TL;DR
Every page on the site about what travel costs and how you pay: official price levels by country, the months when accommodation is dearest, tourist taxes, VAT refunds and tax-free shopping, card and currency rules, customs allowances and Japan's travel taxes. Each page cites its official sources.
None of this is financial advice; each page links to the official rule.
Prices
- Is it expensive? Price levels in Europe and Japan, 2025Official price levels for restaurants and accommodation, food, drink and transport in 34 European countries, and prices by prefecture in Japan.
- Which months is accommodation dearest? Europe by countryWhen accommodation prices peak in each European country, from Eurostat's monthly price index, 2023 to 2025, and where there is no clear pattern.
- How many hotels close in Spain out of season?How many hotels are open in each month in Spain, its regions and its tourist zones, from INE's 2025 estimates: where most close in winter.
- How places stack up: rankings by topicRank 35 countries, 47 Japanese prefectures or 123 regions by topic, or compare four side by side: seasonality, stay, prices, weather and more.
Taxes and refunds
- Tourist tax in Florence, Barcelona and AmsterdamWhat visitors pay in tourist tax in Florence, Barcelona and Amsterdam, who pays it and for how many nights, from the cities' and regions' own rules.
- VAT refunds for visitors to the EU: the 3-month ruleWho can reclaim VAT when leaving the EU, the 3-month export deadline, how customs validates the claim, and what official pages say about minimum spends.
- Japan tax-free shopping from 1 November 2026: new rulesFrom 1 November 2026 Japan's tax-free shops refund consumption tax once customs confirms the goods are leaving Japan. The 90-day limit and the kiosk step.
- Japan's travel taxes in 2026: departure and hotel taxesJapan's International Tourist Tax rose from ¥1,000 to ¥3,000 per departure on 1 July 2026. Plus Kyoto's and Tokyo's accommodation taxes, from their ordinances.
- Duty-free allowances: EU and Japan side by sideEU duty-free allowance: €300 to €430 of other goods, 40 to 200 cigarettes, 1 litre of spirits to 16 litres of beer. Japan's limits and cash rules alongside.
- Duty-free allowance checker: EU and JapanSay where you are arriving and what you are carrying, and see the range of the EU or Japan duty-free allowance for each, with the official links.
Paying
- Pay in local currency or home currency? The EU ruleWhat EU rules make card machines, cash machines and banks tell you before converting a payment into your home currency, and your right to pay locally.
- Paying by card abroad: card rules checkedCard surcharges, deposit holds, pre-ticked extras, euro ATM charges and cloned cards: what EU and UK official sources say.
- Which countries use the euro in 2026?The 21 EU countries that use the euro, the six that do not, Denmark's opt-out, Bulgaria's switch on 1 January 2026, and the non-EU places that use it too.
Bookings and your rights
- Hotel booking hacks, checked against official rulesPopular hotel-booking tips checked against official sources: free cancellation, resort fees, fake reviews, rate parity, and Japan check-in rules.
- Flight booking hacks, checked against official rulesPopular flight-booking tips checked against EU, UK and US official sources: cancellations, refunds, overbooking, split tickets and hidden fees.
- Package holidays: when booking together protects youWhen booking a flight and hotel together becomes a protected package holiday, what happens if the company goes bust, and when you can cancel free.
- Travel booking scams and lookalike sites: official warningsWhat official sources say about rental scams, lookalike hotel and visa sites, and suspicious booking emails, with links to the official services.
- EU flight delay compensation in 2026, and the reformWhat EU Regulation 261/2004 gives you for delays, cancellations and denied boarding today, and what the 2026 reform changes once it is published.
- EU flight compensation checker: which rule applies?Answer three questions to see whether EU air passenger rules probably cover your flight and which situation applies, from the European Commission's summary.
Key takeaways
- Price levels compare countries; they are not trip budgets.
- Taxes and fees change; each page shows when we checked it.
- What we would skip: any cost figure that does not say where it comes from.
Sources
Each linked page lists its own sources. See how we research.
Each linked page states its sources and method.