Package holidays in Bulgaria cost 8.4% more in August this year than in August 2025, Eurostat figures show. That is more than double the average rise across the whole European Union. Plane tickets in Bulgaria, meanwhile, got 2.5% cheaper over the same period — a steeper drop than the EU average.

Across the EU, package holidays rose in price by 3.2% on average over the year — exactly the same as overall inflation in August. Plane tickets in the bloc fell in price by 0.4% on average.

The steepest price rises for holiday packages were in Belgium, up 16.2%. Portugal followed with 14.3%, then Sweden with 12.8%, Lithuania with 12.3% and Romania with 11.9%.

Only four countries saw prices fall: Estonia had the biggest drop, at 21.1%, followed by Spain with 5.2%, Italy with 4.8% and Ireland with 0.4%.

For plane tickets, the EU average fall in August was 0.4%. Flights got cheaper in ten EU countries, with the sharpest drop in Slovakia, at 61.2%. In the other countries where prices fell, the drop ranged from 15.8% in Spain to 0.9% in Lithuania. Bulgaria is among the countries where plane tickets got cheaper.

Plane ticket prices jumped the most in Greece, up 16.3%, followed by Ireland with a 14.4% rise over the year.

Eurostat's figures show sharp swings in the prices of package holidays and plane tickets since the start of 2025, with even bigger jumps in air travel.

In April 2025, plane tickets in the EU cost 13.7% more than a year earlier, but just a month later prices were already down 3.2%. In January 2026 there was a 2.9% drop, in April that year a 4.7% drop, and in May prices climbed again, by 8.1%.

For package holidays, the yearly rise stood at 8.3% in January 2025 and 8% in February that year. Between June and October 2025, the pace of price rises came close to overall inflation, before speeding up again. In April 2026, package holiday prices fell 0.5% over the year, then started climbing again.