How Much Does an Antarctica Cruise Cost? (2027–28)

Last reviewed: July 30, 2026

Key Takeaways

• Live 2027 to 2028 Antarctic itineraries run from $11,321 to $28,500 and up per person, or about $950 to $2,600 per night on classic sailings (as of July 30, 2026).
• Poseidon Expeditions anchors the value tier of our own inventory at about $1,029 per night.
• Flying the Drake Passage costs 30 to 100 percent more per night, yet the total bill is often lower because you buy fewer nights.
• Budget another $1,500 to $4,000 per person for flights, gear, mandatory evacuation insurance, and tips.
• Book 12 to 18 months out. Early-bird discounts currently reach 25 percent, and 35 percent on select sailings.

As of July 30, 2026, an Antarctica cruise for the 2027 to 2028 season costs from $11,321 to $28,500 and up per person. That range comes from the 143 live, bookable Antarctic itineraries across ten cruise lines in our inventory. It works out to roughly $950 to $2,600 per person per night at double occupancy on classic sailings. Short fly-in voyages run higher per night. The floor is an 11-night Poseidon Expeditions voyage departing late February 2028, while the ceiling belongs to holiday-week sailings with Ponant and Scenic.

The fare is only part of the bill, though. Most travelers should plan on another $1,500 to $4,000 per person for international flights, cold-weather gear, mandatory evacuation insurance, and gratuities, all priced below. This guide walks through every live price band, the fly-versus-sail math, what each fare actually includes, and where the real savings are. If you are still deciding whether Antarctica is the right expedition for you, start with our full Antarctica expedition cruise guide and come back for the numbers.

Every cruise price in this article comes from a bookable itinerary you can open and check. All fares are lead cabin, per person at double occupancy, and correct as of July 30, 2026.

The Price Bands: What a 2027–28 Antarctica Cruise Costs

The table below is the short answer to this whole question. These are named, dated, bookable 2027 to 2028 departures across seven cruise lines, sorted from expedition value up to ultra-luxury. We worked out the per-night rate for each so you can compare unlike voyages fairly.

Read the table with a few caveats in mind. We pulled the fares from live bookable inventory on July 30, 2026, and each itinerary page lists every available date, not just the one shown. Some lines had not finished loading their full 2027 to 2028 programs at time of writing, including Abercrombie & Kent and parts of the Ponant and Viking schedules. Expect this band to fill in further. Silversea publishes date changes frequently, so speak with an advisor to confirm live departures on the Silversea voyages above.

The value tier is genuine expedition cruising rather than a stripped-down compromise. Poseidon Expeditions anchors that tier of our inventory at about $1,029 to $1,131 per night. The line also publishes the guide that currently tops the search results for this question. That guide puts the full market at $6,000 to $50,000 per person, with most travelers spending $6,000 to $15,000. Our table sits inside that spectrum but runs narrower, because it prices specific bookable departures rather than the whole historical market.

At the top end, the ceiling keeps going past our headline range. Lindblad's Patagonia, Falklands, South Georgia, and Antarctica routing starts around $43,380 per person, while Scenic sells cruise-and-land combinations that reach $82,205 over 36 nights. For nearer-term context, Tauck's 12-night Antarctica lists from $15,990, Abercrombie & Kent's 13-night Beyond the Antarctic Circle from $18,595, and Ponant's 10-night Emblematic Antarctica from $16,580 on early-2027 departures.

What Drives the Price of an Antarctica Cruise

Five variables explain almost all of the spread in that table. Once you understand them, you can move your own quote up or down deliberately instead of accepting the first fare you see.

When You Sail

The season runs late October through March, and December to January is peak. Those holiday weeks carry the highest demand, sell out first, and price accordingly. Shoulder departures in November and late February through March run 20 to 40 percent cheaper, by Poseidon's own published estimate, and our table backs that up.

How Long You Sail

The per-night rate falls as the voyage stretches. Poseidon's 18-night Best of the Southern Ocean prices at $950 per night, the lowest per-night rate of any Antarctic-landing sailing in our price-band table. The shortest nine-night sailings, by comparison, run $1,400 to $2,250 per night. Longer routings also tend to add the Falklands and South Georgia, as Antarctica21's 19-night voyage does.

