Skip to content
Elysian Moment-Header

Menu
  • Destinations
    • Europe
      • 5 Great Winter Destinations in Europe for Families
      • Austria
        • 1 Perfect Day in Salzburg
        • 2 Days in Vienna
        • 4 Days in Vienna
          • Where to stay in Vienna: The Best location to Stay in Vienna
        • Ski Holiday in Austria
      • Belgium
        • Wellness & Spa Hotel in Belgium, Wu Wei in Kortrijk
        • Bruges, Belgium
        • Weekend in Durbuy, Ardennes
        • One Day in Brussels
        • Day Trip To Ghent
        • Weekend in Antwerp
        • Main things to do if you visit Liège
        • Terhills in Maasmechelen
        • Why you should visit Ypres
      • Cyprus
        • 5 days in Cyprus
      • Estonia
        • Tallinn in 1-2 Days
      • France
        • Paris With Kids
        • Day trip to Lille
        • The Best of Strasbourg
        • Paris
      • Germany
        • Weekend in Hamburg
      • Greece
        • 3 Days in Athens, Greece
        • Zakynthos, Greece
      • Italy
        • Visit Sardinia with kids – Best place to stay in Sardinia for families
      • Luxembourg
        • The Best Spa & Sauna in Luxembourg: Chalets Petry Spa & Relax
      • Malta
        • How to Spend Great Family Holidays in Malta
      • Netherlands
        • Amazing The Hague in 2 days: The best things to do & see
        • How to Spend an Awesome One Day in Maastricht
        • Fantastic Day Trip to Delft, Netherlands: Best Things to do
      • Portugal
        • 3 Days in Lisbon
        • Perfect weekend in Lisbon
        • Porto: 15 City’s Top Attractions and Hidden Gems
      • Spain
        • Fuerteventura with kids at amazing Suite Hotel Atlantis Resort
        • Lanzarote Travel Guide: Unique things to see in Lanzarote in 7 days
        • Luxury Hotel in Fuerteventura, Gran Hotel Atlantis Bahía Real
        • Valencia City Break: Top things to do in a 3-Day Itinerary
      • United Kingdom
        • A Perfect Weekend in London itinerary
    • Asia
      • Southeast Asia Backpacking Route: 18 Best Places to Travel Alone in Asia
      • Indonesia
        • How to spend unforgettable 10 days in Bali
      • Malaysia
        • Short Trip in Malaysia: Perfect Kuala Lumpur Itinerary for 2 Days
        • Malaysia Backpacking Route: Perfect 10-Day Itinerary
      • Maldives
        • The Best Tips for the cheap Maldives Holidays
        • The Best Resort in Maldives for Honeymoon
        • Everything you need to know about Surfing in the Maldives
        • The Best Island to enjoy Maldives Family Holidays
      • Singapore
        • First Time in Singapore: Perfect 4 Days and 3 Nights Travel Itinerary
      • Sri Lanka
        • 2 Weeks of Outstanding Holidays to Sri Lanka
    • Australia
      • Awesome Things you Must Do on Australia’s East Coast
      • Sydney
      • Melbourne
        • CBD
    • New Zealand
      • North Island
        • 1 Day In Auckland Itinerary
        • 7 days Itinerary for the North Island, New Zealand
        • Hiking in New Zealand
        • Kapiti
        • Wellington
          • The Ultimate List of the Best Free Things to do in Wellington NZ
          • Amazing Wellington Day Tour to Wairarapa, New Zealand
      • South Island
        • 10-Day New Zealand South Island Itinerary for an Awesome Road Trip
        • Golden Bay and Nelson
    • Caribbean Islands
      • Caribbean Holidays 2022: Unique Things To Do in Curacao
  • Best places to eat
    • Belgium
      • Amazing Lunch & Dining in Bruges at Gastrobar Hubert
      • Best places to eat in Antwerp, Belgium
      • The Best places to have Breakfast in Bruges
      • Belgian Beer
      • Ghent
        • Three Monkeys
    • Greece
      • Breakfast & Brunch in Athens
    • Malaysia
      • Kuala Lumpur
        • El Cerdo and El Cerdito
    • Netherlands
      • Where To Eat in The Hague: 10 Best Restaurants & Cafés
    • New Zealand
      • Wellington
        • Coene’s Bar & Eatery
        • Hangar
        • House of Dumplings
        • Thistle Inn
        • Foxglove
    • Portugal
      • 10 best places for breakfast & brunch in Lisbon, Portugal
    • Spain
      • Where to Eat in Valencia: The Best Restaurants
      • 10 Best Breakfast and Brunch Cafés in Valencia
  • Travel Tips
    • Europe with kids
    • Packing
      • Things to know before visiting Australia: Essential items for Travelling Packing List to Australia
      • Important Things to Know Before Travelling to New Zealand
      • Tricks to travel light
      • Weekend trip
  • Reviews
    • Airlines
      • Air Asia
      • Air New Zealand
      • Jetstar
      • Sri Lankan Airlines
    • Claim for Flight Delay
      • Flight Delay Compensation with IFDelayed
    • Europe’s bus-lines
    • Events
      • Journey with Bombay in Antwerp
      • Wine&Beer Festival 2017, Wellington
    • Great Products
      • Baby Products
      • Jewelry Stella & Dot
      • Mad Hippie Skin Care
      • MyHeritage
      • Products of New Zealand
    • Shipping Companies
      • Luggage Forward
      • SendMyBag.com
    • Taxi Transfer
      • Affordable Airport Transfer Services in Europe, Easy Transport
      • Uptransfers
  • Media Kit 2020
  • Blogging
    • Review of Affordable Keyword Search Tool, Keysearch
    • SEO for Beginners: How to Rank On Page 1 of Google
    • Top Paying Affiliate Programs to Make Quick Money Online
  • Contact me
Menu
cheap travel by bus in europe

