Everest Base Camp Trek Cost From Singapore: The Real All-In Numbers in SGD for 2026 and 2027

Written by Shreejan Simkhada, CEO of The Everest Holiday and third-generation Himalayan guide. TAAN Member #1586.

Last updated 6 September 2026. Package prices read from our booking system on that date; they hold for 2026 and 2027 departures. Singapore dollar figures use 1 US dollar = 1.27 Singapore dollars, the rate in the first week of September 2026, rounded.

Singapore is the easiest place in the world to leave for Everest. There is a daily nonstop flight, it takes five hours, and the time difference is barely worth mentioning. What Singaporeans ask me instead, every week on WhatsApp, is the money: what does the trek really cost, all in, in Singapore dollars, and what do the cheap quotes leave out? This page is my answer, with the arithmetic shown so you can check it against anything you are holding.

The short answer

A twelve-day Everest Base Camp trek costs a Singaporean trekker roughly SGD 3,900 to 4,300 all in on a budget package once you add your own trail meals, about SGD 5,200 to 5,700 on a standard package with meals and porters, and SGD 8,500 to 9,200 for the luxury version with helicopter transfers. In US dollars, which is what we quote in, that is about $3,050 to 3,400, $4,100 to 4,500 and $6,700 to 7,250. The short, cheap flight is why a Singaporean pays less all in than almost anyone else on the trail. Where the money goes, line by line, is below.

What does the trek package itself cost?

Our own prices for the twelve-day trek, per person, held for 2026 and 2027:

• Budget: US$1,399, about SGD 1,775. Guide, permits, Lukla flights and lodge rooms. You carry your own bag and buy your own meals on the trail.
• Standard: US$2,499, about SGD 3,175. Everything above plus all meals and one porter between two trekkers.
• Luxury: US$4,999, about SGD 6,350. A porter to yourself, private rooms, and a helicopter to and from Lukla instead of the fixed-wing flight.

The route and the guide are the same on every tier; what changes is how much is carried, cooked and arranged for you. The full inclusion list is on the Everest Base Camp trek page.

If you would rather ask than read, message me on WhatsApp with your dates and how many of you there are. Kathmandu is two hours and fifteen minutes behind Singapore, so you will have real numbers the same afternoon.

Does it get cheaper as a group?

Yes, and here are the actual bands rather than a vague promise. Per person, US dollars, for the twelve-day trek:

In Singapore dollars the standard tier runs from about SGD 3,175 for a pair down to about SGD 2,985 a head for a group of thirteen or more. Two things about how we run groups, because not everyone does it this way. Every trip is private, so we never add strangers to your trek to fill seats, and the discount comes from group size alone. Six colleagues from the same office get the same deal as six members of one family. Singapore groups tend to be larger than most, often a hiking group or a company team of eight to twelve, and that is where the third row starts to matter. A solo trekker pays the same per-person rate; there is no single supplement on the trek itself.

How much are flights from Singapore to Kathmandu?

Singapore Airlines flies Changi to Kathmandu nonstop every day, flight SQ442, leaving in the early evening and arriving around nine at night Nepal time. Five hours in the air. Their own published return fare starts at about SGD 775 and rises in October and around Deepavali; our Singaporean clients report paying SGD 800 to 1,100 return when booking two to three months ahead. A one-stop routing through Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok is usually cheaper and adds a few hours; compare it against the nonstop before you book, and if the saving is under SGD 150, take the nonstop. Arriving at night matters: plan two nights in Kathmandu before the Lukla flight, one to sleep off the arrival and one as a proper day for permits, gear checks and Boudhanath, and never fly in the same night you fly out to Lukla.

Visa, permits and insurance

Nepal tourist visa for Singapore passport holders: US$50 for 30 days, about SGD 63, paid on arrival at Kathmandu airport in cash or by card. You can fill the online arrival form up to 15 days before you fly to skip the kiosk queue. Bring one passport photo. The visa on arrival guide walks through it step by step.

Sagarmatha National Park permit: NPR 3,000, about SGD 25. Khumbu Pasang Lhamu municipality permit: NPR 2,000, about SGD 17. On any decent package, ours included, both permits are bought for you and sit inside the price; I list them so you can see where the money goes.

