Tips for planning a European rail trip on a budget
Explore Europe by train without spending big with this guide to planning a European rail trip on a budget – featuring money-saving tips from route planning to rail passes, scenic trips to budget booking tricks.
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I’ve always loved to travel by train and have ridden the rails everywhere from Australia to Canada. But Europe is one of the best places to explore by train, with a wide network of routes crossing the continent and plenty of stunning views along the way.
As well as being much more environmentally friendly than flying, rail travel can be cost-effective too. But there’s a confusing number of different routes you can take and tickets you can buy. So how you go about planning a European rail trip on a budget?
Whether you’re looking to do a one-week rail trip or planning an extended InterRailing adventure, here are my top European train travel tips – from how to choose the best route to where to find the cheapest tickets and whether rail passes are worth the cost.
Planning a European rail trip on a budget
Don’t try to see too much
One of the joys of European rail travel is how simple it can be – the huge network of train lines and relatively small distances make it easy to whizz between cities and countries. If you’re in Munich, you could be in Zurich, Prague, Vienna or Verona in under five hours.
The only problem is that it makes it super-tempting to try and see too much, and you can end up spending most of your trip sitting on a train rather than out exploring.
Taking things a bit more slowly means you get time to experience each destination. It also helps to keep costs down as you don’t need to pay for a train ticket every day. And you can sometimes find discounts on accommodation if you’re staying for several days.
Make sure to check train schedules carefully too – just because two destinations look close together on the map, it doesn’t mean that it’ll be a quick train journey between them. On indirect routes with lots of changes you might spend the whole day travelling.
The Deutsche Bahn (DB) website is a good resource for route planning. It has schedules for trains all across Europe with lots of different search options to include or exclude certain routes. It also shows you all the stops along the way if you want to break up a journey.
Note that DB only allows you to book tickets on trains through Germany though, so you may need to book elsewhere – see below for tips on how to book European rail tickets.
If you’re looking for ideas to get you started, I’ve put together some suggested rail routes around different European regions based on my travels. They all fit into one week but can easily be extended into a longer trip to make them more budget-friendly:
Think beyond the big city stops
The big cities – Paris, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Rome, Berlin – tend to be top of the list when people are planning a European rail trip. But Europe’s network of regional trains means you don’t have to just stick to the famous (normally busiest and most expensive) stops.
You could stay up in the mountains in a ski resort like Zermatt, visit the cliffside towns of Italy’s Cinque Terre, catch the Flamsbana scenic train to the Norwegian fjords, go wine tasting in Portugal’s Duoro Valley or visit remote villages in the Scottish Highlands.
There are a whole host of smaller cities, towns and villages which are accessible by train. One money-saving tip is to base yourself somewhere smaller and cheaper, and take day trips out to more expensive destinations. Like in the South of France, where you could stay in Nice and use the train to visit pricier places like St Tropez and Monte Carlo.
Stay connected
Having access to the internet when you travel is becoming more and more important. On a European rail trip, you’re likely to have to download etickets, get directions to train stations on Google Maps or translate signs or info from different languages.
Many train operators have their own apps – including InterRail, DB Navigator for Germany and SNCF Connect for France – which are worth downloading. You can store your tickets and rail passes online as well as getting real-time updates on any delays.
But as rail trips often visit multiple countries, roaming fees can be expensive or it’s a hassle to change SIMs every time you cross over into a different country. An easier option is to get an eSIM,* an easy way to access mobile data without the need for physical SIM.
Holafly’s Europe regional eSIM gives you unlimited data, so you don’t have to worry about running out partway through your trip or any unexpected costs.
It covers over 30 countries across Europe, and you can customise your package to fit your trip, from 1 to 90 days – for example a week’s coverage costs €26.90, but you can get 5% OFF Holafly eSIMs by using the promo code ONTHELUCE.*
The benefits are it’s easy to install and can be activated instantly. Just purchase your package and you’ll be sent an email showing how to install it on your phone (manually, using a QR code or with automatic installation for iPhones using iOS 17.4 or higher). Then once you arrive at your destination and turn on your eSIM you can start using the internet.
You can keep your existing SIM so you don’t lose your phone number and contacts, and it switches between carriers to get the best signal. Though eSIMS aren’t compatible with some older phones so do check. Holafly has 24/7 customer support if you have any problems.
Take the scenic rail route
When you’re planning a European rail trip route, booking websites usually show you the quickest way to get from A to B. But sometimes there’s another route that might take a bit longer, but the views along the way make it well worth the extra travel time.
Take the journey from Zurich to Milan for example. The quickest route – and the way you’re usually offered when you search on rail booking sites – is the 3 hour 15 minute direct EuroCity train. But you could also take the slower route via Chur and Tirano.
This follows the route of the Bernina Express scenic train through the Swiss Alps, but on board cheaper local trains. It takes more than double the time with several changes along the way, and costs a bit more than the direct route. But you get to experience one of world’s most spectacular rail journeys, through miles of stunning mountain scenery.
In this case the scenic route works out as slightly more expensive, but you can often save money if you’re using slower, local trains versus high-speed intercity services.
Europe has plenty of scenic train lines to choose from – like Germany’s Black Forest Railway, the Golden Pass Line in Switzerland, West Highland Line in Scotland, Douro Line in Portugal, Bergen to Oslo line in Norway or Bar to Belgrade line in the Balkans.
Sleep on the train
A host of new sleeper trains services have started up recently as travellers try to reduce their carbon footprint. Going to sleep in one destination and walking up in another is a really efficient way to cover long distances and save money on a night’s accommodation.
There are lots of night trains across Europe – the Seat 61 website is a good place to find out about the sleeper options which are available on different routes.
Main operators include Intercités de Nuit for France, Intercity Notte for Italy, and Nightjet, EuroNight and European Sleeper for destinations around the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Croatia, Slovenia, Poland and Hungary.
