It's a EuroCity train from Vienna to Prague, around £60 4.5hrs.

I think there are buses taking around the same time - 4-5hrs probably be around €20 in advance. Perhaps try Student Agency or Eurolines, Others may have a better suggestion re buses

It's pretty obvious that on a bus you have to stay in your seat and on a train you can get up and walk around. In terms of comfort the train certainly tops the bus.

There won't be any scenery from a bus as you'll be on the highway and I'm pretty sure there wasn't much scenery from the train either.

Thanks for the replies. We have booked an online Westbus ticket Vienna to Prague (it's actually a Euroliner bus but their website is not secure - so sending credit card information over the internet was not an option). Cost 22 Euros per ticket.

We will book a train for the return trip. Cost 59 Euros per ticket.

The trip by the Westbus is timetabled for just exactly 4 hours. Studentagency bus and train is 4 hours 50 minutes and apparently in some cases the studentagency bus runs into heavy traffic making it longer.

It will be interesting to see if Westbus can stick to its schedule. On a fleeting visit to Prague, every hour counts.

I took the bus from Nuremburg to Prague and it arrived on time. I'm sure they give accurate times as it would be silly for them to understate their arrival time.

You will encounter traffic on the outskirts of Prague but that is normal city traffic. I'm sure it's accounted for in the schedule.