Some European train passes, including Eurail, do not include intra-city public transport. Regional Tickets, however — like if you buy a Bavaria regional pass — do! Check before you buy to make sure. Night trains require a reservation though, so plan in advance. A bed will cost about the same as a hostel bed and should be reserved ahead of time. This is also a good way to save time and money. Many high-speed and overnight trains require reservations even if you have a pre-paid European rail pass.
There is also a small fee for reservations. Most trains within France require a reservation, but you can make a reservation at the train station! For example, Germany has an extensive rail network, mostly monopolized by Deutsche Bahn, which controls the rail system and metro system in cities.
This is definitely the cheapest way to travel! And remember, regional trains do not have a restaurant car! Sometimes train travel is cheaper and more convenient. Other times the bus is.
Flights are a cheaper, faster way to jump countries. Check out this post I wrote on how to find the cheapest flights! It can be overwhelmingly confusing to decipher between the different types of train tickets and passes when planning a trip to Europe. Also, remember, if you decide to purchase a Eurail pass, non-EU residents should use Eurail. European and UK residents should use Interail. Comment below if you found this article helpful!
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That means that if you book your accommodation, buy your gear, or sort your insurance through our link, we earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Again, thank you! Bought a very expensive Eurail global pass and it was stolen along with all my luggage. I had purchased the insurance package, but the only thing they reimbursed me for was the cost of two train tickets. I was furious as there were 5 days left on my pass.
They also did not reimburse the reservations that they required. I will never use them again. More than half the time the tickets would have been much cheaper to buy on line in the country where I was. Very disappointed with Eurail. Plus you have to keep a very detailed log of every train. Hi there! Thank you for the very good info on train in Europe. Somehow I still have some questions to seek your advise. Can you recommend me, which pass is the worth and best choice to travel?
Have a nice day ahead!! Hi, my name is Ravi, am from New Zealand. Would it be best if I get the 2 month global pass? Hey Ravi! Happy adventuring! Because flexi seems to be costly here. Best of luck! The trip is 2 weeks. We have to return to Paris for our return flight. Hi Bill! Your best bet might be the Eurail, which functions within all those countries and is the best option for Americans. Find the rail options here! Hey, thanks for the article.
Can I use a Eurail pass to get from Istanbul to London and is that the best option? I note that there is one for those under Hi Keith! Great point. I believe there is a senior discount too if you are over Consider flying somewhere and then using a train pass from there, since you only have days. The pass is a great investment if you ultimately want flexibility and the ability to hop on and off trains. Your email address will not be published. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Notify me of followup comments via e-mail. This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. More information. Table of Contents Show. Where are you going? A Eurail Global pass covers all 33 participating countries, see the list or see map of rail network in the Eurail countries.
A Eurail Single-Country pass covers just one country of your choice. A one-country pass is cheaper than buying a global pass covering all the countries. How long for? You can buy Eurail passes giving unlimited train travel for various periods of time. But you need to get your head around two different concepts.
Continuous passes give unlimited travel every day for a continuous period of time, either 15 days, 22 days or 1, 2 or 3 months, starting on any date you like. These give the ultimate in freedom and flexibility, but to make them worthwhile you need to be on a train every day or two. Flexi passes are more economical if you plan to stay put for a number of days between each train ride. Flexi passes give 4, 5, 7, 10 or 15 days unlimited travel within an overall 1 or 2 month period. For example, take the 5 days in 1 month pass: The overall 1 month starts ticking on the date you validate your pass at a station, you can then 'spend' each of your 5 days of unlimited travel any time during that 1 month period, on whatever dates you like, just by writing the date in one of the 5 boxes printed on your pass each time you want to use one of your travel days.
All the one-country passes are of this flexi type. The 3-day pass was changed to 4 days in January You can look up the available pass types, time periods and prices at the official Eurail website, www.
You can now choose 1st or 2nd class with any pass type. But 1st class seating is available on most longer-distance trans and if you can afford it, 1st class is obviously nicer, with wider, plusher seats, more legroom. In 1st class there are usually more businessmen tapping on laptops and fewer families with kids. Don't assume 1st class gets you any food or drink or free limo transfers or complimentary massages or whatever, this is not an airline.