The Ship and Its Inclusion Model

An expedition-value fare buys you the same continent as an ultra-luxury one, but the ship, cabin, service ratio, and inclusions differ sharply. Silversea builds flights, hotels, transfers, and gratuities into its fare, while value lines keep the fare lean and let you add on. Our ranking of Antarctic expedition ships compares the hardware in detail.

The Route

Peninsula round trips from Ushuaia or Puerto Williams are the baseline. Crossing the Antarctic Circle, adding South Georgia, or reaching the emperor penguin colonies of the Weddell Sea all push the fare up. That last route requires Ponant's icebreaker Le Commandant Charcot, and the hardware shows up in the price at $2,334 per night on The Emperor Penguins of Weddell Sea.

How You Cross the Drake

Whether you sail the Drake Passage or fly over it changes both the per-night rate and the total bill, in opposite directions. The math is unusual enough that it gets its own section next.

Fly the Drake or Sail It: The Real Cost Math

Most Antarctic voyages sail from Ushuaia or Puerto Williams across the Drake Passage, the two-day open-ocean crossing that separates South America from the peninsula. Fly-cruise itineraries replace it with a charter flight from Punta Arenas to King George Island, skipping the crossing in each direction.

Silversea sells both formats on the same line, which makes the premium unusually easy to measure. Its round-trip sailings from Puerto Williams price at about $1,900 to $2,150 per person per night. The six-night fly-in round trips to King George Island, meanwhile, run from $15,300 to $26,600 per person, about $2,550 to $4,400 per night. Flying costs 30 to 100 percent more per night.

The total bill is often lower when you fly, though. Most fly-in departures total $15,000 to $21,000 per person against $18,000 to $28,000 for the round-trip sailings, because you buy three to six fewer nights. You pay a steep rate for a short trip instead of a fair rate for a long one, and the short trip frequently wins on the checkout page.

Antarctica21, the fly-cruise specialist in our table, prices the flight premium at roughly $2,000 to $4,000 per person over a comparable sailing.

There is a middle path too. Silversea's nine-night Puerto Williams to King George Island voyage, from $19,900 per person, sails the Drake southbound and ends at the island airstrip, so you only fly one way. At the value end of fly-cruising, Lindblad's Antarctica Direct: Fly the Drake 9-Day starts at $13,608 per person on nearer-term departures.

Flying suits travelers who are short on days or prone to seasickness. Sailing, on the other hand, gives you the full expedition arc, with two days of lectures and seabird watching before the first landing. We compare the leading air-cruise programs in our Antarctica21 air-cruise breakdown.

What Is Included and What Costs Extra

The fare gap between tiers shrinks once you count inclusions. Every line in our table builds the core expedition program into the fare. That means daily landings and cruising by zodiac (the rigid inflatable boats used to get ashore), plus the expedition team's guiding, lectures, and all meals. The real differences sit in flights, hotels, gear, gratuities, and adventure add-ons.

Gear is covered more than first-timers expect. Silversea, Ponant, Poseidon, and Lindblad all gift you an expedition parka to keep and loan you the insulated boots. That still leaves base layers, waterproof pants, and gloves to buy, which is where the $600 to $1,000 gear budget below comes from.

At the luxury end, Silversea is the most complete package we book, with door-to-door air, a pre-cruise hotel night, transfers, the parka, and gratuities all inside the fare. Scenic is all-inclusive as well, including gratuities and helicopter flights, with submersible dives priced separately. Ponant includes flights to Ushuaia, a pre-cruise hotel, the parka, and boots.

In the middle, Swan Hellenic and Viking run premium-inclusive models that cover most of the onboard experience without the door-to-door extras. Poseidon keeps the fare lean beyond the parka gift and boot loan, which is exactly the trade that makes it the value tier.

Lindblad folds kayaking into the fare, where most lines sell it as a $700 to $2,000 add-on. The line also staffs one expedition team member for every ten guests. Our Lindblad versus Ponant comparison weighs those two philosophies head to head.

The paid extras are consistent across the market. Kayaking programs run $700 to $2,000 where they are not included, and camping on the ice adds $150 to $400. Gratuities run $150 to $600 per trip on lines that expect them. Silversea and Scenic build gratuities in. To see what the included landings actually deliver day to day, read our zodiac landings guide.

