Published fixed fares for a saloon from Bath to Bristol Airport run from £49 (Bath Taxi Service) to £59 (Tick Taxi, which in the interest of full disclosure is the group that publishes WeKnowBath). Quotes people report on forums span roughly £40 to £75+ for the identical 18 to 20 mile, 40 to 50 minute run. Here is every published number, and why the spread exists.
Only four firms publish a fare for this route at all. The rest make you phone for a quote, and the aggregators sit on top charging more than any local firm. We checked everything below on 3 September 2026 and we state exactly where each figure comes from.
Every published fare in one table
| Operator | Vehicle | Fare | Where the number comes from |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bath Taxi Service (ExecFirm) | Car, up to 4 people | £49 fixed | Its published price list, checked Sept 2026 |
| Roman Bath Private Hire | Standard car | From £52.50 | Its published fare page (the page's own URL still says £39; that figure is stale) |
| Alfa Travel Solutions (bristolairporttransfer.co.uk) | Standard car | "From £55" | Confirmed direct on its site this run (has been intermittently unreachable on other checks; confirm again when you book) |
| Tick Taxi (publishes this site) | Saloon, 1 to 4 people | From £59 fixed | Its live fare page, checked Sept 2026 |
| Bath Taxi Transfers | Any | Not published | Quote on 01225 220789 |
| V Cars Bath (Veezu) | Any | Not published | App or phone quote, 01225 464646 |
| Abbey Taxis | Any | Not published | Phone quote, 01225 444 444 |
For context beyond the local firms: quotes people report on Tripadvisor and Rick Steves forums span roughly £40 to £75+ for this run, and aggregators like Transfeero quote around £74. Who these firms actually are, and what we could verify about their reviews, is in Bath taxi companies compared.
The only full vehicle price ladder published
One firm publishes a fare for every vehicle size on this route, and in the interest of full disclosure it's Tick Taxi, the group that publishes this site. We print it because it's the only way to show what bigger cars cost; the smaller firms publish one number or none.
| Vehicle | Bath to Bristol Airport, fixed |
|---|---|
| Saloon (1 to 4, two 23kg hold bags, cabin case, two backpacks) | £59 |
| Estate | £65 |
| Mercedes E-Class | £69 |
| MPV | £75 |
| 8-seater | £89 |
| Mercedes V-Class | £95 |
The price is locked at booking with no surge, flight tracking is free, airport pickups include 45 minutes of free waiting from landing, and cancellation is free up to 24 hours before. Meet and greet is £15 extra, child seats £5, and booking online saves 20%.
Why quotes span £40 to £75+
Three different products hide behind the word "taxi" on this route, which is why the spread is so wide. A pre-booked fixed fare is agreed before you travel and doesn't move with traffic. A metered cab from a Bath rank charges by distance and time, so the A4 out of Bath at rush hour costs you money by the minute. An aggregator resells a local driver with a margin on top, which is how the same run reaches around £74 on platforms like Transfeero. And below all of that sits a phantom: the £39 that still circulates for this run isn't a real quote at all, it's Roman Bath Private Hire's old price living on in its web address; the current fare is £52.50. We've covered why metered and fixed fares behave so differently in traffic in our fixed versus metered explainer.
Coming back is its own trap: the fare from the airport rank isn't fixed in advance, and Tick Taxi (disclosed above as this site's publisher) says rank fares to Bath climb to £90 or more on weekend evenings and when flights are delayed. That's its claim rather than our measurement, but it's consistent with why the standard advice for this route is to pre-book both legs.
The 6am flight problem
Early-morning reliability is the recurring worry in every forum thread about this route, and it's a fair one: the first Air Decker of the day doesn't suit red-eye departures, so for a 6am flight the standard advice is a pre-booked fixed fare with a firm that confirms the booking. At 4am the £49 to £59 you pay a fixed-fare firm isn't buying speed, the roads are empty; it's buying the certainty that a car turns up. Timings and a minute-by-minute plan are in Bath to Bristol Airport for an early flight.
How to pay less without gambling on reliability
- Book direct with the operator, not through an aggregator. The around-£74 aggregator quotes are for the same local drivers the £49 to £59 firms send.
- Book the smallest car you actually fit in. A saloon takes 4 people and a normal luggage load; jumping to an MPV adds £16 or more for space you may not need.
- Compare final totals, not "from" prices. Ask whether the quote includes the airport pickup, waiting time and card fees before you judge it.
- Treat stale "from" prices as a warning. The £39 many people still quote for this run lives only in an old web address; the firm's real fare is £52.50. If a price looks too good, check the date on the page.
- Take the online discount where one exists. Tick Taxi (this site's publisher, disclosed) advertises 20% off for booking online. The live page doesn't state what the equivalent phone price is, so we can't confirm this brings the online saloon fare under the £49 headline elsewhere on this page; check the discounted price at checkout before assuming it beats the cheapest rival.
The bus benchmark
Every fare above should be judged against the Air Decker: £9.50 single, £16 return, direct from Bath to the airport in about 80 minutes. The service is now run by First Bus as the A4, a fairly recent change, so double-check times on airdecker.com rather than an old blog post. For one person on a daytime flight it beats every car on price by a factor of five; a taxi earns its fare with groups, luggage and departures the bus can't reach.
FAQs
How much is a taxi from Bath to Bristol Airport?
Published fixed fares run from £49 (Bath Taxi Service) to £59 (Tick Taxi, which publishes this site and is disclosed as such) for a saloon carrying up to 4 people. Bigger vehicles cost more: an MPV is £75 and an 8-seater £89 on the only full published ladder. The journey is 18 to 20 miles and takes about 40 to 50 minutes.
Why do quotes for the same journey vary so much?
Because three products share one name. Fixed pre-booked fares are £49 to £59, metered cabs charge by time so rush-hour traffic inflates them, and aggregators add a margin that pushes the same run to around £74. The widely repeated £39 fare isn't a real quote: it's simply out of date, surviving only in an old web address.
Is £70 too much for a taxi from Bath to Bristol Airport?
For a standard car, yes, based on what firms publish: four operators put the fare in writing at £49 to £59. Quotes around £74 are typically aggregators reselling the same local drivers. The exception is a genuinely bigger vehicle; an MPV or 8-seater legitimately costs £75 to £89.
What is the cheapest way from Bath to Bristol Airport?
The Air Decker bus at £9.50 single, £16 return, taking about 80 minutes. It's a fifth of the cheapest taxi fare for one person. The bus stops making sense for groups (a £49 to £59 car split four ways is £12 to £15 each), for heavy luggage, and for flights departing before the first bus can get you there.
Do taxi prices go up for a 4am pickup?
For the fixed-fare firms, the price you book is the price you pay; Tick Taxi (this site's publisher) states its fares are locked at booking with no surge. For the quote-only firms we couldn't verify whether night rates apply, so ask directly when you phone. What does change at 4am is the value of reliability, which is why pre-booking is the standard advice for early flights.