You will not need a car and you will not want one

The MRT does most of the work

Trains run every three minutes or so at peak. More than nine in ten people on the island live within a five minute walk of a station, which tells you how dense the network is.

Google Maps has live train times and is the only app you need for planning a route. Do not bother with a separate transit app.

Tap in and out with the same contactless card or phone you pay for coffee with. There is no ticket to buy and no card to top up unless you want one.

Stations are air conditioned, signed in English, and connected to malls and office towers by underground walkways, which matters more than it sounds when it is thirty degrees and raining.

Buses, and why they are better than they look

Buses are frequent and many are double-decker. On the longer routes they have Wi-Fi, plugs and seats you would not mind an hour in.

Same tap-in, tap-out payment as the trains. Tap out on the bus too, or you get charged for the full route.

The upper deck front row is the best cheap sightseeing in the city.

Rideshare and taxis

Grab is the default and the app most people already have. Gojek is the alternative and is often a few dollars cheaper on the same route.

TADA runs on-chain, takes no commission from drivers, and is usually the cheapest of the three. It is worth having installed as a price check.

CDG Zig is the official ComfortDelGro taxi app. Because metered taxis do not surge, it frequently beats every rideshare app at exactly the moments the rideshare apps are most expensive: rain, conference kick-out, race weekend.

A fifteen minute ride runs about six to ten dollars. Marina Bay Sands to almost anywhere central sits inside that.

Walking and cycling

The Park Connector network links most of the island with separated paths, so a bike is a real option rather than a brave one.

Central Singapore is walkable but the heat is not. Locals route through malls and underground links on purpose. Copy them.