Is An InterRail Pass Worth It?

I’m planning a 4 month journey across Europe, from Oslo, through Poland to Russia, overland, so either rains or buses, and one of the questions in my mind is:

Is An InterRail Pass Worth It?

What Is An InterRail Pass?

An InterRail pass is a train ticket that lets Europeans travel across Europe by train for a fixed price. The equivalent for non-Europeans is called the EuRail pass.

There are different options for both, with respect to length of time and number of countries you want to visit.

InterRail vs EuRail – Country Options

The InterRail is pretty basic, it has a Global option which allows you to use trains in 30 European countries or a single country option.

The EuRail pass has a few more country options. Global, for 28 different countries, then 4, 2 or 1 single country.

InterRail vs EuRail – Trip Length Options

The InterRail pass has 5, 10, 15, 22 days and a 1 month option for €836.

The EuRail pass has 5, 10, 15, 21 day options as well as a 1 month option for €917, a 2 month option and a 3 month option for €1592.

My Trip

I land in Oslo on May 10th and then I’ve a course in Poland that I need to get to 3 weeks later on May 31 so I’ve only really planned that far at the moment. To work out if the InterRail pass is going to be worth it, I need to math up the cost of the individual tickets for each approximate date. Whilst I realise prices can change over time, this is the best I can do to see whether single tickets are a viable option. Also it is worth noting that it’s possible to lose your InterRail ticket (I’ve done that) and a lot of train journey’s require you to pay extra even if you have the InterRail pass.

This comes to 6 weeks and 2 days, 10 train journey, through 6 countries and crossing 7 borders all for €450. Half the price of a 1 month InterRail global ticket.

Is An InterRail Pass Worth It?

For me, definitely not. By just buying individual tickets I will be saving more than €400. If i travelled daily, or crazy long distances, the InterRail would be worth it, but then you’d never get to see anywhere and would always be on the move. With this travel plan I have flexibility and will be spending 2 nights in most places, unless I don’t like them, so won’t feel rushed all the time.

Single Country Travel Options

Looking at the InterRail Single Country options, for €173 I can get 3 days of travel in Norway, but my 2 tickets are only €87. Germany is even more expensive, €317 for 3 days of German travel. It’s not even worth doing that.

I InterRailed round Europe about 10 years ago when the past cost about £300 for a month but we must have visited a lot more places I think, making it a good option, but I’m glad I did the math on this as I was a little concerned about how much this trip might cost. I’m probably also visiting the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland and Belarus after this, maybe Russia too, so hopefully their train costs aren’t too dissimilar.