If you haven’t asked it, answered it or dreamt about it, you’ve probably Googled, Binged or Yahooed it. “How much does it cost to go travelling?”, “How much does it cost to backpack around the world?” or “How much does it cost to wash my knickers in Nepal?”
The way I arrived at the solution, was to invent and utilise the Birds and the Bees; birds being the flights, and bees being the beer, Big Macs and beds. The bees are a simple representative of the countries overall costs.
I’m assuming you won’t munch your way through a Big Mac or drink a beer every day, but the cost of these are relative to the cost of typical things you’ll buy throughout your day; a newspaper and a can of coke, or a brunch of spicy street food and a bus ticket.
Background Research
To give a fair representation of costs, I’ve researched the same itinerary for a Londoner, New Yorker and Sydneysider. All three will leave their city on February 1st 2010, and they’ll all travel clockwise around the world.
At the appropriate point along their journey, they’ll spend 3 months in and around Bangkok, 1 month in the region of their counterparts’ cities and a month each in L.A. – therefore half of their journey will be in the Western world, and half in the budget haven, Asia.
However, the main split will not be our traveller’s nationalities, but the type of traveller they are. So I’ve broken it down into these three categories:
The important thing to remember, is that no part of this study can be exact but it’s as close to the bone as I can get it. There are endless variants; special deals on flights, insurance, scoring free accommodation, falling sick, travelling overland. I’ve also omitted the widely varying price of vaccinations (mostly free in the UK), and the cost of basic kit (some people already have this). All of these will affect the final cost, so this study should simply be an idea of the typical cost of backpacking.
How Much Does a Round the World Ticket Cost?
All three of our travellers will need a series of flights. To obtain the average cost of a six month Round the World (RTW) ticket — that touches down in London, Bangkok, Sydney, Los Angeles, New York and return home — I went to STA Travel and two of the main alliances; OneWorld and Star Alliance.
The New Yorker grabbed himself a round fare of £1986, the Londoner £1906 and the Sydneysider £2031. For the purposes of fair competition, all were done under the guise of a 27 year old traveller — and surprisingly, STA Travel failed to secure any one of the three.
Is it Better to Buy Single Flights?
As a seasoned traveller, my opinion has always been that it’s cheaper to book single tickets, even if you do them all before you leave. For this study I spent a few hours at Momondo, Expedia and Sky Scanner punching in the various itineraries. This proved me right.
The New Yorker would pay £1459 (a saving of £527 on the RTW), the Londoner £1477 (saving £429) and the Sydneysider £1495 (saving £536).
How much is Travel Insurance?
I also ensured they’re all insured. I chose two of the most popular backpacker insurance companies, with the guideline that the insurance company should be able to cover all three of the backpackers. STA Travel and World Nomads both fulfilled this, though their main competitors appeared to be local to each country.
It’s also important to know, that even though I offer the World Nomads promotional code, TRLANT that scores you 6% discount, I did not apply this to these three theoretical travellers.
Unsurprisingly, World Nomads secured all three potential customers on price; New Yorker (£157), Londoner (£191) and Sydneysider (£220).
Alarmingly, if all three had taken their policies out with STA; the Sydneysider would have paid almost three times (£658) the cost for the New Yorker (£237) or Londoner (£223).
How Much Should I Allow For a Daily Travel Budget?
This is where it gets tricky, the typical daily spend is based on the aforementioned Three Bee’s; beer, Big Macs and beds. They’d all be spending c.90 days in Bangkok, plus 30 days in Sydney, L.A., New York and London (excluding their home city’s).
To research this crucial fragment, I spent forty days and forty nights on HostelWorld.com researching the typical cost of a dorm room in each of the cities for the Thrifty and Casual traveller. Then I dug a little deeper to secure the average price of a single room in a hostel for our Flash traveller.
So we know how many Big Mac’s, how many beers, what style of bed and for how long each of our intrepid nomads are going to be in each city. Their nationality only changes things slightly — for instance, none of the three will pay the rates of their home city.
For example, a Thrifty Londoner would need approx 30 dorm room nights in Sydney, LA, NYC and 90 dorm room nights in Bangkok. Plus for every night he’ll need one Big Mac and one beer. This would cost a total of £2964 for the whole trip, which equates to £16.47 per day.
