India is right now in the midst of an aviation revolution, which is unprecedented in the history. As per a new research, it was reported that airfares in India are cheapest in the whole world.
Per 100 kms of domestic air travel in India costs only $2.27 in a low cost airlines, which is Rs 150.9 as per current USD-INR conversion of Rs 66.50. No other country provides such cheap airfares, anywhere in the world. If we talk about legacy airlines, then the cost per 100 kms turns out to be $2.67, which is Rs 177.5 as per current currency conversion rates.
However, for International airfare, costs in India are not the cheapest, but among the lowest in the world. For low cost airlines, international travel cost $3.54 per 100 kms, which translates to Rs Rs 235.4, whereas in legacy airlines, the cost is $4.51 or Rs 299.9 per 100 kms.
On an average, considering both domestic and international travels, airfare in India comes out to be $3.25 or Rs 216.12 per 100 kms which is lowest in the whole world.
Here are the Top 20 Countries with Cheapest Airfares
The research has been conducted by online travel portal Kiwi.com, which studies domestic and international airfares of over 1 million journeys, all over the world. In order to derive the results, Kiwi calculated the airfares for a flight from the country’s national capital to the top 5 cities for domestic route.
And for international flights, Kiwi calculated the airfare from the national capital of a country to the top 5 international hubs in the same continent. All airfares were calculated on the same day, for both domestic and international flights; for both on and off seasons.
Interestingly, in 2014, we had reported that air travel in India is cheapest in the world, a position which we have maintained in the last two years. However, in 2014, the average airfare per 100 kms was $10.36, which translated to roughly Rs 615. This means that domestic airfares in India has reduced by 356% in the last two years. Reduction in global oil price can be one of the reasons for such sharp decline.
There is another interesting observation from the report: The margin between legacy airlines and low cost airlines in India is diminishing faster than we imagined. For domestic routes, low cost airlines’ airfare costs $2.27 per 100 kms, while for legacy airlines, it costs $2.67, a difference of only 40 cents or Rs 27.
This means that cut-throat competition, and more demand is pushing airfares down in India. We have already observed how SpiceJet reduced 75% on domestic airfares in 2014; IndiGo reduced 50% and even Air India offered 50% discounts, periodically.
After India, it’s Malaysia, where airfares is the lowest in the world at an average of $3.78 / 100 kms for both domestic and international flights; followed by Russia at $5.88 and Portugal at $6.71.
UAE is the country with most expensive airfares, where the passenger needs to spend an average of $181.38/ 100 kms for a low cost domestic air-travel and $220.36 in legacy airlines. On an average, for both domestic and international air travel, UAE passengers need to pay $105.71 / 100 kms.
Here is the aviation price index for all the countries.
