Costa Rica is known to be one of the safest and richest countries of Central / Latin America. This of course comes with its price. If you’re wondering how much does a Costa Rica trip cost – then keep reading to find out!
Costa Rica Trip Cost: GENERAL COMMENTS
Costs are for one person
The costs I have listed below are the cost per person (aka, what I personally paid for my part of the trip). However, it is important to mention that I was travelling with my partner. There are some costs, e.g., renting an ATV or hiring a Taxi, that usually end up being a lot cheaper if you are not travelling alone. Hence, if you are travelling solo or in a bigger group, some of the costs I mention below might differ for you.
Comfortable Travel style
I would describe this trip as “budget conscious but still comfortable”. What does this mean exactly? For example, we want our accommodation to be nice (e.g. private bathroom) and in a good location. However, we chose one of the cheapest available options that fit our criteria.. We ate out for lunch and dinner, but always made our own breakfast. I think you get the point…
HERE’S THE Costa Rica Trip Cost
Overall, one week (8D/7N) in Costa Rica cost me 1’513 CHF. This averages out to approx. 190 CHF per day. I’ve excluded the cost of the international flights, because this is of course highly individual and dependent on your country of origin. I’ve also excluded any personal shopping I did and souvenirs that I bought – because once again, this is highly individual 🙂
Here’s a detailed view of how these costs are split between different categories:
| Category | total cost | cost / day |
|---|---|---|
| Domestic flights | 247 | |
| Ground transportation | 180 | |
| Accommodation | 485 | 69 |
| Food | 296 | 42 |
| Activities | 305 | 51 |
| Total | 1’513 | 189 |
I’d like to mention at this point, that the Swiss franc (CHF) is roughly on par with the Euro and the USD. Hence, if you’re looking for a rough estimate in either EUR or USD, just take the mentioned costs as is and you’ll be very close to the true value.
Costa Rica Trip Cost: Domestic flights
Because we were heading to Santa Teresa and our travel time was quite limited, we opted for domestic flights as our means of transport. The flight from San Jose to Cobano only takes approx. 30 minutes, while driving would take around 5-6 hours. For a return flight with Green Airways we paid 247 CHF each. Our fare included 11 kg of checked luggage and 5kg of hand luggage.
Everything went smoothly and I would highly recommend Green Airways!
Costa Rica Trip Cost: Ground transportation
Besides air transportation, we also did quite a bit of driving for our specific itinerary. We took a taxi from the airport in San Jose out to the Manuel Antonio National Park, and back on the next day. One-way costs approx. 130 CHF, split between my boyfriend and me this means that in total we each paid 130 CHF for a return trip. This is by no means cheap, but since we didn’t feel comfortable driving at night, we still felt like this was the best option for us. I know that there are also shuttle or even public buses that drive this route that are more affordable, but also less flexible.
We booked both our taxis through booking.com, and we had a great experience.
Additionally, we had to pay for a taxi to and from the Cobano airport in Santa Teresa. Per person this cost us 40 CHF. We booked this directly through our accommodation in Santa Teresa.
We also took a couple of taxis within Santa Teresa. One trip usually came out to approx. 10 USD, which you will need to pay in cash.
Overall we spent 180 CHF on ground transportation, aka taxis.
Costa Rica Trip Cost: Accommodation
Our first hotel was at the Manuel Antonio National Park. We stayed at a hotel right next to the park entrance called Hotel Villa Prats. The hotel is very basic, but it was all we needed for only one night. For this stay we paid 33 CHF per person per night.
One night in between our destinations we stayed at an airport hotel in San Jose. We chose the Fairfield by Marriott San Jose Airport Alajuela since it was very close to the airport and offered a free shuttle to the terminals. For this one night we spent 69 CHF per person.
In Santa Teresa we stayed at the Nautilus Surf & Yoga, and we loved it! The hotel has its own Yoga studio, pool, café and they also offer surf lessons. The hotel was very well located, just a couple of meters off the main road and super close to the beach. Our room had a fully equipped kitchen, a bedroom, a living room and a cozy little terrace. We spent 5 nights at Nautilus, which cost me 383 CHF, which equals to approx. 77 CHF per night. I’d say this is about midrange for Santa Teresa.
Overall, this means that we spent 485 CHF on accommodation, which averages out to 69 CHF per person per night.