What Should I Budget for Travelling?
I realise that travel isn’t merely about survival. There’s a need to integrate with a region; the temptation to splurge shouldn’t be thwarted. So, here are some typical things to do in each of the five cities, along with the typical cost to do it. You’ll see that I’ve only chosen one high-priced activity — more on that later.
In London they’ll spin round the London Eye (£17.50); in Bangkok they’ll see the Grand Palace (£5.40); in Sydney they’ll give in, and climb the Harbour Bridge (£132); in L.A. they’ll visit Universal Studios Hollywood (£42); and in New York, they’ll scurry up the Empire State Building (£12.26).
I’m making an educated guess here; over the course of six months the Thrifty traveller is going to do the equivalent of climbing the Sydney Harbour Bridge and everything else just twice. This doesn’t mean they’ll actually climb the bridge twice, merely that they’ll swallow the equivalent cost, twice. He might climb the bridge, and do a skydive or swim with whale sharks and take a helicopter flight in Manhattan.
So over six months, the Thrifty traveller will spend £418 on treats, which equates to an extra £2.32 per day. The Casual traveller will do this twice as often as the Thrifty and the Flash at least three times as much. So we arrive at £4.65 a day for Casual, while our Flash traveller racks up an extra £6.97 per day.
How Much do Travel Visas Cost?
Let’s not forget visas. This one’s quite simple for our group of travellers. Only Australia will charge the New Yorker (£10) to enter, while Thailand will charge them all (£18) for a 30-day visa. The cost of exiting and re-entering Thailand (because you can’t usually stay for 90 days) should be considered to be covered by the bees.
So, How Much Does it Cost to Travel?
You will have noticed the alphabetic reference on the sections. If you take A (RTW ticket) or B (PAYG tickets); then add the relevant Thrifty, Casual and Flash equations of C,D, E and F you arrive at the following answer to the question of ‘how much does it cost to go backpacking?’ Remember however, that this should be viewed as an educated guess;
Conclusion of ‘How Much Does it Cost to Travel?’
In conclusion to the above, I’m going to share some interesting points to emerge from my research.
Despite the fact that all three nationalities were departing on the same date — initially to different places — there was a difference of just £36 between the least and most expensive collection of PAYG flight tickets.
With regards to travel insurance, there is clearly a difference in approach to each nationality. Look at both national and international insurance companies. If you do decide to go with World Nomads, then you’re welcome to use the promotional code TRLANT to score a 6% discount.
The cost of a round the world ticket varies wildly, if you believe they’re worth the extra outlay it is definitely worth shopping around and bartering. The dates you fly affect the final price, and in my experience it isn’t an easy process, despite the agents providing various groovy tools.
As most readers will know I’ve been on the road for over two years, so this isn’t just armchair opinion. I collated all my costs after one year on the road in Asia in the post ‘One plus Two=Free‘, and the conclusion then was that it cost £16.60 per day. If I adapt this recent study by using purely the Bangkok rates, I come to a guesstimate of £17.53 per day so that’s within 6% and in my opinion, goes a long way to finally answering the question of “how much does it cost to travel?”.
And how much does it cost to wash your knickers in Nepal? Now you know how much it is to get there, why don’t you go and find out for yourself?
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I’d like to thank the following websites for being so simply brilliant: for the price of beer and Big Macs; PintPrice.com and TheEconomist.com; for hostel beds HostelWorld.com; for fuss-free visa info ProjectVisa.com; for the PAYG flights Momondo.com, Expedia.com and SkyScanner.com; for the RTW tickets OneWorld, Star Alliance and STA Travel; and finally, for travel insurance World Nomads and STA Travel.
Thanks Ant…what a great informative article. I wish I had this before my trip. All the budgets I found then were for bare-bones travel of around $35USD/day which I think is impossible if you want to have any fun. So, I really couldn’t gauge what my ‘casual’ with a occassional splash of ‘flash’ travel (Hello, Dubai!) style would cost. I’d say your estimates are right on. (My actual costs were higher but it’s because I took some group tours. On non-tours days, I spent right between the budget and casual estimate.)
(I’ve added my website above but I haven’t updated since April. It’s been shelved since I’ve been back but I hope to dust it off soon.)
Ant,
I’m clearly a “Flash PAYG” type of traveler… must be getting old man!
