Our Guide to Venice on a Budget

Research and Budgeting

Research and budgeting our next trip is honestly one of my favourite things to do in my spare time! I love how excited it gets you for your next adventure. It’s also a great way to save money so that your travels can be more affordable. 

I always start by researching the sections shown in the table below and trying to find the cheapest deal for each component. The lowest prices then make up my budget. For the activities, I look up all the things we might want to do when we get there and total them up to create a rough maximum cost. Our budget per person in Venice for 2 days was £200 and is broken down into categories below:

Flights £45

Accommodation £30

Activities £60

Food £35

Airport transfers £30

£200

I know this sounds like a lot of money for just 2 days, so we did a quick search to compare the cost to what an online travel agent might charge you and the best option we found was a flight and hotel package of £231, not including any meals during the stay. We chose a location outside the centre of Venice to make it a fair comparison to our accommodation and searched for a weekend at the end of August (this would be a booking of two months in advance). This package option is already over our budget and food and activities haven’t even been considered! We definitely recommend booking each component of your holiday separately and putting in the effort to get the best deal for each one. 

Getting to Venice

1. Flights

For our trip to Venice, the cheapest flights we could find were on Ryanair. Ryanair offer cheap flights but, as the saying goes, you get what you pay for! Don’t expect anything more than just a semi-comfortable seat on a very crowded plane. For the base price, you’re allowed one small bag that fits under the seat in front (you’ll have to pay extra to have access to the overhead lockers). If you’re only going for a couple of days then this is perfect for you, just squeeze all the things you need into a backpack and avoid the extra charges. The other charge that Ryanair impose that might surprise you, is that you have to pay to be able to sit next to the people you are travelling with. We recommend avoiding paying this one, you’ll get to spend all your time together when you arrive, no need to pay up to £10 each way for an extra couple of hours on the plane!

We paid £46.50 return each for our flights from Bristol. This is my local airport, so we managed to avoid paying airport transfers in the UK by asking my Dad very nicely for a lift! It’s important to remember to budget for airport transfers when flying; this can easily slip your mind when planning and no-one wants a costly surprise on their holiday! So that you can get a rough idea of transfer prices: we paid €8 per person each way in Venice for the airport bus that runs to the city and back and a taxi in Bristol for a 15min transfer would cost about £20.

2. Train

The train from London will take you the best part of 17 hours to reach Venice! With changes in Paris and Milan along the way, it could be an ideal way to have a multi-city break. The real problem with this transport option though is the price. The cheapest return ticket for a weekend trip found on thetrainline.com was £408 per person! Combining this with the journey time, taking this option is just pure insanity.

3. Bus

At over a day of travelling, the bus ride from London to Venice is out of the question. You will undoubtedly get the numbest bum ever recorded and be charged around £240 per person to do so! Since we suggest that a couple of days in Venice is the perfect amount of time to experience the city, we don’t think you want to spend the same amount of time getting there and back on a bus!

4. Boat

Cruises all around the Mediterranean start, and port, in Venice which makes travelling by boat a possibility. However, it’s definitely not a feasible option for student travel (unless you are willing to fork out a significant chunk of your student loan)! At around £1500 per person, the cost involved is just too great for it to be financially viable on a student budget. If your heart is still set on a cruise, the best thing to do would be to look out for deals and then tell your parents how much you love them!

Getting Around Venice

1. Walking

Walking is by far the easiest option for getting around Venice. The city is completely pedestrianised with no roads, only narrow alleys and streets that in the past were used by servants only. There are bridges over the many canals every few hundred meters, so be prepared to do lots of stairs whilst in Venice!

It can take a long time to walk from one side of Venice to the other as there is no direct route, you have to zig zag across the city through the tight streets. Any estimated walking time on given on Google Maps you can easily add 10-15mins to, as you will undoubtedly get lost multiple times on your way! Don’t worry though, taking a wrong turn is an inevitable part of navigating this city by foot, and by doing so, it gives you the opportunity to see streets and art shops you would otherwise have never discovered.

2. Water Taxi

The other main option for getting around Venice is to use the water taxi. There are frequent stops on the island of Venice, as well as stops on several of the lagoon islands (see their map of stops). This is a great way to see the city as it was intended to be seen, from the water!  All the best building facades face the water, as traditionally the aristocracy travelled by boat.  

A single trip costs €7.50 so if you are planning on using this as your main mode of transport whilst in Venice, it’s worth buying a day ticket which costs €20 (only €5 more than a return trip). If you plan to buy online make sure you go through the official website to avoid paying extra for the tourist options. 

Accommodation

For our trip to Venice we used our favourite website for travel accommodation, Airbnb. We booked to stay on the mainland, outside of the city, which meant we could keep our accommodation costs low. We spent £63.70 for 2 nights (£31.85 each), and for this price we were able to get an entire apartment to ourselves, much more comfortable than the single room you would get in Venice for a higher cost!

If you plan to save money by booking outside the city centre, you then have to consider the cost of travelling in each day. We caught the bus which cost €3 per person each way. We made sure to book somewhere that had good public transport links into Venice so that we didn’t have to walk far each morning to get to a bus stop; we didn’t want to use up all our walking power before even getting there! There are also trams and trains that run from the mainland into Venice. The trams run late which is something to consider if you plan to stay out late into the night.

To give you an idea of how staying on the mainland and travelling in each day compares to staying in Venice itself, we did a quick price search. The average nightly price on Airbnb in the centre of Venice is £184 but by searching a bit further out on the mainland you can get the nightly price down to £50-70. Even with the additional transport costs, staying on the mainland is clearly the cheaper option!

Things to Do in Venice

For our top recommendations of things to do in Venice, check out our Venice Things to Do page!

Food in Venice

One of the main reasons I love visiting cities in Italy is the amazing cuisine! The pizza and pasta-based dishes are delicious and have so many variations that it’s inevitable that you’ll find something you like.

For our trip to Venice we took packed lunch food with us to cut down our spending on eating out. After eating breakfast at the Airbnb each morning, we prepared our lunches and then headed out into the city. Saving money on our lunches meant we were able to afford to have dinner out both nights we were there, and we got to try both traditional dishes (pasta and pizza).