Your default assumption should be that 2nd class seating is nice, 1st class seating is nicer, and it's normally just the nicer seating with fewer people per car that you're paying for when you go 1st class. Sometimes a 1st class pass will get you into a first class lounge at a station , but more often than not it won't. That may help you decide! As well as the large and well-known Eurail pass range, several countries do their own non-Eurail pass, which can be worth checking. The Swiss Travel Pass is what you want for Switzerland as there is no one-country Eurail pass for that country.
I've summed these up here. They're priced in euros, but obviously you can buy in your own currency. You can check these prices and buy online at the official Eurail website www.
Check current exchange rates. Pass prices vary only slightly between retailers, although you also need to check delivery costs as some retailers deliver for free, others charge a delivery fee. I recommend buying direct from Eurail themselves, they ship worldwide.
Mobile pass or classic printed pass? If you buy at www. There are then no pass delivery costs or delays. You will need to connect the app to the internet every 3 days to keep the app updated and the pass valid.
Mobile passes were introduced as an option in September If you live in the United States www. Forgive me for saying so, but overseas visitors sometimes seem brainwashed into thinking that they have to buy a Eurail pass to use trains in Europe.
Of course you don't. Anyone connected to the internet can buy the same cheap point-to-point tickets that we Europeans buy, at the same prices, direct from the same train operator websites that we use. If you have a simple fixed pre-planned itinerary, buying cheap advance-purchase train fares is almost always the cheapest option. Thanks to the internet, you can buy these cheap advance-purchase fares from any computer, tablet or smartphone in the USA or Australia just as easily as I can from the UK, following my journey-specific advice on the How to Buy European Train Tickets page.
Let's assume your itinerary includes a journey from Berlin to Prague So is a pass the cheapest option? It's also the easiest option, quickly booked online at the German or Czech Railways website and printed out - or you can simply show it on your smartphone. Click, click! But does a pass still make sense? Yes, if you don't want to nail your plans to the floor months in advance, if you want the freedom to travel when you want, or even decide not to go to Prague after all, but to Vienna instead.
Take a more expensive example: Amsterdam-Berlin:. Now a day pass breaks even or if you're under 28 saves money over the cheapest advance-purchase fare, and saves a lot over the full-flex fare. But it depends which pass length your itinerary justifies, as the pass-cost-per-day works out more expensive the shorter the duration of the pass - I've worked out all the pass costs per day here.
But you get the picture! It's really a 4-way decision:. It's risky to generalise, but I'll have a go, for those without the patience to do the maths as explained in the next section For a few short train rides, don't buy a railpass A railpass is total overkill for a few short local journeys.
Obvious, I hope If you can book months ahead, only plan to make one journey per travel day, have a fixed itinerary so know your exact dates and are happy to commit to specific trains on a no-refunds-no-changes-to-travel-plans basis, it's almost always cheaper to buy advance-purchase point-to-point tickets direct from the relevant operator, following my journey-specific advice here.
If you'll only do one journey on any given day which could easily be booked in advance, you'll almost always find advance-purchase fares cheaper:. Point-to-point prices always include any compulsory reservation. Just remember that these advance-purchase fares vary like budget air fares depending how far in advance you book and how popular that date or train is. If you needed to go tomorrow, the pass might be cheaper!
So if you don't really need the unlimited train rides, unlimited distance and unlimited flexibility that a pass give you, you can save a lot of money by buying cheap train-specific advance-purchase tickets instead. Overseas travel agents often don't know about these cheap advance-purchase train fares, and overseas agency sites often can't access the cheap fares for every route.
For a few long train rides where you DON'T want to nail your plans to the floor in advance , consider a pass A pass may well save money over longer-distance full-flex fares bought at the station, if you travel far enough each day, even if it costs more than cheap advance-purchase fares. For many long train rides on an extensive or complex itinerary, buy a pass For a long trip, say several weeks exploring every major city in Europe or a very long journey such as London to Istanbul, I'd buy a railpass even if advance-purchase fares were cheaper.
A complex itinerary booked with cheap no-refund no-changes advance-purchase tickets could collapse like a house of cards if a fire, flood, strike or security alert cancelled one of the trains, forcing you to buy new tickets at expensive full-flex prices for the rest of your trip. A Eurail pass allows you to flex your dates, trains and even routes as necessary, it's a form of insurance. A real-life example: Mrs 61 and I once travelled from my in-laws' in the Netherlands to Italy.
