How Much Does It Cost to Travel Around the World?

One of the most popular questions we get asked is how much does it cost to travel around the world. This was our biggest question also, before we decided to take a big trip similar this.

It costs a lot less than you probably think. Traveling long term, several months or longer, costs a lot less per 24-hour interval than what you lot might usually spend on a typical x twenty-four hours overseas trip.

There are a lot of factors that influence how much yous will spend…which countries you visit, the types of accommodations you stay in, how oftentimes y'all move betwixt cities, your mode of transportation, and how many tours and activities you do. In this mail, we will shed some lite on the costs associated with around the world travel, and requite you a ballpark estimate on what to expect if you have plans for a trip similar this.

Factors that Influence the toll of Long-Term Travel

The Countries you Visit

If you lot spend a lot of your time in developed countries (Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Nihon) your costs will be very high. In Europe and Australia, per person costs average $125 per day. For our family unit of iv, nosotros averaged $350 per day in these countries.

Asia, Africa, and South America are cheaper. In places similar Cambodia, Republic of india, and Nepal, you lot can spend as fiddling as $50 per person per day and still consume well and stay in squeamish accommodations. Our family of iv averaged $185 per solar day in Southeast Asia, $180 per day in Nepal, and $155 per day in India.

Planning your trip such that yous visit more than countries with a lower price of living will help you continue your expenses down. And that is what we did, while making sure they were notwithstanding countries we were interested in visiting.

During our 13 months of travel, we spent nine of them in Asia. We also spent six weeks in Southern Africa. These countries are on the cheaper end of the scale. We limited our time in New Zealand and Australia to seven weeks and we express our time in Europe to just five weeks. All of these are on the more expensive end of the scale. We also knew we could travel back to Europe in the future more than easily than nosotros could Asia because of the travel distances from where nosotros call domicile.

A budgeting resource nosotros used is budgetyourtrip.com. This is a expert resources if you lot want to go basic daily expenses for each land. Merely type in the name of the land and you will become an estimate of the average daily cost to visit that country. This is simply an estimate, only it gives you a starting betoken of how much you can expect to spend in each state.

Mode of Transportation

Your primary way of transportation will accept a huge impact on your upkeep. Plane flights are the most expensive, whereas bus travel is extremely cheap. If you really want to proceed your budget depression, limit your flights and fill up in the gaps with bus and train travel.

But recollect, y'all get what y'all pay for. Bus travel is a very price effective manner of traveling, but it's also wearisome and can get incredibly frustrating. When you are traveling long-term, you lot have the luxury of time, and so adding in a 24-hour interval for travel between Bangkok and Chiang Mai may exist worth the savings over the airplane flight.

What Nosotros Did:

In Europe, we traveled through Italia on the train and occasionally used the public buses. Once in Frg, we rented a car simply for the convenience of touring Bavaria.

While in Southern Africa, we rented a auto for the entire six weeks we were at that place. We drove a lot, merely saved a ton of money since we didn't have to volume flights for the iv of the states.

While in Asia, nosotros booked airplane flights for our longer hops and filled in the gaps with motorcoach travel. Nosotros did take an occasional flight out of convenience. For example, to travel between Laos and Kingdom of cambodia, it was going to be two jitney journeys taking over 24 hours that would accept price just a little scrap less than a aeroplane flight. In circumstances like these, it was a no-brainer to have the flight.

Nosotros toured New Zealand from bottom to the meridian in a car, our best route trip e'er. In Australia, we primarily traveled by car merely we did wing between some destinations.

All in all, over our 13 calendar month journey, we traveled on 90 buses, 56 trains, and 44 airplanes.

Pace of Travel

The more frequently you change location, the more than coin you spend. Every fourth dimension you transfer to a new place, you accept to spend money on transportation, which increases your daily expenditures.

Many people, when they travel for a year, hop from place to identify about every week or two. Some stay a month or longer, really getting to know a identify. And, since there are no transportation costs during this time, expenses are usually very low.

The slower you travel, the lower your daily costs.

What Nosotros Did:

We were dissimilar. Nosotros moved very frequently, averaging merely three days per city. In 396 days, we slept in 149 different places. Our costs were college because we moved so frequently.

For us, information technology was worth it. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity and we wanted to come across as much of the globe equally possible. It was exhausting and we were burnt out towards the end of the year, but I'd do it exactly the aforementioned once again.

Type of Accommodations

Accommodations can easily exist one of the biggest ticket items in your budget. So saving money hither saves a lot of money overall.

During long-term travel, near people stay in two or three star accommodations, hostels, or apartment rentals. If you are traveling solo, hostels are usually the most economical, considering y'all can rent a bed for the dark instead of an entire room for the dark. The downside is that you will be sharing a bedroom and bath with other people. Just on the flip side it provides a social surroundings for meeting other travelers.

Hostels and apartment rentals typically provide kitchen admission. Then you can relieve fifty-fifty more money by preparing your own nutrient when staying in these types of accommodations.

Of grade, at that place are always exceptions to the dominion, just accommodations in lodge of least expensive to about expensive are:

Couchsurfing
Camping
Hostels
Long-term budget rentals
Low-budget hotels and B&B's
Midrange hotels and B&B'due south
Luxury hotels and B&B's

When planning your travels, it'south easy to say that you will but stay in low upkeep, economical places 100% of the fourth dimension. Only every once in a while, it is really nice to splurge. After going budget for so long, those little extras y'all go at a amend identify volition really, really seem nice.

If you are traveling as a family, hostels usually are not more than economical, since they charge per person. We had much better luck in bed and breakfasts, cheaper hotels, and apartment rentals.