The Other Costs: Flights, Gear, Insurance, and Tips

Several costs never appear on the cruise invoice, and together they are large enough to move your budget by thousands. Plan for them at the same time you shortlist the cruise.

The insurance line is the one travelers most often miss. Emergency medical and evacuation coverage is not optional in Antarctica: every operator requires it, most set the bar at $150,000 to $300,000, and proof is checked at embarkation. A compliant policy typically costs just $200 to $500, one of the smallest line items on this whole page.

Add it up and the non-cruise total lands between $1,500 and $4,000 per person before optional add-ons, depending on how much your line already includes. A Silversea guest with door-to-door air covered budgets near the bottom of that range, while a value-tier guest booking every component separately budgets near the top.

When to Book a 2027–28 Antarctica Cruise

The 2027 to 2028 season, with departures from late October 2027 through March 2028, is already on sale, and the current tranche is the cheap one. Early-bird discounts across the market currently run up to 20 to 25 percent, and up to 35 percent on select sailings. Antarctica21 is advertising savings of up to $5,000 on its 2027 to 2028 air-cruises.

The early-booking window closes as ships fill, which typically happens 12 to 18 months before departure. December and January cabins go first, so if Christmas in Antarctica is the plan, the booking window is now rather than next year. Shoulder-season space holds longer, but the best cabin categories still thin out early on ships this small.

The cash-flow side is gentler than the sticker prices suggest. Deposits run 10 to 25 percent of the fare, or a flat $100 to $1,000 per person on some lines. Balances come due 45 to 120 days before departure, depending on the operator. Viking is the outlier. It asks for full payment far earlier than its peers, with 2028 departures due by March 15, 2027, under its published terms. Factor that into which line you choose if you prefer to hold your cash longer.

How to Spend Less Without Downgrading the Experience

The gap between a well-bought Antarctica cruise and a poorly bought one is thousands of dollars for the same landings. These are the levers that actually move the number.

Sail the Shoulder Weeks

November and late February through March run 20 to 40 percent below peak. You can see the effect inside a single itinerary. Poseidon's Realm of Penguins & Icebergs lists from $12,446 per person in December 2027 and from $11,321 in late February 2028. Lead fares have even started under $10,000, with Swan Hellenic's nine-night Antarctic Wonders from $9,800 per person on a November 2026 departure.

Buy Inside the Early-Booking Window

The 25 to 35 percent early-booking discounts above are the single biggest lever on this list, and they reward the traveler who commits 12 to 18 months out. Waiting for a last-minute deal on Antarctica is a poor bet, because capacity is tiny and peak weeks sell through.

Watch the Single Supplements

Solo travelers face supplements from zero to 75 percent of the double fare. Swan Hellenic typically charges around 25 percent, while Silversea and Ponant waive the supplement entirely on select sailings. If you are traveling alone, ask us which departures currently carry no supplement before you shortlist anything else.

Count the Inclusions, Not Just the Fare

A cheaper headline fare can cost more once you add what a pricier line includes. If you were going to kayak anyway, Lindblad's included program is worth $700 to $2,000 against most competitors. If gratuities, transfers, and hotel nights matter to you, Silversea's and Scenic's bundled fares close much of their apparent price gap.

Check the Route Map Before Comparing Fares

Some attractively priced polar voyages never touch the continent itself. Antarctica21's 16-night Falklands and South Georgia routing, from $9,346 per person, is a superb subantarctic wildlife voyage, but it does not include Antarctic Peninsula landings. Keep it out of like-for-like comparisons with the fares above. If you are weighing polar options more broadly, our Antarctica versus Arctic comparison covers which trip fits which traveler.

Booking with Small Ship Travel

We are a small specialist agency, and Antarctic expedition inventory is a core part of what we book. You pay the same fare booking through us that you would pay booking direct with the cruise line. What you gain is the cross-line view this article is built on. You also get an advisor who will say plainly when a cheaper departure or a better-included fare is the smarter buy.

Booking through us also earns credit back. The Small Ship Travel Loyalty Program pays 2 to 5 percent of every booking back as credit across four tiers, Bronze through Emerald. Higher tiers add perks like cabin upgrades and complimentary air upgrades. New members receive a $250 sign-up credit, and the credits accumulate across every cruise line we book, so an Antarctica voyage this season keeps paying toward the next one.