There’s a choice of accommodation on board, depending on how much you want to spend and whether you’re happy to share a room. The options vary slightly between train operators but are usually split between seats, couchettes and compartments/cabins.
Seats are the cheapest but least comfortable so can be a bit of a false economy if you end up with a sleepless night. Better are the couchettes – shared cabins for four or six people with bunk beds which fold down at night and bathrooms at the end of the carriage.
More private but pricier are compartments (cabins), which can be set up as a single, double or triple room. You can book the whole cabin or choose to share. They normally come with a washbasin but on some routes also have their own en-suite shower and toilet – you can even get a double bed on the Caledonian Sleeper from London to Scotland.
As an example of the price difference, a bed on a Nightjet sleeper starts from €49 in a 6-berth couchette, €59 in a 4-berth couchette and €129 for a single compartment (though those are advance fares and prices go up a lot if you book last-minute).
Check out rail passes (but don’t assume they’ll be cheaper)
If you want to make your European rail trip as easy as possible, you can’t beat a rail pass. They’re especially good if you want to be flexible and choose your route as you go rather than booking tickets in advance. But do they save you money?
The main European rail passes are InterRail/Eurail – they work in the same way but InterRail is for European residents and Eurail for non-European residents. You can choose between a Global Pass which covers the whole region or individual country passes.
The passes give you unlimited train travel for either a set period of time or a certain number of travel days within a set time period of one or two months. Prices vary a lot and there are big discounts if you are under 28, and smaller discounts for over 60s.
For example, a Global Pass for seven travel days in a month costs €381 for adults, €286 for under 28s and €343 for over 60s. Or a One Country Pass for Italy for five travel days in a month costs €223 for adults, €167 for under 28s and €201 for over 60s.
But in addition to cost of the pass, in certain countries and on certain trains you have to make (and pay for) a reservation. This usually applies to high-speed and sleeper trains and you can avoid it by travelling on slower, local services. But if you’re travelling in France, Italy, Spain, Portugal or Sweden, you need a reservation on almost all trains.
When you add it up, an InterRail or Eurail pass is unlikely to save you money over booking cheap advance tickets. But what does give you is lots of flexibility, so it may be worth it if you want to avoid expensive last-minute tickets without being tied to specific trains.
Look out for other discounts
There are also other passes offered in certain countries or regions which give reduced cost rail travel. Like the Swiss Travel Pass which gives you unlimited train, bus and boat travel in Switzerland for a set period or a certain number of travel days. Or the Spirit of Scotland pass for unlimited train, bus and coach travel in Scotland over four or eight days.
You can also buy discount cards which give you money off train tickets. These cover a particular country and can be worth buying if you’re doing multiple journeys.
In the UK a Railcard* costs €40 and saves you a third on all rail journeys. In France a Carte Avantage costs €49 and gives you and someone travelling with you a 30% discount. Or a German Bahncard 25 costs €62.90 and saves 25%. All cards are valid for a year.
Book in advance
Most train companies use airline-style pricing, with a limited supply of bargain tickets and prices getting more expensive the closer you get to the date of travel. If you book early you can bag cheap fares like Brussels to Berlin for €27.99 or Barcelona to Paris for €39.
Booking in advance also means you’re guaranteed a seat. But the downside is the lack of flexibility, as cheap advance fares don’t normally allow refunds or exchanges.
But when is the best time to book? It varies depending on the train operator, with tickets going on sale anytime from six months to two months before travel. As a basic rule of thumb, you can book tickets for each country this far in advance:
- 6 months: Eurostar, Germany, Austria, Switzerland
- 4 months: France, Italy
- 3 months: Czechia, Hungary
- 2 months: Everywhere else.
This isn’t set in stone though so you may need to check a few times, especially if you’re travelling in December when there’s a big timetable update each year.
You can sign up for alerts from Rail Europe* if you want to know when a particular service goes on sale. Or subscribe to rail company emails to be notified about special offers.
Know who to book with
When it comes to booking tickets for your European rail trip, there are lots of different booking sites around, so how do you know which one is the best to use?
Third-party companies like Omio* or Rail Europe* sell tickets for journeys all over Europe. They let you book more complex journeys which cross into multiple countries and you can use international credit cards. But they charge a booking fee on top of the ticket cost.
Each European country also has its own national train operator which you can book through. These are usually where you’ll find the cheapest tickets and special deals you can’t find on the third-party sites. They also don’t normally charge a booking fee.
But it can be more complicated to book multi-country journeys through the national operators. And they sometimes don’t accept international credit cards.
The best option depends on how easy to you want to make things, but it’s usually worth checking the prices on a couple of different sites to see where you can get the best deal.
One tip if you are booking with national operators is to use a debit or credit cards which doesn’t charge a fee for paying in a different currency, as if you’re booking a few tickets it can start to add up. Companies like Wise allow you to have virtual bank accounts in different currencies, or banks like Chase or Starling don’t charge extra conversion fees.
Pack a picnic
Long-distance European trains usually have a restaurant car or trolley on board. But what’s available varies hugely – it can range from restaurant-style dining to a packet of crisps and a bottle of water if you’re lucky – and on local trains there’s often nothing at all.
So it’s a good idea to pack a picnic to eat on board, to save having to buy expensive train food and to make sure you don’t go hungry. Most larger train stations have shops, but there’s usually a bigger supermarket nearby where you can stock up on food and drink.
If you have space, it’s useful to pack a basic picnic kit with a small cool bag, cutlery, corkscrew and plastic glasses. You can also take stackable Tupperware containers* to pack leftovers if you’re self-catering. And the cool bag also comes in useful if you want to transport foodie presents or souvenirs like cheese or chocolate home with you.
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