The short answer
If someone else is flying, dropping them off is the cheap option: £10 for up to 15 minutes. If you're flying, a lift there and back costs £23 in charges, or nothing at all if you use Mid Stay's free 60 minutes. Parking yourself costs more than that from the first day: Mid Stay is £48 for 24 hours and £336 for a week if you just turn up. 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 London Stansted Airport's own published charges on 26 Oct 2026, and the car park prices on 25 Oct 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 Stansted: the key numbers
- Drop-off charge
- £10 for up to 15 minutes at the Express Set Down
- A lift there and back
- £23 in charges Dropped off at the Express Set Down (£10 for up to 15 minutes) and collected from the Short Stay Green or Blue car park within 30 minutes (£13)
- Using the free option
- Free Dropped off and collected using Mid Stay's free 60 minutes, each time, with the free shuttle bus to and from the terminal (no return within an hour)
- Cheapest official car park, a week
- £336 in Mid Stay, turn-up price
- Booking ahead
- Up to 80% based on an 8-day stay in January 2027, says the airport
- Checked
- drop-off charge 26 Oct 2026 against www.stanstedairport.com; car park prices 25 Oct 2026 (see the Stansted 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 | £23 | Free | £48 Mid Stay |
| Three days | £23 | Free | £144 Mid Stay |
| A week | £23 | Free | £336 Mid Stay |
| Two weeks | £23 | Free | £672 Mid Stay |
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 25 Oct 2026. The Stansted parking guide has every car park and its full price list.
If you're getting a lift
A lift costs £23 in charges. Dropped off at the Express Set Down (£10 for up to 15 minutes) and collected from the Short Stay Green or Blue car park within 30 minutes (£13). The airport says the Express Set Down is for dropping off, so the collection is priced in Short Stay; collecting from Mid Stay's free 60 minutes instead brings a lift both ways down to the £10 drop-off. It does mean two return trips to the airport for whoever drives you, which is the real cost of a lift. Stansted is a pay-later airport: nothing is paid at the zone, so pay by midnight the day after your visit (see how to pay at Stansted). The London Stansted drop-off guide has the exact rules.
Where you drop off at Stansted
Express Set Down is on the forecourt directly outside the terminal — barrier-free ANPR, and signed drop-off only. Vehicles must not be left unattended (they can be towed, with a towing fee), and re-entering within 30 minutes of first entry brings a £28 charge.
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 Stansted is Mid Stay, at £336 if you turn up without booking. London Stansted says booking ahead can save up to 80%. Its parking page says its pre-book prices and savings are based on an 8-day stay in January 2027, but none of the pages we checked says which car park or dates get the full 80%, so treat it as a ceiling and check the live price for your dates.
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 Stansted
Stansted's drop-off charge has risen from £7 in 2025 to £10, up about 43%. Each rise makes a lift a little dearer, but at £23 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
Stansted Airport station is directly beneath the terminal, a two-minute step-free walk, on the Stansted Express to London Liverpool Street. For some trips that takes the park-or-drop-off question off the table.
Don't forget the pick-up
The Express Set Down is drop-off only — for pick-ups, Stansted's own free option is the Mid Stay car park: the first 60 minutes are free for pick-up or drop-off, the second hour is £5, and the free shuttle takes about 7 minutes to the terminal. One catch — re-entering Mid Stay within an hour brings a £48 charge. Prefer to walk in and meet your passenger? Short Stay pick-ups and drop-offs use the Green and Blue car parks, within walking distance of the terminal, from £13 for up to 30 minutes. 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 Stansted: your questions
Is it cheaper to park or get dropped off at Stansted?
Getting dropped off is cheaper on charges: a lift there and back costs £23, or nothing at all if you use Mid Stay's free 60 minutes. Even the cheapest official car park costs £48 for 24 hours and £336 for a week at turn-up prices.
How much is drop-off at Stansted?
£10 for up to 15 minutes at the Express Set Down. The free alternative is Mid Stay car park: First 60 minutes free — pick-up or drop-off — with a free shuttle taking about 7 minutes.
How much is a week of parking at Stansted Airport?
£336 in Mid Stay if you turn up without booking. That's our sum from the airport's published day rates, checked on 25 Oct 2026.
Is pre-booked parking at Stansted cheaper than turning up?
London Stansted says booking ahead can save up to 80%. Its parking page says its pre-book prices and savings are based on an 8-day stay in January 2027, but none of the pages we checked says which car park or dates get the full 80%, so treat it as a ceiling and check the live price for your dates.
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.