The train is cheaper than turning up at Gatwick’s Long Stay car park for anyone travelling alone, for any group starting from East Croydon, and for any group away for a week or more. Parking wins only for groups on short trips: four people away for a two-night weekend from Brighton or central London, two people from central London on a two-night trip whose outward and return journeys both fall in the weekday peak, and four from central London away four nights if both journeys are at peak. If someone will drive you, being dropped off costs £10 at the terminal forecourt. That is less than any parking stay, and less than the return train for everyone except one person travelling off-peak from East Croydon, though it covers the drop-off only, not being collected. Parking prices were checked on 2026-09-28 and rail fares on 2026-09-27.
How the examples are built
- Long Stay is Gatwick’s official turn-up price, the same at North and South: first day £38 (the first 2 hours are free), then £32 a day, as printed on the airport’s roll-up table. Each day is 24 hours counted from the moment you drive in, and we count one day per night away, so a stay of N nights costs £38 plus £32 for each night after the first: £70 for 2 nights, £134 for 4, £230 for 7 and £454 for 14. A stay that runs into another 24-hour period is charged for it, so compare your return time with the time you drove in. These prices were checked on 2026-09-28.
- Short Stay and Premium Short Stay add up the same way from the same table: Short Stay is £70 a day from the first day on, Premium Short Stay £87.50 a day. Checked on 2026-09-28.
- Rail is twice the recorded single fare per person, since we have not recorded return tickets. From Brighton, where tickets are paper, check whether a return costs less than two singles. The lower figure is both journeys off-peak, the higher both at the peak or Anytime fare. East Croydon and Victoria are contactless pay-as-you-go, one card per person. Brighton is paper Off-Peak to Anytime singles, because contactless is not accepted south of Gatwick. Central London means Southern from Victoria; Thameslink from St Pancras charges the same contactless fares. These fares were checked on 2026-09-27.
- Dropped off is the £10 forecourt charge for up to 10 minutes, per drop-off, whatever the group size. Collecting you later is extra unless the driver waits in a Long Stay car park, where the first 2 hours are free; Short Stay starts at £8 for up to 30 minutes. Checked on 2026-09-28.
| Car park, turn-up | 2 nights | 4 nights | 7 nights | 14 nights |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Long Stay, North or South | £70 | £134 | £230 | £454 |
| Short Stay, North or South | £140 | £280 | £490 | £980 |
| Premium Short Stay | £175 | £350 | £612.50 | £1,225 |
| Brighton station, weekday daily rate | £41.60 | £83.20 | £145.60 | £291.20 |
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The Brighton station row uses APCOA’s weekday daily rate of £20.80 a day; the weekend rate, the weekly ticket and the catch in how its days are counted are in the station section below. Checked on 2026-09-28.
Two nights (a weekend away)
| Travellers | Long Stay | Train, East Croydon | Train, Brighton | Train, Victoria | Dropped off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £70 | £8.20–£13.20 | £19.80–£23.00 | £21.40–£38.40 | £10 |
| 2 | £70 | £16.40–£26.40 | £39.60–£46.00 | £42.80–£76.80 | £10 |
| 4 | £70 | £32.80–£52.80 | £79.20–£92.00 | £85.60–£153.60 | £10 |
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This is where parking does best. Four people from Brighton save £9.20 to £22.00 by driving, and four from Victoria save £15.60 off-peak or £83.60 if both journeys are at peak. Two from Victoria save £6.80 only when both journeys fall in the weekday peak; off-peak the train is £27.20 cheaper. Victoria’s higher fare is the weekday peak one, so on a Saturday-to-Monday or Friday-to-Sunday trip at least one journey pays the lower fare. From East Croydon even four people at peak pay £17.20 less by train. Short Stay, at £140 for the two nights, still undercuts four peak fares from Victoria by £13.60, while Premium Short Stay, at £175, beats nothing in the table. Parking checked on 2026-09-28, fares on 2026-09-27.
Four nights
| Travellers | Long Stay | Train, East Croydon | Train, Brighton | Train, Victoria | Dropped off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £134 | £8.20–£13.20 | £19.80–£23.00 | £21.40–£38.40 | £10 |
| 2 | £134 | £16.40–£26.40 | £39.60–£46.00 | £42.80–£76.80 | £10 |
| 4 | £134 | £32.80–£52.80 | £79.20–£92.00 | £85.60–£153.60 | £10 |
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Only one case still favours the car: four people from Victoria travelling both ways at peak, who save £19.60; off-peak the same four pay £48.40 less by train. Four from Brighton pay £42.00 to £54.80 less by train. Short Stay (£280) and Premium Short Stay (£350) cost more than any rail total in the table. Parking checked on 2026-09-28, fares on 2026-09-27.
A week (7 nights)
| Travellers | Long Stay | Train, East Croydon | Train, Brighton | Train, Victoria | Dropped off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £230 | £8.20–£13.20 | £19.80–£23.00 | £21.40–£38.40 | £10 |
| 2 | £230 | £16.40–£26.40 | £39.60–£46.00 | £42.80–£76.80 | £10 |
| 4 | £230 | £32.80–£52.80 | £79.20–£92.00 | £85.60–£153.60 | £10 |
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The train wins every row. The narrowest gap, four people from Victoria at peak, is still £76.40. A week in Short Stay would cost £490, and in Premium Short Stay £612.50. Parking checked on 2026-09-28, fares on 2026-09-27.
