The honest answer is it depends. Here’s how to work out which is cheaper for your trip.
The honest answer is: it depends. For some trips the airline’s excess-baggage charge is the cheaper, simpler choice. For others, shipping saves you a lot — and your back. Here’s how to work out which is you.
Add up what your airline charges for the extra bags or kilos you’d check. Then get a shipping quote for the same load. Factor in that shipped luggage is collected from your door and you don’t haul it through two airports. If the airline is genuinely cheaper for your trip, we’ll say so — a ten-minute call usually settles it. With shipping, as long as your bags are what you told us, that’s the price you pay, subject to airline rates at the time of booking.