The usual advice for chartering in Greece is that the Ionian is the cheap option and Athens is the expensive one. On headline prices that is true: a typical week out of Athens is almost 30% dearer. Compare the same boat, though, and the gap nearly disappears. Most of the difference is in which boats each area’s fleet is made of, not in the price of an individual boat.
These figures come from Velamari Market Pulse, our weekly crawl of public charter listing pages. This snapshot is week 2026-W40 (prices refreshed 26–28 September 2026). It covers 2,412 listed charter boats across Greece, for the next eight weeks (charter weeks starting 3 October to 21 November). All prices are advertised weekly prices in euros, not what guests finally paid.
Price by region
Regions with at least 80 boats listed, largest first:
| Region | Boats | Typical week | Monohull | Catamaran | Booked | Discounted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Athens | 699 | €3,500 | €2,640 | €5,880 | 30% | 40% |
| Lefkas | 437 | €2,640 | €2,100 | €4,210 | 18% | 47% |
| Corfu | 259 | €2,400 | €2,150 | €4,200 | 20% | 51% |
| Lavrion | 227 | €3,300 | €2,950 | €4,050 | 34% | 52% |
| Preveza | 135 | €2,800 | €2,060 | €3,810 | 16% | 52% |
| Kos | 134 | €2,560 | €2,350 | €4,220 | 34% | 49% |
| Volos | 118 | €2,730 | €2,400 | €4,200 | 20% | 25% |
| Rhodes | 86 | €3,040 | €2,620 | €3,600 | 30% | 65% |
"Typical week" is the median advertised weekly price over the next eight weeks. "Booked" is the share of those weeks no longer offered. "Discounted" is the share advertised below the boat's list price.
Athens is the largest region in our data, with 699 boats listed across its marinas. That is more than any other region we track, including Trogir in Croatia (539).
Athens vs the Ionian vs the islands
Grouping the regions into sailing areas:
| Area | Boats | Typical week | 12–14 m monohull | 12–14 m catamaran | Booked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ionian | 967 | €2,690 | €2,060 | €4,170 | 18% |
| Athens and Saronic | 926 | €3,450 | €2,130 | €4,350 | 31% |
| Dodecanese | 220 | €2,750 | €2,170 | €4,450 | 32% |
| Sporades | 187 | €3,020 | €2,250 | €4,500 | 16% |
| Cyclades | 75 | €4,420 | €2,710 | €4,890 | 21% |
Areas: Ionian is Lefkas, Lefkada, Corfu, Preveza, Palairos and Kefalonia; Athens and Saronic is Athens and Lavrion; Dodecanese is Kos and Rhodes; Sporades is Volos, Skiathos and Skopelos; Cyclades is Paros and Mykonos. Area figures are boat-weighted averages of each region's median. The grouping is ours.
On the headline number, the Ionian is €760 a week cheaper than Athens. For a 12–14 m monohull, the most common charter boat in Greece, the difference is €70. For a 12–14 m catamaran it is €180. Athens looks expensive mainly because its fleet is larger boats: half of it is 14 m or longer, against under a quarter in the Ionian, which also lists many boats under 12 m. The share of catamarans is the same in both, at about a third. A guest comparing like with like will find the two areas priced about the same.
The Cyclades are the real exception. They are pricier on every measure: €2,710 for a 12–14 m monohull, and €4,770 for a typical week out of Mykonos. The samples are small (75 boats across two regions), but the direction is clear.
Price by boat length
Across Greece, the typical advertised week by hull type and length:
| Length | Monohull | Catamaran |
|---|---|---|
| 10–12 m | €1,610 | €2,960 |
| 12–14 m | €2,130 | €4,310 |
| 14–16 m | €2,780 | €7,740 |
Up to 14 metres, a catamaran costs 1.8–2× a monohull. Above 14 metres the gap widens to 2.8×. Large Greek catamarans are effectively a separate, more upmarket market.
Across all the regions we track, boats that list air-conditioning advertise about 4% more per week than comparable boats without it (same region, hull, length, age, cabins and week). There is no country-level figure yet; see the Mediterranean overview.
How late the Greek season runs
Share of Greek charter boats already booked for each coming week:
| Week starting | Booked |
|---|---|
| 3 October | 67% |
| 10 October | 47% |
| 17 October | 39% |
| 24 October | 25% |
| 31 October | 7% |
| 7 November onwards | 2–3% |
Greece holds its season a week or two longer than Croatia, where only 11% of boats are booked for the week of 24 October. It closes earlier than Turkey, where more than a quarter are still out on 31 October. The areas that stay busiest are Athens and the Dodecanese (31–32% booked over the eight weeks). The Ionian and Sporades are quieter (16–18%).
Where the discounts are
42% of Greece’s upcoming weeks are advertised below list price, up from 19% a month earlier. Among the large markets, only Croatia rose as fast. Rhodes discounts the most (65% of weeks, typical cut 20%). Lavrion, Preveza and Corfu are all above 50%. Volos holds price best among the larger regions, at 25% discounted.
The cuts themselves are moderate. The typical discount is 15–20% at every large Greek region, compared with 25–35% at many Croatian ones. Greek operators are discounting a lot of weeks, but not by much.
For charter operators
The Athens-vs-Ionian finding applies to every fleet. A region’s average price mostly reflects its fleet mix, and what decides a booking is how your boat is priced against the boats a guest is actually comparing. Velamari tracks that per boat, down to make and model, next to your own bookings. See rate benchmarking in the platform, or talk to us.
For the Mediterranean overview, see Mediterranean charter prices, autumn 2026.
Method
Figures are advertised prices and availability from public charter listing sites, crawled on a fixed cadence. Each boat is counted once, from one monitored site. A region is the place the listing gives as the boat’s base, so it can span several marinas: “Athens” counts every boat listed there, not one marina. Any cell drawn from fewer than five boats is withheld. Bases split across several marinas or brands are undercounted compared with single-marina bases. The full methodology is on the Market Pulse overview, and the live, weekly-updated figures are on the Greece page.
You are welcome to quote this data. Please credit "data: Velamari Market Pulse" with a link to velamari.com/market.