The short answer
If someone else is flying, dropping them off is the cheap option: £8.50 for up to 10 minutes. If you're flying, a lift there and back costs £17 in charges, or nothing at all if you use Long Stay's free 30 minutes. Parking yourself costs more than that from the first day: Plane Parking is £45 for 24 hours and £165 for a week if you just turn up. Edinburgh Airport says booking ahead can save up to 60%. Parking is the better call when nobody can do the two return trips, or when you'd rather have the car waiting when you land.
The drop-off charge was checked against Edinburgh Airport's own published charges on 26 Oct 2026, and the car park prices on 30 Sep 2026. Totals for longer stays are our sums from the airport's published day rates. Pre-booked prices change daily, so we link to them rather than quote them.
Park or drop off at Edinburgh: the key numbers
- Drop-off charge
- £8.50 for up to 10 minutes at the Pickup & Dropoff zone
- A lift there and back
- £17 in charges Dropped off and collected at the Pickup & Dropoff zone (10 minutes each time)
- Using the free option
- Free Dropped off and collected using Long Stay's free 30 minutes, plus a walk of about 10 minutes each way
- Cheapest official car park, a week
- £165 in Plane Parking, turn-up price
- Booking ahead
- Up to 60% if you book early
- Checked
- drop-off charge 26 Oct 2026 against www.edinburghairport.com; car park prices 30 Sep 2026 (see the Edinburgh parking guide)
Lift or park: the cost by trip length
A lift costs the same however long you're away; parking adds up with every day.
| Away for | Lift there and back | Using the free option | Cheapest car park, turn-up |
|---|---|---|---|
| 24 hours | £17 | Free | £45 Plane Parking |
| Three days | £17 | Free | £85 Plane Parking |
| A week | £17 | Free | £165 Plane Parking |
| Two weeks | £17 | Free | £305 Plane Parking |
Car park figures are the lowest turn-up price for each stay among the car parks you can drive into without booking and get to the terminal from, worked out from the airport's day rates and checked on 30 Sep 2026. The Edinburgh parking guide has every car park and its full price list.
If you're getting a lift
A lift costs £17 in charges. Dropped off and collected at the Pickup & Dropoff zone (10 minutes each time). Long Stay is free for the first 30 minutes. It does mean two return trips to the airport for whoever drives you, which is the real cost of a lift. The Edinburgh drop-off guide has the exact rules.
Where you drop off at Edinburgh
The charged Pickup & Dropoff zone is on the ground floor of the terminal multi-storey, directly at the terminal — follow the Pickup & Dropoff signs on the approach.
If you'd rather park
Parking buys you independence: no one has to fit your flight times around their day, and the car is there when you land. The cheapest official option for a week at Edinburgh is Plane Parking, at £165 if you turn up without booking. Edinburgh Airport says booking ahead can save up to 60%. At the full 60%, Plane Parking £165 for a week would be £66: that is our sum, not a price the airport publishes.
Taxi fares depend on where you start, so we don't quote them. If you're weighing one up, the sum is two fares against the parking totals above.
Why the sums have shifted at Edinburgh
Edinburgh's drop-off charge has risen from £6 in 2025 to £8.50, up about 42%. Each rise makes a lift a little dearer, but at £17 it would take a much bigger rise for a lift to cost more in charges than even a day's parking. Every UK rise is tracked in the price index and the change log.
Or leave the car at home
An Edinburgh Trams stop sits right outside the terminal (a tram, not heavy rail), running to the city centre and connecting to mainline trains at Edinburgh Gateway. For some trips that takes the park-or-drop-off question off the table.
Don't forget the pick-up
The same zone is signed for pick-ups and drop-offs at the same £8.50 tariff. For a free collection, Edinburgh's own alternative is the Long Stay: 30 minutes free, then £14 up to an hour, with a 10-minute walk to the terminal — there's no shuttle. See the UK pick-up charges guide for how other airports handle collections.
Compare pre-booked parking prices
We list every parking partner that covers this airport, Airparks, Holiday Extras and YourParkingSpace, in alphabetical order, not by what they pay us. These are affiliate links: we may earn a commission if you book, at no extra cost to you, and it never affects our charges data.
Nearby airports
Park or drop off at Edinburgh: your questions
Is it cheaper to park or get dropped off at Edinburgh?
Getting dropped off is cheaper on charges: a lift there and back costs £17, or nothing at all if you use Long Stay's free 30 minutes. Even the cheapest official car park costs £45 for 24 hours and £165 for a week at turn-up prices.
How much is drop-off at Edinburgh?
£8.50 for up to 10 minutes at the Pickup & Dropoff zone. The free alternative is Long Stay free zone: 30 minutes free in the Long Stay car park — no shuttle bus, a 10-minute walk to the terminal.
How much is a week of parking at Edinburgh Airport?
£165 in Plane Parking if you turn up without booking. That's our sum from the airport's published day rates, checked on 30 Sep 2026. The airport says booking ahead can save up to 60%.
Is pre-booked parking at Edinburgh cheaper than turning up?
Edinburgh Airport says booking ahead can save up to 60%.
Method & corrections
Every charge on this page is checked against the airport's own published charges and stamped with the date we checked it. We re-verify the full dataset quarterly, and after any reported change — see how we check every figure and who maintains the site.
Spotted an error? Email hello@airportdropoffcharges.co.uk — corrections are made visibly and dated. The dataset behind this page is free to reuse with attribution: JSON · CSV (CC BY 4.0) — about the data.