The Burrow
Jun 27, 2023
Public transport has come a long way from its humble beginnings of horse-drawn carts, steam trains and steam-liners. Now commuters can cross cities across a vast network of bigger, more powerful trains, buses, ferries, plus other methods like trams.
While transport options have grown quickly, the value of a dollar has not – and mass transit isn’t cheap to run.
So, which country has the most expensive public transport fares?
To find out, the travel insurance experts at Compare the Market have crunched the numbers, weighing-up one-way tickets and monthly passes together in one indexed score out of 10 (with 10 being the most expensive) for 99 different countries across the globe.
Switzerland is known for being a really expensive place to live, so it’s not too surprising to see that they were the number one most expensive country for public transport fares. Switzerland’s average one-way fare of US$3.97 was the most expensive of any country, while the average cost of a monthly pass was the fifth-most expensive at US$88.26.
Looking at the city level, 4 of the 10 most expensive cities in the world were in Switzerland, including the number one: Zurich. The average one-way ticket in Zurich was US$4.85.
Close on the heels of their ritzy European neighbour was the Netherlands. The Dutch homeland had the second-most expensive one-way average fares at US$3.65, and the sixth-most expensive monthly pass with a cost of US$87.51 on average.
Maybe this is why so many Dutch people prefer to travel by bicycle?
At the city level, the Netherlands had 3 of the top 10 most expensive cities: Eindhoven (US$4.83), Rotterdam (US$4.29) and the Hague (Den Haag – US$4.29 a ticket), which were the second, third and fourth-most expensive cities respectively.
Rounding out the top three countries was the ‘land Down Under’: Australia. The ‘lucky country’ might not be so lucky after all, as Australia had the second-most expensive monthly pass after Ireland, with the average monthly pass costing US$106.93. Australia also had the tenth-most expensive one-way tickets at US$2.93 a fare. This means the country performed worse than Ireland and other countries overall, landing Australia in third position on our index.
Based on our data, Sri Lanka has the cheapest indexed public transport costs. However, almost one year ago in June 2022, Sri Lanka was in the midst of a fuel crisis that saw people queuing up for days to secure petrol, which saw fuel prices rise dramatically.1
This undoubtedly had an impact on public transport costs. Fortunately, in March 2023 the Sri Lankan Government announced it had received economic relief in a US$2.9 billion International Monetary Fund bailout agreement, and that fuel prices would be slashed.2 These brought much needed relief, which in turn affected public transport fares.
As of May 2023, the average one-way fare was US$0.17 – the second-cheapest in the index after Uzbekistan at US$0.13. Sri Lanka also had the cheapest monthly pass at US$5.79 on average.
The second-best index score for public transport fares was for Pakistan. Pakistan had the third-cheapest one-way tickets at US$0.18 a fare and the second-cheapest monthly pass at US$7.01 on average. Two of Pakistan’s cities, Islamabad and Karachi, were in the top 10 cheapest cities at US$0.14 and US$0.19 a fare, when looking at the city level.
The nation with the third-cheapest public transport fares is Nepal. The small mountainous nation has the fifth-cheapest one-way fares at US$0.19 a ticket, and the third-cheapest monthly pass at US$7.57, on average.
Nepal’s capital city, Kathmandu, is the eight-cheapest city out of the list of cities with an adult one-way ticket costing an average of US$0.19.
The top 10 most expensive and cheapest countries are displayed in the tables below. Click here to view the full list of 99 countries and 407 cities.
| Country | AVG ticket price (USD) | AVG monthly pass price (USD) | Index score (/10) |
| Switzerland | $3.97 | $88.26 | 9.80 |
| Netherlands | $3.65 | $87.51 | 9.69 |
| Australia | $2.93 | $106.93 | 9.49 |
| Norway | $3.61 | $72.15 | 9.33 |
| Ireland | $2.36 | $118.04 | 9.29 |
| Sweden | $3.24 | $77.22 | 9.28 |
| United Kingdom | $3.09 | $82.10 | 9.28 |
| Denmark | $3.46 | $72.01 | 9.18 |
| Germany | $3.22 | $74.05 | 9.18 |
| New Zealand | $2.12 | $106.41 | 9.13 |
| Country | AVG ticket price (USD) | AVG monthly pass price (USD) | Index score (/10) |
| Sri Lanka | $0.17 | $5.79 | 0.05 |
| Pakistan | $0.18 | $7.01 | 0.15 |
| Nepal | $0.19 | $7.57 | 0.30 |
| Algeria | $0.18 | $9.21 | 0.31 |
| Uzbekistan | $0.13 | $10.00 | 0.41 |
| Tunisia | $0.24 | $9.69 | 0.61 |
| Egypt | $0.19 | $11.17 | 0.71 |
| Vietnam | $0.30 | $8.52 | 0.81 |
| India | $0.30 | $9.69 | 0.92 |
| Azerbaijan | $0.24 | $11.76 | 0.97 |
| Expensive City | AVG one-way ticket price (USD) | Cheap city | AVG one-way ticket price (USD) |
| Zurich, Switzerland | $4.85 | Tashkent, Uzbekistan | $0.13 |
| Eindhoven, Netherlands | $4.83 | Islamabad, Pakistan | $0.14 |
| The Hague (Den Haag), Netherlands | $4.29 | Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia | $0.14 |
| Rotterdam, Netherlands | $4.29 | Buenos Aires, Argentina | $0.15 |
| Lausanne, Switzerland | $4.11 | Colombo, Sri Lanka | $0.16 |
| Bern, Switzerland | $4.03 | Kolkata, India | $0.18 |
| Plymouth, United Kingdom | $3.98 | Almaty, Kazakhstan | $0.18 |
| Basel, Switzerland | $3.97 | Kathmandu, Nepal | $0.19 |
| Reykjavik, Iceland | $3.95 | Karachi, Pakistan | $0.19 |
| Zug, Switzerland | $3.90 | Astana (Nur-Sultan), Kazakhstan | $0.20 |
Travel insurance is designed to help cover expenses if things go wrong with your travels. This can include the cost of medical care or stolen luggage, but it can also cover a variety of bookings. Compare the Market’s General Manager of General Insurance, Adrian Taylor, explains.
“If something goes wrong on the way to your flight overseas, or bad weather impacts your travel plans, travel insurance can cover the cost of lost accommodation bookings, events, and even public transport tickets on the way to the airport or locally in your destination,” says Taylor.
“If you can show that you pre-purchased a ticket or monthly pass but you could no longer use a ticket or travel pass due to an insured event outside your control, travel insurance can pay you back so you’re covered for this financial loss – subject to the policy excess,” Taylor continues.
“Plus, if you need extra accommodation and alternative transport to continue your journey – or get home – travel insurance could cover that too, according to the terms and conditions detailed in the Product Disclosure Statement (PDS).”
The public transport ticket prices were sourced from Numbeo on 29/05/2023. To create the index, the national average one-way adult fare and national average monthly pass were each given a score out of 10, with the most expensive country receiving the highest score, and the cheapest country receiving the lowest score. All the other countries were given a score based on their cost within that range.
These two scores – one for one-way tickets and one for the monthly pass, were then averaged together to create an equally weighted index score out of 10. City-specific prices were referred to in the article but did not form part of the index. The data and sources are detailed below:
1 Sri Lanka’s energy crisis is a glimpse of what’s coming. Pradeep Kurukulasuriya, United Nations Development Programme. 2022.
2 Sri Lanka slashes fuel prices after IMF bailout, says minister. Al Jazeera. 2023.