Cheap travel by bus in Europe

Posted on October 10, 2016July 19, 2018 by Kate

Traveling nowadays has reached a revolution, people are changing their destinations more than ever before. The reason for that is the flexible timetables, various ways to travel and surprisingly low costs. The easiest way to reach multiple destinations in Europe is doubtlessly by train, but unfortunately train companies are not travel friendly because most of the time they ask for ridiculously high prices. So if you are willing to explore Europe by road but you are on a tight budget or you just prefer to spend your money smart, then traveling by bus will be a great option for you. For spontaneous travelers here is a list of the main bus-lines with their good and bad sides.

Eurolines

Eurolines is one of the biggest and cheapest bus line networks in Europe. It provides it’s customers with an extensive network across Europe, 29 different countries to all major European cities. Unfortunately there is no big variety in departure times.

It’s possible to book a ride just a couple of hours before but you definitely need to print out your ticket, which are are by the way not refundable. If you travel to another country within Europe, you should always be prepared to show your passport or ID. You are free to take two medium sized suitcases, which will be stored in the cargo hold. The friendly drivers will help you, but it’s not always the case that they can speak the local language or English.

As I already mentioned Eurolines is the cheapest bus company, so automatically you should know that it attracts specific clientele. On the tickets it always says you should be at the bus station 1h before, this is not true. You can just come 10 minutes before, furthermore Eurolines are often late. That’s why if you planned to have a 5h ride, anticipate to arrive minimum 1h later. Sometimes it can happen that the bus tour was canceled or there is no seat available, regardless of you buying a ticket already, and you won’t be informed concerning said changes.

The inside of the bus is fine, the seats are pretty hard but it’s ok for a journey of max. 5-6 h. It has toilet facilities that can sometimes give of an odor to the whole bus. On the website it says that the company provides it’s customers with Wi-Fi. Unfortunately I’ve experienced it only once out of a couple of times. Moreover it didn’t work properly.

Flixbus

Flixbus is a affordable and reliable bus line from Germany. As we all know Germans are famous for their affinity for punctuality, so this transport will pick you up and bring to your chosen destination mostly on time. At the moment the company is overtaking all other bus networks, smartly building a monopoly. But it’s fine because they offer a good service for expectable costs. The question is only for how long.

