Cost-of-living comparison · Eurostat PLI 2024
🇨🇭 Switzerland vs 🇬🇧 United Kingdom
How the cost of living compares between Switzerland and United Kingdom - overall and across rent, groceries, transport, healthcare, utilities and dining, weighed against local income.
- Cheaper overall
- United Kingdom
- Price gap
- 43%
Planning a move? Scale your income from Switzerland to United Kingdom in the calculator, then save the pair to come back to it.
Cost by category - Switzerland vs United Kingdom
Switzerland - price level by category
United Kingdom - price level by category
Side-by-side
| Category (EU-27 = 100) | 🇨🇭 Switzerland | 🇬🇧 United Kingdom |
|---|---|---|
| Overall cost | 184 | 129 |
Highlighted = lower price level (or higher affordability). Affordability = median net income ÷ cost index, higher is better.
What the Switzerland vs United Kingdom comparison shows
On Eurostat's comparative price-level scale (EU-27 = 100), United Kingdom is the cheaper of the two overall at index 129, against 184 for Switzerland - a difference of about 43% in everyday prices. Because the same standardised basket is priced in both countries, that gap is directly comparable and not an artefact of exchange rates.
The category table above shows the gap is rarely uniform. Housing usually drives most of the difference because rent cannot be traded across borders, so weight the rent row most heavily, a country that is cheaper on groceries but dearer on rent often works out more expensive in practice, since the rent gap is larger in absolute euros than the savings on smaller categories.
For a complete picture, weigh these prices against local income: the cheaper country is not automatically the one where a typical income goes furthest.
Frequently asked questions
Is Switzerland or United Kingdom cheaper to live in?▼
United Kingdom is cheaper overall, its Eurostat cost-of-living index is 129 versus 184 for Switzerland (EU-27 = 100), a difference of about 43%.
Which has cheaper rent, Switzerland or United Kingdom?▼
Rent price levels are shown in the category table above.
Does cheaper mean better value in Switzerland vs United Kingdom?▼
Value depends on both prices and income; see the affordability figures above.
Source: Eurostat, comparative price levels (prc_ppp_ind) and median equivalised net income Price-level indices, EU-27 = 100, 2024.
Read our methodology - how these indices are sourced and computed.