Cost analysis
Every figure the calculator uses, where it comes from, and what happens to the answer when you disagree with it. Change the two numbers people argue about most — what your hour is worth and what the fare actually is — and watch the verdicts move.
Argue with it
A 500-mile trip for two. Nothing is hidden and nothing is cached — this recalculates with the same code the results page uses.
An hour of one person's day is worth
$137
Driving — cash $137 · all in $197
$434
Flying, two fares, bags and both rides
Tesla it
At $25 an hour
| Trip, two people | $25/h | $75/h | $150/h | $400/h | $1000/h |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 200 miles | Drive | Drive | Drive | Drive | Drive |
| 500 miles | Drive | Fly | Fly | Fly | Fly |
| 800 miles | Fly | Fly | Fly | Fly | Fly |
| 1,400 miles | Fly | Fly | Fly | Fly | Fly |
On the 500-mile trip, flying takes over at about $60 an hour per person. Above that, no amount of cheap charging catches up, and this site will tell you to fly. If your hour is worth four figures, the honest answer is that you should fly almost everything, and you probably didn't need a calculator to know it.
The hours you can't work
This is the best argument against driving, so it gets charged for rather than argued away. A flight hands you most of the day back, and the hours you do spend in the cabin you can work, read or sleep through. Behind the wheel you can't. On a highway with the car steering you get some of that back, but only some — you're still watching the road, and that's not a tray table. Every hour of difference between the two doors is charged at the rate you set above, for each traveler.
Cash versus all in
By default the comparison uses cash out of pocket: charging, road food and any forced hotel night on one side; fares, bags and the two rides on the other. Tires, maintenance and depreciation are real costs of owning the car, but they aren't money you hand over for this trip, and you'd carry most of them whether you drove or not. Both readings are shown above so you can pick the one you believe.
Driving
| Charging | $0.36 per kWh at 3.7 miles per kWh | Cash |
| Food on the road | $22 per person, past four hours of driving | Cash |
| Hotel night | $145, added past eleven hours of driving | Cash |
| Tire wear | $0.04 per mile | Wear |
| Maintenance | $0.02 per mile | Wear |
| Wear on the car | $0.06 per mile | Wear |
Depreciation is set at 6¢ a mile. Generic per-mile figures use 15¢ or more; electric cars have fewer wearing parts and Teslas have held their value better than that number assumes. Set it to zero if you consider the car already paid for, or tick the box above to include it in full.
Flying
| Airfare (estimate) | $95 base plus $0.13 per mile, per person | Cash |
| Checked bag | $35 per person | Cash |
| Ride to the airport | $30 each end | Cash |
| Airport parking instead | $24 a day if you drive yourself — swap it for the rides above | Cash |
The fare is a distance-based estimate, not a live price, and it's the weakest number on the site. Real fares swing with the date, the day of the week and how far ahead you book. A cheap advance fare beats this figure; a last-minute one is far worse; a business fare is in a different universe and will win nearly every route on its own. Put your real fare in the box above rather than trusting the formula. Flight distance is measured airport to airport between the nearest airports to each place, and miles or status earned on a paid fare aren't counted at all.
Where the time goes
| Drive time and distance | Live routing data for the actual roads between the two places |
| Charging stops | One stop every 180 miles, 25 minutes each |
| Drive to the airport | 28 minutes at each end |
| Security and waiting | 105 minutes before boarding |
| In the air | 36 minutes of taxi and climb, plus great-circle miles at 500 mph |
| Deplane and bags | 35 minutes |
Both sides are counted door to door. Still not counted on either side: a cancelled flight costing you a day, a hotel at the destination you'd need anyway, and the tenth hour of a drive feeling nothing like the first.