These 5 US Cities Had The Most Dramatic Increase In Cost Of Travel For 2025

City hopping in the USA can be a pricy business. From the gritty neighborhoods of New York City to the hills of San Francisco, some of the great metropolises of the country are often counted among the most expensive destinations in the world. The Independent even places the Big Apple above Stockholm and Venice, calling it the second-priciest place on the planet — not great news for travelers eager to hit the world-famous shopping of Fifth Avenue.

The thing is, some cities have been getting even pricier in recent years, which is where this guide comes in. Using data from a recent Forbes report, here is a quintet of urban hotspots where your money now goes a little (or even quite a lot) less far than it did only a few years ago.

The bad news? It includes some of the country's most alluring towns — think the likes of Chicago, Conde Nast Traveler's Best Big City in the U.S. for nine years running, and the gorgeous South Carolina city of Charleston, with its European-style buildings and stacks of galleries and theater houses. Perhaps it's time to start saving for your next city break.

Detroit is famed as the birthplace of the American car industry and the home of Motown. Sadly, it also comes with a heavier price tag than it used to, since this, the largest metropolis in Michigan by quite some way, leads the pack in the Forbes Advisor report on cities that have gotten more and more expensive.

Yep, there were increases in the costs of things right across the spectrum here. The results show that the cost of hotels went up almost 13%, while the price of meals in Motor City soared nearly 60%. Even the price of car hires in this car-mad metro area went skywards, with the rates of daily rentals costing more than 19% extra in 2025 compared to 2022.

Don't despair, though. There are still places you can explore on a budget in these parts. You can explore the Detroit International Riverwalk, a 3-mile stroll between Francophone bridges and volleyball courts on the Detroit River, or take in the vintage architecture of the city's prestigious public library. Look into visiting Belle Isle Park because it's totally free and has lovely picnic spots, historic buildings, and great views on offer. And flights aren't the only place you can save cash. The Inspired Backpacker blog lists 45 things to do in this southern city that won't cost a dime, ranging from relaxing stints down in Waterfront Park to beach days on the side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Breezing into an unenviable tie for first is the Windy City of Chicago. Forbes' findings reveal that the cost of key travel expenses here went up just as much as it did over in its Midwestern compadre of Detroit, with a wallet-worrying rise of over 77% in the cost of food and drink really driving the home of Soldier Field and the Shedd Aquarium up the list.

It's a bit of a change of fortunes for a city that's often been hailed as an outlier among the more budget-busting, bucket-list American metropolises. Or, as one Reddit user puts it on the r/Chicago subreddit, the biggest city in Illinois is "cheaper than the West Coast, NYC, DC, and BOS. But more expensive than the majority of the US."

Luckily, you don't have to spend stacks. For example, Choose Chicago has put together a whistlestop, 48-hour tour of the town that's specifically for budget-conscious travelers, including craft beer, the must-see landmarks of Millennium Park, and hostel recommendations. You can also skip the Michelin-starred restaurants here and opt for something more affordable, like Chicago's "most notorious hot dog stand," where street food and profanity reign supreme.

The Forbes Advisor report places the capital of the Peach State just below the two Midwest giants of Chicago and Detroit, but only by a whisker. Again, it was the price of food, drink, and dining out that walloped the hopes of budget travelers in these parts the most, with an increase of three times the study's average. You might just have to throttle your daily intake of famous Southern fried chicken and waffles, sorry!

There are some glimpses of hope when it comes to costs in the city, though. For one, the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers — a measure of how fast the price of the most commonly bought goods is increasing or decreasing — has dropped across the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell area, going from nearly 12% a year in 2022 to under 2% as of August 2025. The upshot? Food bills in Atlanta aren't continuing to soar in price quite like they did over the course of the Forbes study.

There are some tricks that travelers can use to cut what they spend while on vacation in old Atlanta, too. Discover Atlanta, the official marketing portal for the city, champions the Atlanta CityPASS, which they say can offer nearly 50% savings on key attractions, from the Georgia Aquarium to the World of Coca-Cola. There are also plenty of totally gratis things to do, like strolling amid the onetime sports venues of Centennial Olympic Park, for example, or perusing the local markets — there are farmer's markets in Brookhaven (Saturdays, but only throughout the summer) and in Grant Park (on Sundays, year round), along with creative food and craft beer at the Krog Street Market.

"And there in the blue air I saw for the first time, far off, the great snowy tops of the Rocky Mountains. I had to get to Denver at once." So wrote Jack Kerouac in his coming-of-age beatnik epic "On the Road." Indeed, it's easy to see why the Mile-High City has such an allure. The thriving Colorado gem is America's craft beer capital, it's a gateway to legendary ski destinations like Aspen, and it gets a tan-giving 300 days of sunshine on average each year. Nice.

Feel a catch coming? Denver sits on this list because Forbes says the cost of everything they tested went up, up, up like the Front Range of the Rockies. The main increases came in the price of hotel bookings, which peaked at 19% in the period between 2022 and 2025, and in the cost of daily meals, which went up a massive 74% in total.

On the flip side, you shouldn't have to bust the bank for some of the real highlights of Denver. There are regular free-entry days to the Denver Art Museum, for example, and you won't spend a dime to tour the Denver State Capitol between Monday and Friday. You could also head out to cruise along the Gold Belt Byway south of Denver to see rugged canyons and Gold Rush-era settlements — the only cost could be fuel and car hire if required, which, according to Forbes, has only increased in price by 8% in the last few years.

There are two things that have gotten considerably more expensive for travelers keen on exploring the wonders of Charleston, South Carolina. First, hotels spiked in price by over 25%, meaning you should expect to pay a chunk more for stays in the handsome French Quarter or the bustling City Center than you would previously. Second was food, which surged in cost here more than in any other city in the Forbes study between 2022 and 2025, going up nearly 92%!

That latter metric is particularly striking, especially since food is something Charleston does well. Very well. The town came in second place on TripAdvisor's Traveller's Choice Awards for the best foodie destinations in the country, after all. It's a sentiment echoed by The Blonde Abroad, who hails this southern destination as a gourmet hub, waxing lyrical about the city's lobster rolls, its comfort food, and — of course — its oysters. You can still enjoy all that, but don't be surprised if it costs nearly double what it did only a few years back!

The one saving grace for Charleston was a relatively small rise in the cost of domestic airfare into the city. This one saw the lowest increase in that category of anywhere in the top five, with an increase of just 5.99% in total. 

This list of the five cities with the biggest increase in the cost of travel comes straight from a 2025 Forbes Advisor report that crunched the numbers on 75 of the largest cities in the United States. They took into account the changes in the cost of four pillars of travel expenditure: Daily hotel rates, daily car hire rates, the cost of meals, and the price of domestic airfare. The data was collated and computed in order to rank the destinations that have seen the biggest spikes and dips in costs in recent years. The selection above is the five cities that showed the biggest increase across the board.