The day before our return journey a train crash in Belgium completely blocked our planned Milan-Paris-Rotterdam route. Fortunately, we were using railpasses so could easily divert via Milan-Zurich-Cologne-Rotterdam without having to buy new tickets or losing any money on existing tickets.
If you are under 28 years old, consider a pass For one or two or three specific journeys, I'd still buy advance-purchase tickets, but for anything more than that consider the pass. Even if it costs a few euros more, the extra flexibility is worth it, giving you the ability to change your mind or divert via another route or train if something goes wrong with one leg of the itinerary.
Incidentally, the age limit for Youth passes changed in , anyone under 28 now qualifies for a youth pass, previously it was under The free Eurail passes for children may swing the balance towards buying a pass, even for a pre-planned itinerary. Now you really have to do the maths, as shown in the next section. Why not mix-and-match a pass with budget train tickets , to save money on pre-planned parts of your trip?
Or if the start of your trip is known and fixed, but you want to stay flexible for the rest, you could buy a cheap ticket for the first journey or two, then use a railpass. And if your plan includes a few short hops, use cheap local point-to-point tickets for those, and buy a cheaper pass with fewer unlimited travel days. Perhaps you came to this page thinking that railpasses save money , but these days they often don't. It's more accurate to think of them as the deluxe option offering affordable go-as-you-please flexibility, instead of cheaper pre-booked budget train fares that fix your plans in stone.
Stands to reason, really. A pass giving unlimited flexible 1st class travel ought to cost more than a cheap budget ticket booked two months in advance direct with the train operator Step 1, work out what a Eurail pass costs per day Working out the cost per day makes it easier to see if it'll save money over the point-to-point prices.
Just divide the pass cost by the number of days travel it gives you or, for a continuous pass, by the actual number of days you think you'll be using it. I've worked it out for you with 2nd class flexi passes here:. Step 2, factor in any likely Eurail reservation fees You need to pay reservation fees for certain trains in addition to the cost of the pass. The cost can be significant if you're visiting the pass-unfriendly countries, but might be negligible if you're visiting pass-friendly countries.
For planning purposes, here's a rough - but still pretty accurate - rule of thumb:. Step 3, now work out what point to point fares would be Go to the How to buy European train tickets page and select the starting city for each journey you plan to make.
On the following page, select the destination city. I'll tell you the best routes and trains between those cities and which website to use to book or price it. European trains normally open for reservations 90 days before departure or in a few cases or days and in eastern Europe only 60 days, If your European trip is still many months away, pick a random date in the next days and check fares for that date.
The prices won't change much! Wandering without a plan is often how we find the situations that make for the best travel memories. It can be extremely budget-friendly, too, as you can skip an expensive town for a cheaper one. As mentioned earlier, those with more time to spend can take the slower trains to get around, and those are always cheaper. I am going to Italy in June and doing a similar trip to Itinerary 1. Does using the train still make sense for a family of 4 versus renting a car?
Thanks for the question, John. It still mostly comes down to math. An excellent explanation of the two tactics! Most properly the point-to-point booking would be superior to the railpass option in Italy. Excellent comparison. I had done it myself but was wondering if I was missing any Eurail Italy Pass benefits. I am still doing my research and trying to avoid too many train changes!! Thanks for your time.
Eurail Passes can be great for wanderers with no plans who want to know they can just hop on any old train when they feel like it. Travel paper-free across the country with our new mobile One Country Pass. Just choose a mobile Pass at checkout to travel using our app, where you can do everything from planning your trip to ticket inspection.
Only non-European residents can travel with a Eurail Pass. You cannot use the One Country Pass to travel to or from the country your Pass is valid in. The One Country Pass is only valid for travel with participating train, ferry and public transport companies in the country covered by your Pass.
Read more. Most high-speed and night trains require a reservation at an additional cost. Learn more about seat reservations. You need to activate your Eurail Pass within 11 months of the issue date.
You can do this at a European train station, or online using our free activation service at checkout. All standard Eurail Passes are refundable or exchangeable if they are returned unused.
Read our booking terms. Children under 4 travel for free and do not need a Eurail Pass.
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