Travel insurance: this is the one item you must buy yourself and the one item not to economise on. MediShield Life and an Integrated Shield plan pay nothing outside Singapore, and a helicopter from Gorak Shep to Kathmandu is billed in the thousands of US dollars. Buy a policy that names trekking to 6,000 metres in the wording; it has to be higher than Kala Patthar at 5,545 metres, not equal to it, because a rescue helicopter flies above you to reach you. Most Singapore travel policies stop at 3,000 or 4,000 metres unless you add the adventurous-activities rider, and a few exclude helicopter evacuation altogether, so read the exclusions page rather than the brochure. Budget SGD 120 to 250 for two to three weeks. Ask the insurer for the confirmation in writing, because the helicopter company in Kathmandu will phone them before it lifts. Send us the wording before you fly and we will tell you honestly if it has a hole in it.

What will I spend on the trail?

On a standard or luxury package with meals included, trail spending is small: hot showers (NPR 500 to 800 higher up), wifi, battery charging, snacks and a bakery stop in Namche. SGD 20 to 30 a day covers it comfortably. On a budget package you buy your own meals, and prices climb with altitude because everything above Namche arrives on a porter's back or a yak. Plan on SGD 45 to 60 a day for three lodge meals and tea, so roughly SGD 550 to 700 across the trek.

Add two or three Kathmandu hotel nights, which are not included in trek packages, ours included. A clean tourist-class double in Thamel runs SGD 90 to 130 a night; a five-star runs SGD 250 and up. Carry the trail money in Nepali rupees from Kathmandu. Singapore dollars change easily in Thamel, or use a Kathmandu ATM, but do not count on the trail: the only ATMs on the route are in Namche and they are often empty.

How much should I tip?

Tipping is not a Singapore habit, and it is a bigger part of the trek than it is of a holiday elsewhere, but nobody in Nepal will make you feel awkward about it and it genuinely matters to the crew. A fair guideline is about ten per cent of the trek price, pooled: for a standard trek, think SGD 260 to 360 for the guide and SGD 180 to 260 for the porter, adjusted for group size and how the team looked after you. Hand it over on the last trekking day, in rupees or US dollars.

The full arithmetic, from Changi

Standard package, one trekker sharing rooms:

The same arithmetic puts the budget route at about SGD 4,100 once you add roughly SGD 620 of trail meals and tip the guide alone, and the luxury route at about SGD 8,700. If someone quotes you dramatically less than the bottom of that range for the same twelve days, a line has been cut somewhere, usually wages, an acclimatisation day or the safety margin. The fuller breakdown of what sits under every operator's pricing is in what Everest Base Camp really costs.

How many days off work do I need?

Fifteen is the honest answer from Singapore: twelve for the trek, one travel day each way, and a spare day at the end. Lukla weather occasionally holds flights, and a buffer day turns a drama into a rest day. Against fourteen days of annual leave that is tight, which is why so many Singaporeans anchor the trip on the Deepavali long weekend in early November, or on the year-end when the trail is cold, clear and empty. If you genuinely only have two weeks, tell me and I will show you honestly what fits, which for most people means a twelve-day itinerary with the buffer day dropped and a flexible return ticket, not a shortened trek.

When should I go?

October is the most reliable month and the busiest. Know one thing most sites will not tell you: from late September to the end of November, Lukla flights leave from Manthali airstrip, four to five hours by road from Kathmandu, with a 1 to 2am pickup. We tell every client this before they book. Mid-November into early December is quieter, colder and often better value. Late March into April is the warm, rhododendron alternative. Two recent autumns have seen the tail of a Bay of Bengal cyclone clip the last week of October, so if your dates are free, the first half of November has become my honest recommendation. One more thing for a Singaporean specifically: you live at sea level in 30-degree heat, and Gorak Shep in November is minus ten at night. The cold is a bigger shock than the altitude for most of our Singapore clients. The down jacket and the sleeping bag are free with us, and the Everest Base Camp weather month by month guide tells you what each month actually feels like.

What does MFA say?