@Stacy: I think a lot of people underestimate the cost, as (especially online) it’s considered retro or cool to spend less.
This article is based on reality, and takes into account all the small things that speckle your day.
It is definitely possible to travel on $35USD, but over a period of time there’s bound to be spikes that will bring that up. For instance, a PAYG set of ticket would cost you c.£1477, which over a 6 month period would cost you £8.20 per day ($13.35USD). Over a 3 month period this would double.
@[F]ox: I think most people would pay YOU that rate just to travel and write about it, mate!
I’m just putting a post together myself about the real cost of travel. Before we set out three months ago we did some similar (although not nearly as exhausting) search to determine daily costs. In the end, we decided that our average daily budget of $100 CAD would work over the whole year. We also had some ideas of what individual countries would cost. We’ve been over budget almost every day! What happened? I think a combination of underestimating the costs in South America and underestimating our style of travel. We’re adjusting…our spending and our expectations of staying in budget…but it would have been better to know ahead of time. Good work!!
Thanks for your comment Gillian – would that be $100 CAD (£56) between the two of you? The feedback I’m getting from this post is really interesting, and affirming.
There are so many variants involved, but in the end — like you’re discovering — you find your level. Safe travels, I’m still loving your website.
Hey, thanks for that article, its nice that people actually put this stuff on the internet to help people out! i’m goin travellin for 5.5 months in hopefully march time. i want to go to thailand, through to bali, sydney (where i’ll be stayin with my sister) and gettin a hop on hop off bus to do the east coast of oz. i want to then go to fiji (only for like 10 days), then new zealand, then peru and then the USA.
I was wondering if you had any guess to the cost of that???? i want to have the money to do things like sky dive, bungee jump etc (so i spose i’m the flashy!) i’ve been trying to figure it all out myself for ages but nervousof not budgeting well!
Any help would be really appreciated Ant
Hi Tom. Thanks for your comment, it’s always great to hear such positive feedback. I wouldn’t necessarily say you’re automatically the Flash traveller. Staying with your sister in Sydney (a relatively expensive place for accommodating) will go some way to offsetting the cost of your sky dives and bungy jumps.
Without knowing how long you’re planning to be in each country; or your ticket plans; and presuming from your email address that you’re British; I can still take an educated guess that you’ll spend approximately £34-40 per day.
I hope that helps, perhaps you can come back in a years time and let us know how accurate I was?
Hi Guys,
i plan to go backpacking RTW for approx 6 months, im looking at places like Thailand (phi phi island), fiji, NZ, OZ land and then SE Asia. and Amsterdam to finish off.
the only problem i have is that i dont know how much i will require to take with me. i think i will need £6000. i intend to go “off the beaten track” for most of the trip and i will be living cheap whislt im away.
do you think this is enough? if not can you help me out?
Many Thanks
Jordan
Hi Jordan, welcome to the site and thanks for the comment.
I’m confident you have budgeted enough for your trip. I spent £1000 a month while travelling in Europe — and that included flights and accommodation. The fact that you’ll be in Asia and off the beaten track (which often means it will be cheaper) tells me that you’ll be cutting costs down considerably. You’ll be living on an average of £32.88 a day and that is a lot of money to spend in Asia every day.
The key destinations to watch your budget will be NZ and OZ, and I’m guessing Amsterdam is more of a weekender to finish off your budget. Which in itself, is quite a dangerous place to finish it off as you could end up so baked you’ll miss your onward flight as I almost did.
Let us know how you get on.
Ant
Thanks so much for the advice!! My boyfriend and I are leaving (from UK) for a RTW trip on the 29th Jan 10. We intend to spend 2 months in SE Asia (mainly thailand), 2 months in Oz (east coast), 1 month in NZ, 2 weeks in Fiji and 6 weeks in USA.
We have flights, insurance, a 10,000km greyhound bus pass for Oz, and a few other things already paid for. We will have approximately £9,000 between us for the 7 months and have relatives in Sydney and Brisbane we can stay with for a week or so each. We do not intend to work. How realistic is this?
Also do you have any tips on how to handle currancy? Travellers cheques? Cash? Credit/debit card?
Any other advice? What to bring etc?