Another fashion to keep costs low is to combine your transportation costs with accommodation costs. Booking overnight trains and buses are corking ways to save money.

What we did:

Primarily, we stayed in 2 to iii star bed and breakfasts and homestays. A homestay is basically a room in someone's house that is set like to a hotel room. These were great because we got more personal attention, they were flexible with keeping all four of us together in the same room, and sometimes they would cook u.s. dinner (for an actress fee). And it was an opportunity to immerse ourselves in the local community and gain a improve appreciation of how the locals lived.

Nigh of the time, nosotros all slept in one room. This actually kept costs down, since we merely had to pay for ane room. In Asia, if we asked, hotel staff were ordinarily all-around in calculation cots or extra mattresses to the room. It took some adjusting being together all of the time, but it was ane of the main ways nosotros saved coin.

Every in one case in a while we did splurge, either to have access to a hotel pool, have a great view (a watering hole with elephants in Republic of botswana!), stay in a unique hotel (silos in New Zealand), or get a dose of luxury (a villa in Bali for our nuptials ceremony). Simply places similar these were few and far between for u.s.a. on our trip effectually the world.

Food

Nutrient is another detail that adds up fast on the trip budget. If you are really trying to keep costs downward, minimize your visits to restaurants and maximize your visits to grocery stores. Preparing your own meals will save money.

Dining out every 24-hour interval gets expensive, even in cheaper countries. Alcohol, even only a glass of wine, can beginning to break the budget.

Eating the local nutrient is much cheaper than dining in restaurants that serve a western carte du jour. Sometimes, your best bet for skillful, cheap nutrient are the street food stalls. Just choice a place that gets a lot of business concern and always seems to have a line to avoid a case of food poisoning.

Activities, Tours, and Multi-Twenty-four hours Excursions

This is the fun part of traveling and yes, you practice have to budget for it. Museum entrance fees, guided tours, zip lining, surf lessons, concerts, and excursions all demand to be accounted for in your budget. So, how much do yous need to add?

That'southward a tough question. The answer depends on what you lot similar to do. Hiking tin can exist an inexpensive mode to explore. Exploring a city on your ain and visiting the complimentary museums is a manner to go sightseeing for the least corporeality of coin. Add in a piffling bit of money for those other must-see sites. Once you start calculation in activities such every bit food tours or adventure sports your costs will actually get upwardly.

Budgeting for activities can be very hard because in most circumstances, you are non going to know what you desire to do until yous get there. And you do non want to fall into the trap of not doing anything because it will cost you money. Only remember why you are traveling in the get-go place.

If you program to practice a big ticket activity, such as going on safari in Africa, trekking in Nepal, or taking an expensive, multi-day excursion, put this money aside so it volition be easier to manage your normal daily expenses. Most likely, these are activities that yous are budgeting for during the planning stage anyway.

If in that location is something that you really want to do, then do it. You'll regret it later if you don't. But residue out the cost of the activity with your other expenses. Find cheaper places to stay, cook more of your own meals, etc.

What We Did:

One of the main reasons we stayed in cheaper accommodations and took more buses is then that we had the money to spend on activities. We wanted to feel as much every bit possible. That meant if some amazing opportunity presented itself, nosotros took information technology.

At present, that doesn't mean we did every single thing we wanted to. We did take to pick and cull quite a bit. And if we spent coin on an expensive activity, for the adjacent day or two we had to find cheaper food options to make up the difference.

Nosotros also felt like we would go more out of the activities than nicer accommodations, creating lasting memories of our travels. Turns out that some of our upkeep accommodations and cheaper nutrient options created lasting memories as well. So it was a win-win correct?

Those Miscellaneous Fees

Unavoidably, you will spend money on miscellaneous fees, such every bit visas on arrival, souvenirs, laundry, replacing worn clothing, buying new gear, and for other unaccounted items equally you travel. Many people propose having between $1,000 and $2,000 set aside to be used in these circumstances.

Pre-Trip Expenses

Unfortunately, there are more expenses to consider: those upfront costs that you volition spend even before you lot gear up pes on that showtime airplane. These costs include plane flights, vaccinations, visas needed in advance, travel gear, travel insurance, health insurance, homeschooling materials, etc.

So, How Much Does information technology Price?

In general, you should wait it to cost betwixt $20,000 to $30,000 per person to travel around the world for a year. This crude approximate comes from reading travel budgets of other bloggers, various travel planning resource, and our ain experience.

This is just the midrange. Yes, you tin absolutely travel for less than $20,000 per person for an unabridged yr. Many people have done information technology and written about information technology. Or, you could spend more than for luxury, traveling for $40,000 to $50,000 or more per person.

The bottom line is that if yous are a solo traveler, you should be able to travel the world for $25,000 for one year (that'southward just over $2,000 per month, $66 per day)!!

Desire to travel the globe as a family, like we did? Attempt to do so before your kids turn 12. About travel expenses, airline fees, activities, etc., are cheaper for kids under 12 years of age.

What'due south next?

If you are considering long-term travel, your next steps are to come up with a basic itinerary, determine your traveling mode, and start making your travel budget.

Hither are some more articles that can assistance yous as yous plan your effectually the world trip:

How to Design an Around the World Itinerary

RTW Ticket vs. I Way Ticket, Which One is Amend?

Our Around the Earth Packing List

One Year Effectually the Earth

Or, check out our entire page devoted to effectually the globe travel, including planning your trip, what to look on the road, and what it is like to finally come up dwelling.

How to Travel Around the World

If you have questions, comment below or ship us an email.

Thanks!

How Much Does It Cost to Travel Around the World?