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Laundry vs. Pack More Calculator
Compare the luggage weight of packing for the entire trip against packing light and doing laundry partway through.
Lighter luggage has a real cost too
Every kilogram you leave at home by planning a laundry stop is a kilogram you don't carry through airports, up hotel stairs, or risk paying an overweight fee on — but it costs time and money to actually do the laundry. This tool puts a number on both sides.
Longer trips, bigger savings
The weight saved by packing to a shorter cycle grows with trip length, since the gap between "pack for the whole trip" and "pack for one cycle" widens the longer you're away. For very long trips, doing laundry two or three times usually beats packing enough clothing to avoid it entirely.
Frequently asked questions
How is "weight of clothing per day" estimated?
A reasonable default is about 0.6–0.8kg per day of clothing (a t-shirt, underwear, socks and a share of bottoms and outerwear), but it varies by climate and personal packing style — cold-weather layers weigh more per day than warm-weather clothing, so adjust the default to match your own trip.
How many laundry loads does the calculator assume?
It assumes one load of laundry each time you complete a laundry cycle before the trip ends — for a 14-day trip with a 7-day cycle, that's one load partway through; for a 21-day trip with the same cycle, that's two loads.
Is doing laundry always the lighter option?
Packing for a shorter cycle and doing laundry is almost always lighter on luggage weight, since you're carrying fewer garments — the real question this tool answers is how much weight you save and whether that's worth the laundry cost and the time spent finding a machine or launderette.
Does this include the cost of hotel laundry versus a launderette?
No — enter whichever cost per load applies to how you'd actually do laundry on this trip, whether that's a coin launderette, a hotel laundry service, or an Airbnb's in-unit washer, since those costs can differ by several times over.