Nepal Travel Costs

These are per-person figures for travellers sharing a double room; solo travellers in private rooms add 20 to 30 percent.

The trek figures cover room, food, drinks, showers and charging only. A licensed guide adds $25 to $35 a day and a porter $18 to $25, split between however many people share them, and permits and transport to the trailhead come on top. That is why a two-week trek that looks cheap per day often costs more than two weeks of city travel.

Beds in Nepal’s two tourist hubs are among the cheapest in Asia. Thamel, Kathmandu’s backpacker district, has hostel dorms for 500 to 900 rupees ($4 to $6.50) and basic guesthouse doubles with a private bathroom for 1,500 to 3,000 rupees ($11 to $21); expect hot water to be solar-heated and lukewarm by evening at the lower end. Mid-range hotels with reliable hot water, a generator or inverter and a rooftop breakfast terrace run 4,000 to 9,000 rupees ($30 to $65). Heritage boutique hotels in restored Newar houses in Patan and Bhaktapur, and Kathmandu’s international five-stars, start around 14,000 rupees ($100) and pass 25,000.

Pokhara’s Lakeside is similar or a little cheaper: 2,000 to 6,000 rupees buys a double with a lake or mountain view, and long-stay discounts of 20 to 40 percent are normal if you ask for a weekly rate. Rates rise in the October to November and March to April trekking seasons and fall by a third or more in the June to September monsoon. Many hotels quote in dollars and add 10 percent service charge plus 13 percent VAT, so check whether the price you were given is “net” before you agree.

On the big teahouse routes, lodges set prices through local committees, and the menu price rises with the effort it took to carry the food up. The rule is simple: the higher and more remote the lodge, the more everything costs. Rooms are cheap or even free when you eat dinner and breakfast in the same lodge, which is the expected deal; skip the meals and the owner will charge for the room.

On the Everest Base Camp trek, a backpacker who eats dal bhat twice a day and boils or treats water spends 4,500 to 6,000 rupees a day below Namche Bazaar and 6,000 to 8,000 above it. The Annapurna routes are 10 to 20 percent cheaper because roads reach further up the valleys. Treating water with tablets or a filter instead of buying bottles saves 1,000 rupees a day at altitude and keeps plastic off the mountain. Our Nepal trekking guide compares the routes themselves.

Most popular treks need two or three permits, paid in rupees at the Nepal Tourism Board office in Kathmandu or Pokhara, at park entry gates, or by your agency. Foreigners pay the rates below; SAARC nationals pay much less.

• TIMS card: 2,000 rupees for foreign trekkers. Since April 2023 independent trekking without a licensed guide is not permitted in most national parks and conservation areas, and the card is issued through a registered agency.
• Annapurna Conservation Area (ACAP): 3,000 rupees, covering the Annapurna Circuit, Annapurna Sanctuary and Poon Hill treks.
• Sagarmatha National Park: 3,000 rupees at Monjo, plus the Khumbu Pasang Lhamu rural municipality fee of 2,000 to 3,000 rupees at Lukla, for the Khumbu region.
• Langtang National Park: 3,000 rupees, also covering Gosaikunda.
• Restricted-area permits: issued only through agencies for groups of two or more with a guide. The Department of Immigration lists Upper Mustang at $50 per person per day, Upper Dolpa at $500 for the first 10 days, and the Manaslu Circuit at $100 per week from September to November and $75 from December to August.

The Department of Immigration permit table has the full list of restricted-area rates.

With guides now required on most trekking routes, budget for one from the start. A licensed trekking guide booked through a Kathmandu or Pokhara agency costs $25 to $35 a day, with experienced English-speaking guides on high routes at the top of that range or above; a porter carrying up to about 20 to 25 kg costs $18 to $25 a day, and a porter-guide who carries a lighter load and leads the way costs $22 to $30. Those daily rates normally include the staff member’s food, lodging and insurance, but confirm it in writing, along with who pays for their flight or jeep to and from the trailhead.

Tipping is expected at the end of a trek: a common rule is 10 to 15 percent of the total guide or porter fee, handed over in rupees on the last day. Full agency packages for Everest Base Camp, including permits, a guide, a porter shared between two, lodges and three meals a day plus Lukla flights, typically cost $1,300 to $2,000 per person for 12 to 14 days. Annapurna packages of similar length start around $800 to $1,200 because no flight is needed.

The Valley’s big monuments charge foreigners separate, much higher tickets than Nepalis, and the money funds post-earthquake restoration. Keep your ticket: in Bhaktapur it is checked at every entry to the old town.

Outside the Valley, Chitwan National Park charges foreigners around 2,000 rupees per day of entry, which is usually built into a jeep or canoe safari of 2,500 to 6,000 rupees per person, and Lumbini’s Maya Devi Temple charges a few hundred rupees. Fees change most years, so treat these as the 2026 guide and carry spare cash.

In Kathmandu, Pathao and inDrive app rides are the cheap option at 150 to 500 rupees across town; a metered or bargained taxi costs 300 to 800, and the airport to Thamel runs about 700 to 1,000. Local buses and microbuses cost 20 to 50 rupees a ride but are crowded and unmarked in English. Between cities, a tourist bus from Kathmandu to Pokhara costs 1,000 to 1,500 rupees on standard coaches and 2,500 to 3,500 on the deluxe services, for a 7 to 9 hour ride. Kathmandu to Chitwan’s Sauraha is similar.

Domestic flights carry a foreigner fare roughly double the local fare. Kathmandu to Pokhara is around $100 to $130 one way, and the Lukla flight for the Everest region about $220 each way; in peak season many Lukla flights leave from Ramechhap, a four to five hour jeep ride from Kathmandu that adds 1,500 to 2,500 rupees per seat on a shared jeep. Shared jeeps to Annapurna trailheads such as Besisahar cost 1,000 to 2,500 rupees. For airports and transfers see our Nepal airports page.

Nepal is still a cash economy outside hotels, upmarket restaurants and agencies, and on the trails it is cash only. ATMs are plentiful in Kathmandu, Pokhara and larger towns, but most cap a single withdrawal at 25,000 to 35,000 rupees ($180 to $250) and charge foreign cards 500 to 600 rupees per transaction, on top of whatever your bank charges. Standard Chartered and Nabil machines in Thamel and Lakeside are the usual picks for higher limits. Decline the on-screen offer to charge you in your home currency.

Withdraw everything you need for a trek before you leave the city. The Everest trail has ATMs in Lukla and Namche that often run out of cash or fail on foreign cards, and the Annapurna routes have few or none above the road head. Carry the full amount in small notes (100s and 500s), since lodges rarely have change for 1,000-rupee notes at altitude. Bring some US dollars in clean, recent notes as a backup: money changers in Thamel give fair rates, and visa fees on arrival and some agency bills are payable in dollars. Cards work in mid-range hotels and the bigger trekking agencies, usually with a 3 to 4 percent surcharge.

These totals cover costs inside Nepal and exclude international flights, the visa and travel insurance (which must include helicopter rescue to the altitude you trek to).

A sample backpacker week: six nights at 1,500 rupees a person in shared doubles (9,000), food at 1,500 a day (10,500), tourist buses Kathmandu to Pokhara to Chitwan and back (4,500), three heritage tickets (3,800), a Chitwan safari day (4,000), a SIM and two ATM fees (1,500), which comes to about 33,000 rupees or $240. Add the visa: $30 for 15 days or $50 for 30 days, explained on our Nepal visa page.