Duty-free savings: how much you actually save at the airport, by product category

The duty-free market keeps expanding, but the discount that made it famous has quietly shrunk. Whether an airport shop saves a traveller money now comes down almost entirely to one thing: what is being bought.

The global duty-free and travel-retail business has grown steadily for years. One 2016-era forecast put the market at around £47.7 billion by 2019; in the event it ran higher still, with worldwide sales peaking at roughly US$86 billion in 2019 before the pandemic knocked it back (Statista). The headline story, then, is a thriving retail channel — even as e-commerce has eroded the price edge that airport shopping once relied on.

That leaves a simple question for the traveller standing in the terminal: is any of this actually cheaper? The honest answer, borne out by repeated price studies, is that duty-free savings are real in a few categories and illusory in most. The dividing line is tax.

Where duty-free wins: spirits and tobacco

The genuine bargains sit where the tax is heaviest. Alcohol and tobacco carry excise duty as well as VAT, so removing that burden at the airport produces a visible discount. Consumer group Which? found premium spirits running roughly 20 to 35 percent below UK supermarket prices, with a litre of Jack Daniel's around £12 cheaper on some flights than the supermarket average in 2023. The UK government's own post-Brexit estimate put the saving at about £11.50 on a litre of spirits, £2.23 on a bottle of wine and £2.86 on champagne or prosecco.

Tobacco follows the same logic but is far more dependent on where the traveller lives. A smoker flying home to a high-tax market can save a great deal; someone whose home duty is low may find little difference. The rule holds: the more a government normally taxes an item, the more duty-free has to offer.

Where it barely moves: perfume and cosmetics

Perfume is the category most travellers assume is a bargain, and it is the one where the assumption most often fails. Fragrance is not subject to excise duty, so the only tax being removed is VAT — a ceiling of around 20 percent, and one that online discounters routinely match. A detailed 2016 comparison of 113 perfumes priced across budget and premium airlines, World Duty Free and Amazon UK illustrates the pattern (figures as reported 2016):

• The average bottle was about £3.54 cheaper on Amazon than bought onboard a flight.
• Across all duty-free outlets combined, 66 of the perfumes were cheaper online and only 47 were cheaper duty-free — and most gaps fell within £10 either way.
• The best airline for a discount was Ryanair, at an average saving of about £5.36; the worst was Qatar, where onboard prices ran about £11.97 higher on average.

Cosmetics and skincare land in the same grey zone. Which? found a Clarins serum about 16 percent cheaper at World Duty Free in 2023, yet other studies put typical fragrance and cosmetics markups at 10 to 20 percent. The saving exists on some lines and evaporates on others, which is why a 10 to 15 percent gap is the usual threshold before buying is worthwhile.

The old instinct — grab the perfume at the gate — no longer pays. On most fragrances the online price is within a few pounds, and often lower.

Where travellers often overpay: electronics and sunglasses

Beyond drink and tobacco, duty-free frequently costs more than the high street, not less. A PriceSpy survey of more than 300 products across Manchester, Birmingham and Heathrow found shoppers could save about 14 percent on average by buying online instead. Electronics are the clearest trap: laptops, cameras and headphones at airports have been found marked up 10 to 25 percent over online retailers, because the tax saved is small next to the terminal's rent and overheads.

Sunglasses are worse still. In one check, Ray-Ban Aviators sold for £121.65 duty-free against £75.50 online — about 38 percent cheaper away from the airport. The advice that follows is blunt: treat non-tax goods at the airport as convenience purchases, not discounts.

How to shop duty-free well

• Stick to the taxed categories — spirits, wine and tobacco — where the discount is structural.
• Check the online price on your phone before buying perfume, cosmetics or electronics; a saving under 10 to 15 percent usually is not one.
• Never buy sunglasses or gadgets at the airport on impulse — they are among the most marked-up items in the terminal.
• Watch the exchange rate at overseas airports; a headline price in another currency can hide a poor deal.

Frequently asked questions