With the assurance of relatives in Sydney and Brisbane, and so much of your travel pre-paid for already I reckon you’re budgets (approx £21.23 per day) will be fine, Claire.
Travelling as a couple also helps to keep costs down, you can split the cost of taxis, food, and as you’re travelling with your boyfriend, you’ll find it easier to take a night off from the bright lights of city bars.
In terms of handling currency, I always use my credit card. I load it with credit so I don’t incur charges for not paying it off — which is highly likely if you find yourself in rural Asia or the Aussie outback, miles from a computer safe enough to do your internet banking. For obvious reasons, be aware of carrying too much cash. Other advice around this, is to email yourself critical phone numbers — like your bank or credit card providers international phone number. Should you lose your vital cards, it’s imperative that you shut them down asap to avoid them being compromised.
Aussie, NZ and the USA are all on par with UK prices these days. Especially when it comes to beer and food. Just bring a positive attitude, and make the most of every day. Come back and let us know how your trip (and your budget) goes. Also be aware of the 30-day Thailand visa, I believe you can nip in and out to renew the visa, so plan that in to your SE Asia leg.
hi ant i am going to thailand for 1 year how much do you think it will coast me
That is the most subjective comment imaginable, JJ. Have you even read the article?
hey there ant, love your article (always wondered about my knickers in nepal).
what’s your opinion on tour buses in NZ? i plan on doing SE Asia and South America by travelling independently, but i feel as if getting a tour in nz ia good because a) it could save costs, and b) it might be easier to meet people on a tour in a more developed country.
any thoughts? would love to hear your advice! take care x
Hi Ant, Just wanted to say thanks for writing such a well thought out post and I think you’re great for replying to everyone also!
Hey Al, welcome to TrailofAnts.com. I think you’re absolutely right about your assumptions on saving money, and making friends. NZ is a farely remote country, so unless you’re looking to have escape people and stretch your arms on the summit of a lonely mountain, I’d recommend taking a tour. Perhaps use the big cities as stepping stones along your way, I know from my experience here in Wellington that there are plenty of places to meet people, and it’s a great city to put the brakes on and recharge the batteries (literally!) Let me know what you decide.
Kia ora, Kate. You’re most welcome. My philosophy with travel extends to the site, it’s not just about the content, it’s about the people. I hope to hear from you again sometime soon.
Hi Ant,
Your info above is great. My partner and I are currently planing a long trip and are in a debate about our daily budget.
We plan to go the India 3mths, China 2mths, Mongolia 3wks, SE Asia 2mths – As much as possible of this overland and then will fly from KL to South America and will spend 3-4mths there. Mostly overland here as well. Maybe a few cheap flights thrown in.
We have our flights to India from Aus and will purchase our insurance before we go. I would say we are between thrifty to casual, we stay in budget accomodation when travelling however do like to to be able to do or buy things if we feel like it.
I realise it would be a guess but would you be able to give us an idea of our daily budget? We are looking at aprox $50Aus each per day.
Thanks for this great forum!! Just what I needed.
I think you’ve budgeted pretty good there, Nic. From my experience in India, China and Mongolia you’ll actually find it really easy to stay on, if not under your budget. It’s sometimes quite hard to spend money, as although there are undoubtedly a lot of tourists, there isn’t an in-your-face tourist industry. The attraction is the country, not the country’s man-made attractions.
There are very few things that will cost you lots of money. Even when you take into account a week tour of the Gobi, you’re food and accommodation is often accounted for so you can simply split the cost up by the number of days and I bet it’s not far from $50/day target. Sightseeing in India is cheap, as is travel. The only big expense I incurred was renting a Royal Enfield for a month, which was a £100!
I don’t think hostels even exist in India, so accommodation is more expensive, but watch you’re not ripped off – easily resolved if you are. China has hostels in the main cities, outside these basic accommodation is super cheap, and Ulaanbaator has some great hostels, offering a plethora of value for money tours. I recommend Idri’s Guesthouse. It’s both cozy and friendly.
SE Asia is often the acid test for a travellers budget. Do you like to drink, take drugs and dissolve your travels into a semi-vacation? Well, your budget will take the impact. It’s hard to not to arrive in the party hotspots from India or China and not want a massive release, a few nights hitting the parties is well worth it – just remember to leave, and your budget will survive!
