When you’re flying out of the UK, you may want to use your miles and points or cheap premium cabin airfare in order to book your holiday or business trip. Unfortunately, the UK Air Passenger Duty Tax is a significant blocker towards valuable miles and points redemptions, or cheaper airfare. This is because longhaul premium cabin travellers are levied a large departure tax when flying out of the UK.
This only applies to itineraries originating out of the UK. For example, if you book a longhaul flight out of Stockholm and position there from the UK on a separate itinerary, you’ll only have to pay the Air Passenger Duty tax for the flight from the UK to Stockholm. While everyone departing the UK has to pay the APD, different passengers pay vastly different amounts of APD tax, so there’s a way to get around this to ensure you’re paying the minimum airfare.
What is the UK Air Passenger Duty Tax?
The UK Air Passenger Duty (APD) tax is a tax levied on all passengers departing out of the UK. The airline charges this directly when you are booking the ticket, so you’ll usually see it included in your fare during the booking process – you won’t have to pay extra at the airport.
The APD applies to those who are booking with miles and points, as well as those who are booking cash. There’s no way to avoid paying the UK APD tax if your itinerary originates from the UK. However, if you’re connecting in the UK, you’re exempt from this tax (unless your connection is over 24 hours).
My £224 tax when flying from London to Hong Kong in Cathay Pacific business class
The APD tax is not the same as a fuel surcharge – that’s a separate discretionary charge applied by the airline, whereas the UK Air Passenger Duty tax is transferred over to the government.
The APD depends on the distance between London and the destination’s capital city, as well as your class of service:
- when flying domestically, the APD is £7 if you’re in economy, or £14 in any other cabin
- when flying internationally to a destination within 2,000 miles, the APD is £13 if you’re in economy, or £28 in any other cabin
- when flying internationally to a destination between 2,001 and 5,500 miles, the APD is £90 if you’re in economy, or £216 in any other cabin
- when flying internationally to a destination over 5,500 miles away, the APD is £94 if you’re in economy, or £224 in any other cabin
These rates will change from April 2026:
- when flying domestically, the APD is £8 if you’re in economy, or £16 in any other cabin
- when flying internationally to a destination within 2,000 miles, the APD is £15 if you’re in economy, or £32 in any other cabin
- when flying internationally to a destination between 2,001 and 5,500 miles, the APD is £102 if you’re in economy, or £244 in any other cabin
- when flying internationally to a destination over 5,500 miles away, the APD is £106 if you’re in economy, or £253 in any other cabin
The APD is charged to the airline, so the airline doesn’t technically have to transfer the cost to the consumer. However, in 99% of cases, the airlines do – the only exception is with ultra low-cost carriers, which rely on ancillaries to make up this amount spent.
Any flight out of the UK will incur an Air Passenger Duty tax, though this can range from £7 to £224
As you can see, there’s a flat rate whether you’re flying in premium economy, business class, or first class. The APD can be an especially big hit for the former, as you’ll have to pay a £224 tax on top of a base fare that could’ve been less than twice that.
Premium economy travel is made significantly more expensive out of the UK
Just to make clear who pays the Air Passenger Duty tax:
- if you’re flying from London to Copenhagen to New York on the same itinerary, you’ll pay the long-haul APD, unless your connection in Copenhagen is over 24 hours (in which case you’ll pay the shorthaul APD)
- if you’re flying from Copenhagen to London to New York on the same itinerary, you won’t have to pay the APD, unless your connection in London is over 24 hours (in which case you’ll pay the longhaul APD)
- if you’re flying from London to Copenhagen to New York on different itineraries (e.g. flying Norwegian to Copenhagen, then flying SAS on a separate ticket to New York), you’ll pay the shorthaul APD
- if you’re flying from New York to Copenhagen to London on the same itinerary, you won’t have to pay the APD, as it’s just a departure tax
You’ll have to honour the highest cabin class on the itinerary. So for the above example, if London to Copenhagen was in economy, but Copenhagen to New York was in business class, you’d pay the premium cabin APD rate.
How To Minimise The UK Air Passenger Duty Tax
Simple answer: don’t fly longhaul out of the UK.
