into account to give you good advice.

We are flying into Frankfurt with German grandkids and will travel to Prague, Vienna and Budapest until we rejoin the family in Germany. I'll look at the British version of the train schedule. Thanks for the suggestion.

Hi,

If you fly into Frankfurt, you can connect to Budapest, or Vienna or Prague. The other way is to go by train to those places from Frankfurt am Main Hbf. Yes, you get to FRA from Hbf to get a flight to Vienna or Budapest.

I'll be landing in Frankfurt at the end of April and afterwards going east . I prefer taking the ICE train after Frankfurt and would suggest first going to Vienna from Frankfurt by train. That's a direct connection.

Getting on a flight at Frankfurt could be expensive. If there's any delay in landing, you could miss the onward flight. If you have tickets with separate carriers, neither will be responsible (or take care of you) if you miss the connection, and this includes if either carrier makes a scheduling change. Also, you will have to collect your luggage in Frankfurt and then check it in for the next flight. If your luggage is delayed, your first carrier isn't likely to send it on to another country.

So if you haven't got your tickets yet, and you want to fly, try to book with one carrier. As long as you're on the same ticket, they are responsible. Unless you want to spend a night in Frankfurt - there is what to see and do there.