Traveling for Work from Dubai to Riyadh is Straightforward

Traveling for work from Dubai to Riyadh is straightforward. Growing up as a youngling and listening to friends of my parents and community talk about their business travel to and from Riyadh in the 1970s and 1980s, I know that today I have a lot more flexibility and wide array of options for me to identify the optimal way to grow the business and do more in between Dubai and Riyadh.


The elements you need for a short productive visit are listed below:


Airline Tickets: There are multiple airlines with multiple flight times and cost ranges. Every day.

Hotels: Booking.com, Trivago, and others have most of the listings in Riyadh. Note that you need to spend more time than you would expect to identify a suitable hotel as there are many independent hotels that you likely have not heard of. Go through the public user ratings first. What I do, is every trip I experiment with a different hotel to rule out the hotels that we don’t like and commit corporate visits to the hotels we are the most comfortable with and fits our budget.

Getting Around: Uber and Careem are widely available with a high number of taxis. This means that your wait times for pickup are less than ten minutes. Moreover, the key and common elements in the city are mapped out so you can be specific in your destination selection.

Internet Connectivity: Mobile data is fast and affordable. You can pick up a SIM card from Riyadh Airport. Moreover, the WiFi connectivity at hotels and offices tends to be speedy.

Food: Jahiz, Uber Eats, Careem Now,… are examples of restaurant marketplaces that can easily and readily get you food from all across the city (sushi, Middle Eastern, burgers, Indian,…). Moreover, there are many grocery marketplace apps that deliver.

Meeting Locations: This is generally not an issue as you are in Riyadh to meet specific people and it is usually at their premises. The meetings can also take place at your hotel. Moreover, there are more coworking spaces that are opening, so they are an option for you as well.

Opening an Office: If you have a growing amount of work and you are looking to get your own standalone license, look at the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA), the primary authority that issues licenses. There are costs of establishing a company, costs on an annual basis, hiring requirements, and costs of closing a company. It depends on how big the opportunity is for you in Riyadh, you will need to see if the costs make sense for you to invest in establishing a company is worth the extra costs.