On every trip on this site — all 62 of them — what a child pays goes by age, and the rule is the same each time: under 6 travels free, 6 to 11 pays half the adult fare, and 12 and over pays the full fare. On a Nile cruise that puts a child of 6 to 11 at $212.50 on our lowest fares, and $295 on the middle ship of our 37. Two adults with a child of 8 and a child of 4 pay two and a half fares, not four.
The three ages
| Age on the day you travel | What the child pays |
|---|---|
| Under 6 | Nothing |
| 6 to 11 | Half the adult fare |
| 12 and over | The full adult fare |
These are the terms under "Before You Book" on every product page, and they are the price: the same three bands apply on every trip, and no trip has a child rate of its own. What a child travelling free does not get depends on the trip:
- Nile cruises, dahabiyas and the 2027 eclipse sailing: the child shares the parents' cabin and has no separate bed.
- Packages: the child shares the parents' room, and their cabin on any nights aboard, with no separate bed.
- Day tours: the child is not given a separate seat.
What a child of 6 to 11 pays, by kind of trip
Each trip's adult fare is the "from" price its own page shows, per person; the child's fare is half of it. The middle fare is the median: the one in the middle when that kind of trip is put in price order, or the two in the middle when the count is even.
| Kind of trip | Trips | Lowest adult fare | Child, 6 to 11 | Middle adult fare | Child, 6 to 11 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nile cruises | 37 | $425 | $212.50 | $590 | $295 |
| Dahabiyas, per night | 5 | $692 | $346 | $692 | $346 |
| Packages | 8 | $400 | $200 | $1,040–$1,049 | $520–$524.50 |
| Day tours | 12 | $30 | $15 | $100–$115 | $50–$57.50 |
The lowest cruise fares are Royal Elite and MS Royal Liberty, both $425, and the middle of the 37 ships is Royal Beaurivage at $590. Dahabiyas are priced by the night: Merit I, Merit II and Swan Luxury are $692, so a child pays $346 a night, and the two Mazaj boats are $807, or $403.50 for a child. The cheapest package is the 2-night express cruise from Aswan to Luxor at $400; the middle two are the 6-day Pyramids and Nile cruise package at $1,040 and the Christmas 2026 cruise at $1,049. Day tours start with the Nubian village at $30, and the middle two are Old Cairo and the museum at $100 and Alexandria from Cairo at $115.
One family, priced on real trips
Two adults, a child of 8 and a child of 4. The 8-year-old pays half the adult fare and the 4-year-old nothing, so on every trip the family pays two and a half adult fares: the children add a quarter to what the two adults pay.
| Trip | Adult fare | Two adults | Child of 8 | Child of 4 | Family |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| M/S Chateau Lafayette, 3 nights, summer | $500 | $1,000 | $250 | Free | $1,250 |
| M/S Chateau Lafayette, 4 nights, winter | $900 | $1,800 | $450 | Free | $2,250 |
| Merit I Dahabiya, per night | $692 | $1,384 | $346 | Free | $1,730 |
| 5-day Cairo and Luxor package | $825 | $1,650 | $412.50 | Free | $2,062.50 |
| Christmas 2026 cruise, 21–25 December | $1,049 | $2,098 | $524.50 | Free | $2,622.50 |
| Giza Pyramids and Saqqara day tour | $95 | $190 | $47.50 | Free | $237.50 |
The two Chateau Lafayette rows are one ship. A child pays half of the fare you actually book, and on a cruise that fare moves with the season and the length: the figures are per person sharing a double cabin, from the rate table on the ship's page. The Christmas cruise repeats the terms on its first screen — children under 6 travel free in your cabin, and ages 6 to 11 pay half the adult fare.
The birthdays that change the price
The age that counts is the age on the day you travel, so a birthday between booking and departure moves the fare. On three nights aboard Chateau Lafayette in summer, a child costs nothing at 5, $250 from their sixth birthday, and $500 — the full fare — from their twelfth. A child who turns 12 before you sail pays as an adult.
Where these figures come from
The children's terms are the ones printed on every product page. The fares are each trip's "from" price as its page showed it on 5 November 2026, across all 62 trips on the site: 37 Nile cruises, 5 dahabiyas, 8 packages and 12 day tours, each counted under the kind of trip its own page names. Dahabiyas are quoted per person per night; every other fare is per person for the whole trip. What a cruise fare includes is in what is included in a Nile cruise, and six of the ships are priced per night, season by season, in Nile cruise prices per night.
Written by the Travel To Egypt team, Nazlet Al-Zanati Street, Luxor.