Take the direct Southern train. It makes five stops and takes about 40 minutes to Eastbourne on a weekday, with the quickest runs doing it in 34. There is no change, and nothing else on the timetable beats it, so the only decision is which half-hour slot suits you.
On the weekday timetable we checked, trains left Brighton about every half hour, starting with early departures at 05:00, 05:22 and 05:52 and then nearly always at 26 and 56 minutes past the hour. That regularity means you can turn up at Brighton station without much planning: if an Eastbourne train has just left, the next is about half an hour behind it. The only real gap comes at the end of the evening, when the 22:26 was followed by a last train at 23:37, more than an hour later. The 05:00, first of the day, reaches Eastbourne at about 05:40, and that 23:37 at about twenty past midnight.
The train beats the car on this run, too. By road the trip is 26 miles on the A27 and takes about 51 minutes, roughly ten minutes longer than the rail journey from Brighton.
Journey searches sometimes suggest changing at Haywards Heath, Wivelsfield or Lewes. The Haywards Heath version took about an hour and the Wivelsfield one about an hour and twenty minutes, so they make sense only if a direct Eastbourne train has been cancelled. One Lewes change, leaving Brighton at 17:06, took 46 minutes: close to the direct time, but with a change thrown in for no benefit.
From Eastbourne station, Terminus Road is about eight minutes on foot, just under 600 metres away, so leaving Brighton on a direct train puts you in the middle of Eastbourne in about 50 minutes.
Journey times and changes below come from the rail and bus timetables for Tuesday 1 December 2026. Weekend and holiday timetables differ, so check the day you travel.
From Brighton on the weekday we checked: about every half hour between 05:00 and 23:37.
By road it is about 26 miles from Brighton to Eastbourne, mostly via the A27 — roughly 51 min with clear roads. Car parks in Eastbourne are listed on the Getting Here page.