A fortnight (14 nights)
| Travellers | Long Stay | Train, East Croydon | Train, Brighton | Train, Victoria | Dropped off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £454 | £8.20–£13.20 | £19.80–£23.00 | £21.40–£38.40 | £10 |
| 2 | £454 | £16.40–£26.40 | £39.60–£46.00 | £42.80–£76.80 | £10 |
| 4 | £454 | £32.80–£52.80 | £79.20–£92.00 | £85.60–£153.60 | £10 |
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Two weeks of turn-up parking costs £300.40 more than the dearest group rail total in the table. The same fortnight is £980 in Short Stay and £1,225 in Premium Short Stay. Parking checked on 2026-09-28, fares on 2026-09-27.
What the numbers leave out
- Fuel and the drive itself. None of the parking figures include getting the car to Gatwick, and none of the rail figures include getting to the station. Being dropped off means your driver makes the trip twice.
- Rush-hour traffic. One private-hire firm on the Victoria route warns that peak traffic adds 30 to 45 minutes to the drive. A train timetable does not move with the traffic. Checked on 2026-09-28.
- The shuttle from Long Stay. Buses run 24 hours a day, every 10 to 12 minutes. Gatwick puts the ride at 5 to 10 minutes to the South Terminal and 10 to 12 to the North, although another of its answers says to allow about 20 minutes from North Terminal Long Stay. The railway station is inside the South Terminal. Checked on 2026-09-28.
- Very early flights. On the weekday checked, the first Southern train left East Croydon at 04:59, and Thameslink ran through the night from there at 01:28, 02:07, 03:07 and 04:07. No train left Victoria for the airport between 00:08 and 04:30, while Thameslink from St Pancras ran at 01:32, 02:32, 03:32 and 04:32. We have no first train recorded from Brighton; the first coach from Old Steine leaves at 02:50. Checked on 2026-09-27. More in our early flights guide.
Pre-booking against turning up
Gatwick says pre-booking is cheaper than the turn-up prices above, but it sells pre-booked parking through a booking engine whose prices change by date and prints none, so we show none. Treat the figures here as the ceiling. Mid Stay, Valet and the other pre-book-only car parks publish no price either. If you overstay a pre-booked Long Stay exit, Gatwick charges £15 a day. Do not use Short Stay for a trip: at £70 per 24 hours, two days there cost £140. Checked on 2026-09-28.
Blue Badge holders
The forecourt drop-off is free for Blue Badge holders who register the vehicle with Times24 before the visit, including a taxi. Long Stay North has 32 Blue Badge bays; for Long Stay South, Gatwick’s Long Stay page says 95 and its Blue Badge page says 25. The Long Stay details we recorded show no reduced price. Brighton station car park is free for Blue Badge holders who register with APCOA and display the badge, and has 31 disabled spaces. Checked on 2026-09-28.
Electric cars
Neither Long Stay car park has charging points. Each terminal’s Short Stay has four 22kW chargers, which Gatwick suggests using when dropping off or collecting. Brighton station car park has 6 chargers at £0.65 per kWh. Checked on 2026-09-28.
The middle option: park at the station
Brighton station car park on Stroudley Road charges £20.80 a day on weekdays and £16.90 at weekends, or £110.90 for a pre-booked weekly season ticket, each plus a 15p convenience fee that we have left out of the totals below. We count one weekday daily rate per night away, as we do at Gatwick, but APCOA’s daily rate runs only until 04:00 rather than for 24 hours, so a stay can be charged one more day than it has nights: check your times against APCOA’s terms. Parking checked on 2026-09-28.
| Brighton station parking plus the train there and back | Parking | 1 traveller | 2 travellers | 4 travellers | Long Stay instead |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 nights, daily rate | £41.60 | £61.40–£64.60 | £81.20–£87.60 | £120.80–£133.60 | £70 |
| 4 nights, daily rate | £83.20 | £103.00–£106.20 | £122.80–£129.20 | £162.40–£175.20 | £134 |
| 7 nights, daily rate | £145.60 | £165.40–£168.60 | £185.20–£191.60 | £224.80–£237.60 | £230 |
| 7 nights, weekly season ticket | £110.90 | £130.70–£133.90 | £150.50–£156.90 | £190.10–£202.90 | £230 |
| 14 nights, daily rate | £291.20 | £311.00–£314.20 | £330.80–£337.20 | £370.40–£383.20 | £454 |
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Against driving on to Gatwick’s Long Stay, the station saves one person £5.40 to £8.60 over a weekend, and more on every longer trip. Two people come out ahead from four nights, by £4.80 to £11.20. Four people come out ahead for a week only with the weekly season ticket, which saves them £27.10 to £39.90, since a week at the daily rate overlaps the Long Stay price; over a fortnight the daily rate saves them £70.80 to £83.60. APCOA prints no two-week ticket, but its monthly season ticket, at £265.40, costs £25.80 less than 14 weekday daily rates. We found no published price for parking at East Croydon. Parking checked on 2026-09-28, fares on 2026-09-27.
When a private transfer beats both
On longer trips a pre-booked car there and back can cost less than Long Stay. From Croydon, a saloon to the airport and another back cost £96 to £163 in fixed prices, against £134 for four nights’ parking. From Brighton the pair cost £110 to £168, and from Victoria £128 to £264, against £230 for a week in Long Stay. Not every firm says whether its price includes the £10 drop-off charge, so ask. Quotes checked on 2026-09-28. The break-even calculator sets the car against the train for your group.
Run your own numbers
The park or train calculator takes the number of nights, your group size and your starting station. It adds up each car park the way the tables above do, from the first-day price and the further-day charge the operator prints, and shows the sum; where an operator prints no further-day charge, a stay longer than its longest price shows no price rather than a guess. From Brighton it shows the station car park’s daily rate and its weekly ticket side by side. Prices change, so confirm with Gatwick, the car park operator or the train company before you travel.