It’s one of the first questions asked by anyone considering a round the world trip: how much will it cost?
This is our best shot at nailing down just how much it costs to travel around the world. It’s tricky to give an exact answer to this question, because every trip is based on different variables like destinations, timing, and traveling style. If you want to see our hard number, jump to that section. Otherwise, read on to see why a hard number shouldn’t always be trusted.
Which variables affect costs?
When you go – Timinghas a huge influence on the overall cost of an around-the-world trip. Prices in a given location can vary wildly depending on the time of year you’re there(also known as seasonality).
Where you go – Some parts of the world are more expensive than others. Europe, the United States, Australia, and Japan are going to cost more. India, Southeast Asia, and Central America will bring the cost down.
What you do when you’re there – Going out for adventures every day will bring up the total cost of your trip. Skydives, snorkeling, dune buggies, and ski slopesaren’t cheap!
Your accommodations – hostels, hotels, guest houses, long-term rentals. The level of luxury you choose will havea huge effect on your trip’s cost.
The type of food you eat – Eating at street vendors, supermarkets, restaurants, local homes or Buddhist monasteries…where you eat will alter your food budget.
What’s generally included in the cost of a round-the-world trip?
There are really only a few things that people spend their money on when they travel:
Plane tickets – Getting from region to region. The average cost of an AirTreks ticket tends to be in the $2500 – $3500 range per person, including taxes. Over the last twentyyears this number has remained fairlyconsistent. You can estimate the cost of your airfarewith our TripPlanner. If you need a generalized price for your budget, use$3300. If your trip comes in lower, that’s a bonus! Of course, business class will run a little extra.
Accommodations – These can range from the most barebones dormitory-style hostel to a fairly luxurious hotel or resort. Of course you can mix and match over the course of your trip. After plane tickets, accommodations will be the most expensive part of your travel budget.Plan on $20-40 per night in inexpensive regions and $90-150 in expensive ones. If you plan on hostels every night, much less. In cheap areas you can find a dormitory for under $5 and even in the most expensive areas, it’s rare to find one over $25.
Food/Drink – This item can range from supermarket picnicking, to street food, to restaurants. This will vary from meal to meal. Plan on $1-5 per meal per person in inexpensive regions and $5-20 per meal per person in expensive ones.
Activities – These are things like tours, museums, adventure activities, elephant riding. Of course you’re going to spend money on doing things.Can range from $5 to $200 each, depending on the activity and location.
Ground transportation – This includes buses, trains, ferries, taxis, moto-rickshaws, regular rickshaws, tuk-tuks, barges, speedboats, motorcycle rentals.Costs vary depending on how far you’re going and how fast. Taking a moto across town in Africa costs less than a dollar. Renting a Mercedes in Dubai might cost $500. Generally, though, ground transportation is a small fraction of your expenses.
Thegeneral consensus from travelers who’vedone these trips is that a year on the road costs somewhere between $20,000 and $30,000.
However, that is just the middle of the bell curve. If you prefer to live in the lap of luxury, flying in business class and staying at the Four Seasons, you’re going to have to pay a lot more than that. But if you’re a lowly backpacker, you could potentially travel the world for a year on $6,000 (it has been done!)For the sake of argument, let’s average a comfortable RTW year-long trip at $24,000. If you break that down monthly, a Round the Worldtrip will cost one person around $2,000 per month,taking everything into consideration. For many people it’s cheaper to be on the road than staying at home.
*This shouldn’t be taken as a hard and fast number, since variables for your particular traveling style are numerous.
Keep in mind that the longer the trip, the less you spend on a daily basis simply because you don’t need to fill each day with activitiesorspending expensive time in airports. This is the reason why we’ve said that longer trips can actually be cheaper on a relative basis.
If you want some further hard numbers on how much a round the world trip cost, there’s a selection of travel bloggers who have posted their numbers online for all to compare and to evaluate. The travel blog Jack and Jill Travel has compiled some of the best.The blog RTW Expenses put together a yearlong tally of their personal costs for a RTW trip.
And finally, AirTreks producer Gil Gildner wrote an extensive account of his 40 day, 6-destination trip around the world along with how much it cost per day.
So, How Much Does it Cost? In general, you should expect it to cost between $25,000 to $35,000 per person to travel around the world for a year. This rough estimate comes from reading travel budgets of other bloggers, various travel planning resources, and our own experience. This is just the midrange.
Oneworld RTW prices for itineraries starting stateside begin at roughly $3,500 for an economy ticket to three continents. However, that price climbs to about $7,000 for travelers planning to visit six continents. Those seeking to travel in business or first class should expect rates to start at more than $10,000.
How much is a round the world ticket? A round the world ticket can range wildly, between $1500–$20,000 dollars depending on your flight's mileage, your route, whether you're flying economy or not, and the number of stopovers, though a simple two to four stop around the world ticket might cost as little as $1,500.
A minimum of 3 stopovers must be taken on most round the world tickets (full Star Alliance Tickets require a minimum of only 2 stops). More than 20 stopovers can be had on the top tier of tickets. A city may only be stopped in once but can be transited up to 3 times.
Perhaps the easiest way to figure out your budget is to work backward and figure out how much will it cost per day. Several popular travel blogs, such as A Little Adrift, Never Ending Footsteps, and Earth Trekkers, all agree that a baseline of $20,000 per person for one year is doable.
Just take that $20,000 and divide it by 12 months to set your monthly savings goal. You'll need to save a bit more than $1,600 each month to make that happen. Or, if you're looking to travel for 6 months, you'll need about $9,000, which means you'll need to save about $750 a month for a year to achieve your goal.
3. When should you book round-trip air tickets? Round-trip tickets are only valid for a maximum of 6 - 12 months. Therefore, if you are traveling for a short time or on a long-distance business trip and have a solid schedule and specific plan, you should choose to buy a round-trip ticket from the beginning.
The length is totally dependent on you, the time and budget you have. Of course, it will also modify the number of countries / continents you will travel to. Most of the people that are doing a world tour are doing it for 1 or 2 year.
walking at 5km/h (3mph): 334 days or 500 days. cycling at 20km/h (12.4mph): 84 days or 126 days. driving at 80km/h (50 mph): 21 days or 32 days. flying Boeing 777 at 880km/h (550mph): 2 days (46 hours)
If you're flying domestically in the U.S., the cost of two one-way flights will usually be the same as a round trip; however, when flying internationally, it can be much more expensive to book two one-way tickets.
An around-the-world ticket is generally a series of flights that circumnavigate the world and start and end around the same general point, all booked as part of one airline ticket. The rules for around-the-world tickets vary based on the airline, airline alliance or mileage program issuing the ticket.
Can I buy a roundtrip ticket for a one-way trip? Technically, you can buy a roundtrip ticket and only use it to go one-way, but airlines frown upon this. And, you can only skip the return flight. If you miss a segment of your trip, the airline may cancel the rest of your ticket without giving you a refund.
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