Costa Rica Trip Cost: Activities
Overall, we spent 305 CHF per person on activities, which averages out to 44 CHF per day. Here’s what we did for that amount of money:
- Manuel Antonio National Park Guided Tour: We took a guided tour through the Manuel Antonio National Park, which in my opinion is a must! The guides are highly skilled at spotting animals, very knowledgeable and well equipped. Trust me, you will get a lot more out of your visit if you go with a guide! We booked our tour through Viator and had a great experience. This cost us 41 CHF per person, plus the 17 CHF park entry fee.
- Surfboard rental: We rented surfboards twice, which cost us 13 CHF per rental. We always rented with Del Soul Surf, they are highly professional, friendly and uncomplicated 🙂
- Surf Lessons: I took one surf lesson through our accommodation, which cost me 60 CHF for a group lesson. You can check them out here.
- Bioluminescence Tour: This was such an awesome experience! We booked the tour directly with Zuma Tours, and it cost 80 CHF per person. This included a transfer to Montezuma, a boat ride to Isla Tortuga incl. Snorkeling and dinner. Finally, the highlight of the trip was the nighttime snorkeling somewhere in a dark bay where you could see the bioluminescence in the water! Beer and other refreshments are also included. Check them out here.
- Yoga: I did 4 Yoga classes at our hotel which cost approx. 13 CHF each. You can get multi-packs (up to 7 classes) which gives a slight reduction in price.
- ATV rental: We rented an ATV for 24 hours which cost us 88 CHF in total, incl. insurance and fuel. Per person this equals 44 CHF split 2 ways. We rented through Valerios, and we had a great experience!
Costa Rica Trip Cost: Food
While we looooove food, we also like to find a balance and not spend too much on eating out! Hence, we usually opted to make breakfast ourselves, which we bought at a local grocery store. This led to us spending only roughly 35 CHF on breakfast in total, which averages out to 5 CHF per person per day – a bargain! Lunch was our most expensive meal, because it is the only one we spent eating outside during daylight. We loved to treat ourselves to beachside lunches, which is why our average lunch cost was 16 CHF. Largely excluding alcoholic beverages, but the occasional beer or cocktail might be included in that price haha. For dinner we spent 13 CHF per meal, which again sporadically included some alcoholic beverages. Since we had dinner in simpler places (e.g. local sodas), the price is slightly lower 🙂
We also spent around 8 CHF per person per day on miscellaneous snacks and drinks, e.g. coffees, smoothies, sunset drinks, etc…
You can find the same information summarized per cost per category in the table below:
| Category | Total Cost | Cost / Day |
|---|---|---|
| Breakfast | 34 | 5 |
| Lunch | 113 | 16 |
| Dinner | 89 | 13 |
| Snacks | 59 | 8 |
| Total | 296 | 42 |
Overall, we spent around 42 CHF per person per day on food. For a detailed cost split, check out the chart below.
If you want a review of all the places we ate at, check out my post here!
Can I visit Costa Rica for cheaper?
Yes, of course!! There are three main things that come to my mind that could drive your costs down. First of all, you could use shared shuttle buses instead of private taxis to get around. If you are travelling in a group the savings will not be significant here, but if you are on a really tight budget then I would definitely recommend this.
Second, and most importantly, if you want to save money then you shouldn’t fly We took a domestic flight from SJO to Cobano, which saved us a ton of time but cost us over 200 CHF per person. If you’re on a budget, you could take a shuttle bus for the same route for probably a quarter of the price.
Lastly, we obviously stayed at a mid-range hotel in a private room. I saw that there are a ton of fun-looking hostels in Santa Teresa, which are a lot more budget friendly…
Do I need cash in Costa Rica?
Costa Rica is a very modern country and you will be able to pay for most things by card. However, there are still certain things for which it is worth having cash. For example, we took several taxis home at night in Santa Teresa. For this, you need cash. But don’t worry, USD are widely accepted, so you don’t need to exchange any colones! There are also several services that give discounts if you pay in cash (e.g. 10% off). Lastly, while Costa Rica is one of the safest latin / central American countries, it’s still also recommended to carry some cash for safety reasons. Hence, I’d recommend to take at least 100-200 USD (depending on the length of your trip) in small denomination with you, just in case.
I personally always use Revolut for my card payments. They are super safe, offer multiple digital cards and have one of the lowest exchange rate fees!
So there you go, in my experience one week in Costa Rica, split between Manuel Antonio and Santa Teresa costs approx. 1’513 CHF. If you’re looking for inspo about what our one-week itinerary looked like, check out my post here.