A £13 tax for a shorthaul economy flight is really nothing to fret about, and even the higher £28 tax in a premium cabin is doable. The issue is when your flight from the UK stretches over 2,000 miles – you’ll either pay £90-94 if you’re flying economy, or £216-224 if you’re flying a premium cabin. While you might want to avoid the fare if flying economy, generally I’d most recommend positioning to avoid this fare if you’re trying to fly out of the UK longhaul in a premium cabin, especially since shorthaul flights from the UK to Europe can cost much less than £200.
Let’s say I want to fly from London to Hong Kong in Cathay Pacific premium economy. Flying out of London directly would cost HK$3,437 (£333) in taxes and fees.
Meanwhile, if I fly the same itinerary out of Frankfurt, the total taxes and fees are HK$1,714 (£166). By the way, Cathay Pacific is now flying their new 777s to Frankfurt, so I’d still get to try Cathay Pacific’s newest premium economy cabin.
That gives me a £167 cash saving. Well, how much does it cost to fly over to Frankfurt? £55, and that gives me a free carry-on as well.
Or I could even choose to redeem points for this flight, where I’d pay £40 and 10,000 Asia Miles, and would also get a checked bag.
Even if I pay cash for the repositioning to Frankfurt, I’d managed to save £112 on this itinerary.
You can play around with the fares quite a bit – I can even fly out of Milan the night prior, sleep at home in London, and fly the exact same flight out of London for HK$1,378 (£134) and 8,000 more miles. Do note that you can’t just skip the Milan to London segment, since that would void the rest of the itinerary.
Then I could pick up a £15 flight from London to Milan. It gets me into Bergamo, I’d pay £8 for the bus into Milan, have a nice lunch and work from a coffee shop, head to the airport, and start the itinerary. (You will have to add up the costs to get to Stansted, though even then we’re still looking at prices significantly lower than what the APD would’ve charged.) I also presumably wouldn’t be bringing a carry-on or a checked bag if I was just doing a day trip in Milan.
Side note, do you have to pay the APD when flying Ryanair? Ryanair is actually in the 1% of cases where the APD isn’t transferred to the customer – the customer doesn’t pay any of the airport taxes. This is because Ryanair doesn’t try and make a margin per passenger, though rather relies on ancillaries and peak season surge pricing for revenue, which are much more inelastic goods for travel. (The APD is £13 for the above, so the base fare would be £2, not even accounting for the small airport-levied departure and arrival taxes.)
The APD is one of the most simple reasons to manipulate your origin airport so you end up paying lower airfare. However, usually airfare out of the UK is also bumped up due to higher demand, so you’re much more likely to find cheaper airfare when originating out of elsewhere.
Low-cost airlines and shorthaul economy are your friend
One observation of saving money this way is that you have to be alright with flying low-cost airlines, as well as full-service European airlines in economy. You can’t be precious about wanting premium cabin service treatment the whole way – you have to do some shorthaul segments flying a low-cost airline in order to maximise the value you’re getting from flight tickets. That’s a general principle for finding cheap airfare, but applies especially if you live in the UK and like premium cabin travel.
You can’t really maximise your UK APD savings unless you’re willing to fly unglamorously shorthaul
I’ll write about positioning flights in a separate post.
When does it not make sense to pay the APD?
It doesn’t always make sense to reposition to dodge the APD, and here’s when I just suck it up and pay it:
- At the end of the day, repositioning for the APD will save you around £100-150 – that’s good if you’re taking a day off, but sometimes if you have work commitments you will have to just cut your losses and pay the APD
- e.g. when I flew the Aria Suite to Hong Kong, sure I could’ve booked a connecting ticket out of Paris and positioned there, though that would’ve cost me at least half of a working day
- During peak season I sometimes just pay the APD, as a positioning flight might cost the value of the savings (or cost so much that the lower savings just aren’t worth the effort)
- You do need to consider when the first flight on the new itinerary leaves – if it’s too early in the morning, you’ll have to factor in hotel costs
Conclusion
The UK Air Passenger Duty tax is a tax levied to airlines for all passengers departing out of the UK. The amount taxed depends on the distance travelled to the final destination on a single itinerary (unless broken up with a >24h layover), as well as the class of service. By flying out of the UK in economy or on a low-cost airline, and booking a longhaul itinerary out of another airport in Europe, there’s the potential to save a good amount on a longhaul itinerary (in addition to any savings that you’d make by manipulating your origin airport).
