Planning to climb Mount Kilimanjaro? Here’s a detailed cost breakdown from a real experience in 2023. Some expenses have been paid in autumn 2022. This guide covers everything you need for your Kilimanjaro trip and more, including accommodation, and safaris.
COSTS – KILIMANJARO ONLY
If you only plan to fly in, do Kilimanjaro and fly back, the budget is fairly straight forward, there are only few expenses.
I’m adding how much I paid personally, this is for indication only as your costs might be different depending where you live or your personal preference. For example choose more expensive company with add-ins. Also my insurance is fairly high because I stayed 3,5 weeks.
The cost for the Kilimanjaro tour will differ depending on the tour provider you choose. I have an article with more details in this topic HERE
My total – if I only did Kilimanjaro – would be around 4400 USD.
KILIMANJARO – OTHER ITEMS TO BUDGET FOR
The budget of 4400 USD is excluding any items specific for you, such as gear which you might need to buy or rent. I had all the hiking gear from previous trips, however I did end up renting down/windbreaker pants for the summit night for 15 USD/trip. Also your company should inform you which gear is included and what is the cost of rental.
For example sleeping bag should be included, but you might prefer to use your own. Inform your company of this in advance. It will likely not decrease the cost of your tour, but at least the porters will not need to carry as much. Also consider that due to this you might need potentially more porters.
Or you might own hiking poles, but prefer not to pack them in your suitcase since they are awkward shape, you might want to rent them.
Also budget for any further items that you want to purchase, such as medication (malaria pills), toiletries, hand warmers, snacks, etc.
Most companies offer airport drop off/pick up and 2x nights in hotel (1 night before the trek and 1 night after), so you do not need to worry or budget for this. Do check with your company before booking that this is the case.
During the trek food should be provided. Before and after the trek, for example in the hotel or airport, food is usually not included, so I allocated some budget for it. Do note that hotel food tends to have Western prices, around 10-15 USD per meal per person. For your indication, you can visit one of the places where locals eat, I have paid 5 USD for 2 meals and 2 smoothies.
You will not spend money elsewhere as there are no places to spend it at unless you have more time or energy before or after the trek. Possibly some money can be spend at the airport for food, snacks or souvenirs.
COSTS – TANZANIA
If you are able to spend more time and money, I highly recommend staying longer in Tanzania. I have spend 3,5 weeks there doing 3 different activities: safari, trekking and Zanzibar.
Read more for tips on saving money and avoiding tourist traps like the Maasai village tour.
COST – SAFARI
The cost of safari can vary dramatically. Some 3-day tours go for 3000 USD or more. SURICATA SAFARIS was the cheapest found at 750 USD. The reason for low cost is that we joined open group, we were 5 people in the jeep. We also opted out for sleeping in tent instead of hotels or other glamorous accommodation. Similar to Kilimanjaro, I find that paying premium price is absolutely unnecessary, the experience is more less the same. During the day, everyone is driving around same route in similar jeep and there are only few campsites available. You might want to pay for luxury hotel with pool but you will arrive very late to the camp and leave very early, so you will not have chance to enjoy the luxuries all that much. Personally the experience of sleeping in savannah with giraffes grazing around, hyena running through our campsite and hearing lions roaring while you are in the tent were my favourite safari memories.
Food, accommodation, park fees, transport, water should be all included in your tour. There is nothing further you need to budget for unless you want to buy additional tours, snacks or souvenirs.
Personally I opted in also for hot air balloon, which set me back around 600 USD including tips. We didn’t see many animals and I did miss part of the safari, so I would have preferred to skip this part or do it outside of my tour.
We have also visited Masai village, paying 15 USD per person. I would advise you to skip this unless you are 100% certain the village is truly authentic village, and your guide will say they are even if that is not the case. Most of them are tourist trap and complete scam. They will dance for you, but all the time they will try to guilt you for additional money. They brought us to “school” which was falling apart, full of children who put on show for you and then look extremely sad asking for money. Then they ask you to buy overpriced souvenirs to support local community. And I had someone downward ask for more money just because. Do not support this scam and AVOID.
COST – TREKKING AND CHEMKA
I have hiked both Mt Kilimanjaro and Mt Meru. In terms of budget, I have same comments for Mt Meru as I had about Kilimanjaro. I used the same company for both.
I have also done day tour to Chemka hot springs, through the same company. You could probably get this tour significantly cheaper if you did it on your own, for example rent car or taxi and then pay the entrance and lunch yourself. I assume self organised tour would be about 50% or less, but since it was my first time in Africa and I was solo female, I preferred organised tour. The guide gave me a lot of info and thought me some Swahili on the way, took pictures for me and made sure I had everything I needed. The day trip to Chemka was really nice and I enjoyed. It seems most people leave after lunchtime so its nice and empty in the afternoon with local people doing some crazy tricks on the swing.
COST – ZANZIBAR
I also decided to see other part of Tanzania and flew to Zanzibar for 5 nights. Please note that I did Zanzibar with a friend and while I mention the price of the hotels and taxi at full price for your indication, for me this was half since it was shared cost. Day tours and Zanzibar-budget were my personal expenses.
Also Zanzibar was fully self-organised so the cost will be dependent on your personal preference, what kind of hotel you want to stay, what restaurants you want to eat in, what tours you want to take, do you travel around or stay in one place (reduce taxi costs). The approach of me and my friend was that we have chosen more budget-friendly options for hotel with the idea we will only sleep there while explore the island. We tried to eat on budget most of the time. Of course we went to restaurants few times, but we didn’t do the full breakfast-lunch-dinner eating out. It was too hot anyway, so sometimes fruit and cookies did the trick. Of course we still enjoyed ourselves and treated ourselves, we just preferred to spend money mostly on the experiences. And haggle prices for the taxi 🙂
We have also done day tour to Cheetah’s rock, which was expensive for 160 USD per person, but very much worth the money. Part of the tour package was collection from/to hotel with option from hotel/to airport, so we have saved about 40-50 USD on taxi.
For the animal lovers out there – this place is truly caring for the animals and they ended up there as rescues and it is not possible for one reason or another to release them back to nature. The crew will share stories of each animal and you really feel that they very much care for the animals and only let the animals do what they are comfortable with. They share few rules not only to keep you safe, but also the animals. The place is not tourist trap exploiting animals, but sanctuary doing tours as a way to sustain the centre. I do not support place that just takes advantage (or worse) of animals, so I did a lot of research prior. If you can budget for this, I do recommend this experience. You will be supporting the cause and have amazing experience.
COST – TOTAL
The total of my 3,5 weeks in Tanzania was around 8500 USD.
In general I’m very happy with the experiences I had and the tours and companies I booked with.
The price of my trip could have been slightly lower by opting to skip some tours, mainly hot air baloon that would deduct the price by 600 USD. Or by joining open group for Kilimanjaro or by skipping Cheetah’s rock. But for me all of this was worth the price.
On the other hand I feel like the trip is on the lower side as most options I have selected were budget-friendly. Most companies run safari’s around 3k, same for Kilimanjaro at 3k and other companies offered Mt Meru to me for 2k, where just these 3 tours would cost me 8000 USD.
I hope this helps in planning your dream vacation in Tanzania.