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs advisory for Nepal, as I write this, asks Singaporeans to exercise a high degree of caution and to avoid the districts hit by the flash floods of late August: Rasuwa, Nuwakot, Dhading, Gorkha and Chitwan, along the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli rivers. The Everest region is on the other side of the country and was not touched. I keep a trail-by-trail status page updated at which treks are open after the Rasuwa flood. Read the MFA page for Nepal yourself before you fly, and eRegister your trip while you are there; it takes two minutes and your insurer expects it.

Which Everest trek should a Singaporean trekker book?

The twelve-day trek on this page is the classic and the right first choice for most people. Three variants sell well with our Singapore clients, and each trades a little time for a lot less crowd:

• Everest Base Camp with Gokyo Lakes via Cho La, 15 days. The Gokyo side carries a fifth of the traffic of the main corridor.
• Everest Three Passes, 17 days. The full circuit, for people who have done Kinabalu and Rinjani and want something that lasts longer than a weekend.
• Everest Base Camp by road, 15 days. No Lukla flight at all, which some people pick for the budget and some for the nerves.

How do I pay from Singapore?

We quote in US dollars, so there is no exchange-rate guesswork between us, and your bank converts at its own rate on the day. A 10 per cent deposit confirms the booking; it goes by card through Himalayan Bank's secure gateway, and the balance is paid in Kathmandu in cash or by bank transfer. Singapore Visa and Mastercard cards go through without trouble, provided overseas use is switched on in your banking app, which for most local banks is off by default. PayNow cannot reach a Nepali bank, so card is the practical route. The deposit is non-refundable, but if your plans change we move your trek to any date within a year, free, with 72 hours' notice.

Check us before you pay

Trekking scams in Nepal are real and in the news, so do not take my word for any of this. The Everest Holiday Pvt. Ltd. was registered in Kathmandu on 8 April 2016, company registration 147653/072/073, trekking licence 2090/072, Trekking Agencies' Association of Nepal member 1586. Every legitimate operator holds the same paperwork and will send it without being offended that you asked. Ask me for a call before you send a deposit; I am on WhatsApp all day and we are in nearly the same time zone. If a company will not get on a call with you, walk away. Our reviews are on TripAdvisor and Google under our own name; read the critical ones as well as the kind ones.

The questions Singaporean clients always ask me

Do I need to be very fit? You need to walk five to seven hours a day at altitude with a daypack. Singapore has no hills to train on, so train on stairs and long MacRitchie loops with a loaded pack, and if you can, do Kinabalu first. If you have summited Kinabalu comfortably, you know what 4,000 metres feels like; Base Camp is 1,300 metres higher and you sleep above 4,000 for five nights, which is exactly why the itinerary has two acclimatisation days and why we will not cut them.

Is the food a problem? Every lodge cooks dal bhat, noodles, fried rice, momos and eggs, and above Namche vegetarian is the safer choice because meat has been carried up for days. Halal meat is not available on the trail; Muslim clients from Singapore go vegetarian from Lukla and eat well. Tell us in advance about any dietary need and the guide handles it lodge by lodge.

Can I drink the water? Not from the tap. Budget for purified refills or bring purification tablets rather than buying bottles all the way up. Refills are cheaper and the mountain does not need more plastic.

What gear is provided? With us, a down jacket and a sleeping bag rated to minus fifteen Celsius are free on every tier, so do not buy either in Singapore, where they cost a fortune and you will never use them again. Bring broken-in boots, proper layers and category-3 sunglasses. Full list on the trek page.

Will my phone work? Buy a Ncell or Nepal Telecom SIM at the airport for a few dollars; it works to Namche and patchily above. The Everest Link wifi card in Namche covers the lodges further up. The daily roaming passes from the Singapore telcos cover Nepal but are poor value against a local SIM.

Can I use my card in Nepal? In Kathmandu, yes, at hotels, better restaurants and ATMs. On the trail, no. Withdraw rupees in Kathmandu and carry them.

If you want a quote for your own dates and group size rather than an article's averages, write to me on WhatsApp and I will send the real numbers, including the unwelcome ones. That is rather the point of this page.

Shreejan Simkhada is the CEO and co-founder of The Everest Holiday, a family-run trekking company in Kathmandu, and a third-generation Himalayan guide. TAAN Member #1586. Every booking helps fund our Nagarjun Learning Center.