Thanks Ant really appreciate it. Do you remember which tour company you went with to see the Gobi? Is it easy just to book this over there?
I booked it through the hostel (which is Idre’s with an E, not Idri’s as I said originally). I think it was actually his own tour company. I went with a lady guide, called Tiggy (warn any single males — she’s quite amorous, but in a friendly way!) It’s really easy to book tours — as with much of the travel world, they make just as much profit off their tour side of things, as they do their accommodation.
Obviously you can shop around (although I remember the owner, Idre didn’t like this at all and he actually kicked out a couple who booked elsewhere — though he didn’t directly say it). Don’t let that scare you though, there’s very little between them all and reputation is everything in a small town like UB.
Hi Ant
My bf and I are planning a round the world trip leaving mid August. We were planning to go to Candada and some of the US (Grand Canyon, Yosemite, a few days in Vegas) etc. In total, this was going to be for 6 weeks and we estimated 6k including car hire, buses private rooms/motels, and food. Do you think this sounds right?
We then plan to go to SA for around 3 months and estimate this will cost about £3500 in total.
We then will go to NZ for a month – hoping it won’t cost more than 2k in total including campervan hire. Prior to travelling NZ, we will take a flight to Fiji and stay there for 10 days-2 weeks. I’m thinking it will cost about £500 to stay there.
Our final stop will be to Singapore/Bangkok and we will travel Asia for one/two months spending no more than 2k.
Do you think this all sounds about right??
Many thanks for your help!
Daisy
Hi Ant
I also forgot to say that the flight centre are quoting £2100 each for all those flights (except we have to make our own way from Vancouver to LA). Apparently this is a very good deal.
Taking off North America, they say it will cost £1700 each.
thanks
Daisy
£6k for 6 weeks in North America will give you a lot of freedom to explore, Daisy. Have you considered combining the car hire and private rooms, and renting a campervan? It could be the best of both worlds.
£3500 for 3 months in South Africa is reeling it back in, but you’ll still be able to live comfortably on that budget.
£2 for 1 month in NZ is a fair budget too. The campervan option is a great way to go, but beware of rising petrol prices (not far behind the UK).
You’ll get a lot for your £2k for a month in Singapore, Bangkok and the surrounding areas. They offer great value for money. Singapore is often highlighted as an expensive city, but in reality you can find really cheap eats which will offset the price of accommodation, plus there aren’t a great deal of expensive tourist attractions.
All in all, I think you have an above average budget so you’ll be afforded the freedom of choices wherever you go. The important thing is to keep an ear out for things you really want to do in certain places (swimming with sharks in South Africa, bungy jumping in New Zealand etc) and use these as stepping stones along your journey.
It’s worth knowing that since I left England in June 2007, I haven’t spent anywhere near as much as you’re planning to do. Granted, much of my journey was in Asia and living in a tent in the Australian outback, but the point is — you can expand or retract your journey to suit your daily budget, and without compromising impact.
Be sure to let us know how it went…
Cheers,
Ant
Hey Ant,
Superb and well-researched article, thanks!
Seeing as you keep answering questions, I thought I’d give it a shot…
I’m in Oz and have $5k Aussie (Let’s call it GBP 2.5k) to spend. I need to leave the country for a bit to get some visa shenanigans sorted (I’m English). What would be a realistic destination do you think and for how long?
How about South America? I speak Spanish and would love to see it. So flights are from $1500 return – 2 months out there on $3k? Should be do-able, eh? Those flights are to BA, I’ve lived in Brasil for a year, so don’t need to go there again, but I’d love to go to Bolivia, Peru, Colombia… It’s a case of internal flights driving up the price then I suppose.
Or do you think SE Asia?
Cheers,
Gav
I’m a huge fan of Indonesia, so that would be my knee jerk reaction, Gav. South America is high up on the list, especially after researching Peru for a recent article.
Your budget sounds spot on, regardless. With £2500 you could just about get away with flights home, and drift around Europe for two months. So quite honestly, the world is your oyster.
Shanghai is hosting the World Expo in May this year so might make an interesting side show, as well as the World Cup in South Africa.
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Wherever you decide, please consider insuring yourself with World Nomads using the promotional code TRLANT. Not only will it save you 6% on your policy, it will also help keep this site live and me answering the questions : )
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