Price comparison between north and south of Thailand

The way I'd put it is that South Thailand is very cheap compared to the west, and North Thailand is ridiculously cheap. Like anywhere else, prices vary a lot depending on the area and your lifestyle.

Ko Phangan, Ko Samui, and Ko Phi Phi are tourism islands. Places like that are going to be overpriced for foreigners. Patong and Chalong (Phuket) are expensive too, again because of high tourism. I live in Phuket Town, which is a mix of tourists and locals, so prices are higher on average, but I don't find them excessive for my lifestyle. If you want to eat western food, drink lots of beer, and hit all the tourist spots, then it will be more expensive than North Thailand but still far cheaper than many other countries.

I can't be much help in this topic because I have only lived and worked here; I have not vacationed here. Most people would find it very fun and worth the price, I think.

In Phuket, you can get padthai for 35 baht. Noodles and rice are cheap. If you want a good portion of meat, you'll be getting meals for 45-60 baht. Last week I went to an all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ (the tables have a little grill and you cook the food yourself) for 140 baht. I've never been to a hostel, but the cheap hotel I first got here was 200 baht a night (I think). Now I pay 5,000 baht a month for an apartment. A motorbike can be 100-200 a day.

I know expats here that spend over 20,000 baht a month on beer and girls, or go the Phang Nga caves or Krabi waterfalls every weekend, or eat a 500 baht western dinner every night. Thailand is a place where you can live very cheaply, but it also has a huge tourism industry that has grown accustomed to wealthy tourists who don't balk at $10 for a meal. There's a wide spectrum of prices.

It's more to do with the province than the region.

Bangkok is the capital, so most things are more expensive, but there is more choice and with enough time to look around prices can be matched against other major cities easily enough.

The islands are more expensive because they are very touristy (rich pickings) and because there are transport costs to take in to account.

Some places like Phuket, Pataya and parts ok Bangkok are expensive due to both tourist trade, amount of wealthier foreigners AND locals (Thais) and due to extortion/corruption.

Where I live, Chiang Mai, it is much cheaper than most places with large foreign communities and tourists, but still not that cheap (at least not any more). Of course bargains can be found and CM is small enough that it is not hard to. CM also benefits from cheap labour from neighbouring provinces and Burma, probably more so than anywhere else in Thailand.

This leaves almost 70 provinces that are mostly very cheap> areas in central Thailand (such as Lampang for example) and to the east (Kohn Kaen) are very cheap. Smaller towns and villages, one can live on a fraction of the money (if one wants to live that way!).

All this also depends on what is on the shopping list of course. Items that locals buy/live on and going to be much cheaper as there is much competition (everywhere) - so 35Baht Phad Thai can be got in any province as far as I have visited anyway (which is a fair number of provinces). Beer fluctuates (though more by local location, such as near clubs or red light areas (Loi Kroh in CM) than province), though Lao Kow is cheap everywhere (even in 7-11). Cars are expoensive everywhere (with up to 350% import tax). Western food is expensive, but actually more likely to be cheaper in areas where it warrants stocking supermarkets (in CM we have many supermarkets that sell western food - some almsot entirely western - and as a result they can be cheaper than local markets and Tesco Lotus/BigC for the same products).