If you are traveling with Flixbus, you can be extremely spontaneous, because you can quickly buy tickets online or even from the driver. If you’ve decided to cancel your trip, you can use the spent money for your next journey. Departure times and routes have a wide range. But this is not the only one benefit of traveling with this company, they also offer clean, comfortable and spacious seats, plug sockets, which is very useful to charge your phone or laptop and Wi-Fi, which is not so bad but it works only in Germany. I had the situation a couple of times that we didn’t have any internet on the bus, so people needed to talk to each other instead of staring on the screen.

Flixbus is very popular in Europe, especially in Germany, it means it can be full with travelers. It’s better to come 15 minutes before departure, so you will have enough time to put your luggage into the hold and find the perfect seat for you. The quality and the duration of the ride depends on the driver. Some of them don’t care about punctuality, take breaks longer than they are allowed and can even smoke in the bus.

MegabusPostbus

Megabus used to be an English low price competitor of Flixbus. So the German bus company decided to acquire it. The same has happened to German colleague Postbus, now they are also part of the Flixbus corporation. This means that they have equal quality and prices.

Conclusion

Before you decide to travel by bus you should think what is more important for you: time, costs or comfort. If you need around 5 hours to get to your destination, then you can really go low in price. This period of traveling is convenient to spend your time in a low budget bus.

In my opinion for longer journeys it is better to spend a bit more money and have a comfortable and relaxing trip. Just think about it, when you arrive you want to enjoy the city and if the journey was horrendous  you will be exhausted and moody.

The best way to search for the cheap bus tickets is to use busliniensuche website. Unfortunately it’s in only in German, again it’s the German mentality to keep everything in their own language, but it’s easy to operate. Another alternative to find the best way to get to your dream destination is GoEuro. It’s similar to the first searching tool but it translated in 12 different languages. Additionally it displays Europe’s excellent rail, bus and air travel.

6 thoughts on “Cheap travel by bus in Europe”

  1. Ireland says:
    October 26, 2016 at 5:12 am

    Findnig this post solves a problem for me. Thanks!

    Reply
  2. Ania says:
    April 1, 2017 at 11:50 pm

    Thank your for all the tips about bus lines in Europe! I want to do some travelling in Eastern Europe this summer, so this will definitely help! Thanks again 🙂

    Reply
  3. Harsh says:
    April 2, 2017 at 7:29 am

    Hey, thanks for the help. We are traveling to Europe in August there and will be pretty much using buses for transfers. I’ll prefer Eurolines though sincerely hope there’s no odour. can you please tell if it operates to Amsterdam from Paris and if yes then how long does it take?

    Reply
  4. Suruchi says:
    April 2, 2017 at 7:05 pm

    Thanks for such a wonderful and informative article. This is surely going to help me and the people traveling to Europe.

    Reply
  5. Ana Rose | Roads and Pages says:
    April 2, 2017 at 11:37 pm

    Knowing how to go to another destination in multiple ways is a plus when travelling. It is for that reason that people who love to travel must also how to do an intensive research. Your post is really helpful and I agree with your tips. My boyfriend and I will be travelling to another Asian country which is known for traffics. For that reason, we opted to just spend some money on airplanes rather than by trains.

    Reply
  6. Haley says:
    April 4, 2017 at 12:14 pm

    This post is really useful. I’ve found that Polskibus is very good when travelling from Polish cities Berlin, Kiev and Prague.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Hey! I'm Kate & I'm another happy travel blogger who wants to share my experiences with you. Traveling is my biggest hobby and most of my money I spend on tickets and holidays. I hope with my way of traveling, I will inspire you to visit these countries.

Instagram

How to earn money with PINTEREST MARKETING
Privacy Policy

Instagram

Copyright © 2020 ElysianMoment.com | All Rights Reserved

©2023 | Built using WordPress and Responsive Blogily theme by Superb
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT