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What’s your go-to secret to finding cheap flights?
I’m on a quest to finding cheap flights. Have normally always used google flights to finding the cheapest. Is there someone else you guys use to find cheap flights?
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Have flexible dates- Wednesdays tend to be cheapest
Live near a big city (or be willing to drive to one)
Kiwi.com & Skyscanner.com- but ALWAYS BOOK WITH THE AIRLINE
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I've never heard about the "always book with the airline" thanks man.
Yes definitely book with the airline if you can, unless the deal is only through that website (like cheap Caribbean or Expedia or something). If an issue arises and you need a refund for any reason, dealing with a third party is a pain in the ass and the airlines will defer to them if you purchase with them.
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I have to add especially if you have a connecting flight, never book with a third agency. Because if any problems happen in the way, you are screwed. For example, if your first flight is delayed and you miss your second flight or if your bags are not transferred to the second flight, airlines will not even talk to you.
I bought through skyscanner (they redirected me to Flighthub website) once and when I got to the airport, they told me I have to clear security in London and re-check my bags (ended up paying again for checked bags in London) all in 75 minutes layover!!
Skyscanner has fixed this since. Now they show a "self-transfer" note in there for flights like this, but a few years ago They did not have it. Now I NEVER BOOK THROUGH THIRD PARTY AGENCIES unless it is a direct flight and has a massive discount through the third party.
That's great advice, thank you!
What if it's 3,4 connecting flights
from USA to Asia? Have to use those kayak, expedia sites right? Can't
book directly from the airline?
Also search in incognito mode!
They up the prices on you otherwise 🙂
nope not true. Flight prices are based on fare buckets, different number of seats available at different fare levels. If you keep searching fares, depending on how far you get in the booking process it will reserve one of those seats (hold time varies, maybe a few minutes or hours), if the availability was low at the time, searching will 'fill up' those cheaper seats.
You can sometimes see this when booking multiple tickets when availability is low. Booking 1 seat shows $100 but trying to book 2 seats will show $150 each for example.
Why?
Price discrimination- an economic strategy which airlines have become pros at. Even when you buy tickets in different geographies the prices vary.
Why always book with the airline?
If you need to make changes, or if flight is cancelled, etc, it's much easier to deal with the airline directly. If you book United via Expedia, you need to call Expedia to make any changes, even if you're at the airport standing at a United counter.
One good reason is that with most airlines (in the U.S. at least) you have free cancellation within 24 hours. I booked a flight through a third party, tried to cancel my flight 18 hours later, they said no even though it was circumstances beyond my control. Luckily the situation resolved itself, but I will never book third party again. The protections you receive by going through the airline directly make it worth it.
I got low key fucked with a third party for €2000.
Thought I bought the right cancellation insurance, but it 'wasn't thát one'.
So, I prefer to pay 10% more than get fucked again.
Someone replied below with a good answer (sorry, I'm on mobile!)
But don't websites like kiwi and skyscanner book your directly with the airline? I remember I did kiwi once and I had an airline reservation code with each flight.
I've never booked with kiwi, but IIRC, you pay kiwi and kiwi pays the airline. It's better to cut out the middle man because you get more cancellation protections, more flexible changes, better seats, etc.
Unless you're booking with southwest.com/ your airlines'/ code share airlines' website, you're booking through a third party which is not ideal.
Hm yes that is a good point. I guess StudentUniverse would be an exception since I think some of their offers are for verified students and couldn't be found on the airline's website.
I know im super late to this but I have had great experience with Kiwi in the past even had flight delays and would’ve missed my connection flight but they got me taken care of at the Airlines ticket desk
On sky scanner I find a united airlines flight for $500 but when I go to the airline to book it's $980+..
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Sky Scanner!
Seconded,
I used them for all my trips. There’s a ton of features that allow you to look at price analytics and prices per day across the entire internet!
It’s completely free too!
Just booked a trip to Europe(5 countries)and leaving in a couple days, flights were very very cheap(under $300 to across the Atlantic round trip)
Definitely useful!
Another suggestion though, also check the holidays and the weather of your preferred dates.
Spontaneously booked a flight and later found out that it was a week-long holiday for that country -- meaning most shops and tourist spots will be closed too. Lol
Let me guess, Golden Week in China.
Tet in Vietnam
Where to and what dates?
Jan 7-20th.
Going London -> Amsterdam -> Prague -> Zurich -> Barcelona
Paid only about $30 because of credit card points.
But without would’ve been $130 to London, $25/flight in Europe and about $140 back.
Hitting Bahamas after in 12 weeks & Italy(driving top to bottom)Greece, Turkey next!
And then Paris, Krakow, Prague, Vienna next Christmas for the winter markets!
Super low flight prices! Will be around $300-400 total for flights in each Europe trip(before CC points)
Tip: if you go Paris -> Krakow -> Prague -> Vienna in winter it’s only about $800 for 3 weeks + flights!!
Cheers & Happy New Years!
What credit card company do you use?! damn !
Our travel plans are very similar. Leaving for Italy, Prague, Amsterdam tomorrow and going to Greece in March. Enjoy!
you need to start a blog
This. I've tried loads of others like Hopper but Sky Scanner always finds the best and much better filter and search options. Though I have found some craaaazy good deals on Holiday Pirates, you have to be super flexible on dates and location for them.
Hopper just did me substantially better with their rates. Thanks for the tip though. Much better than many other brokers I’ve seen.
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About 60 days prior to departure begin checking the third party sites for deals. Make sure you read all the fine print regarding the booking, like restrictions, prepay no cancel etc. Then call the airline that has the best price, tell them what you found and on what site. Usually if they can verify it’s a valid third party offer, they will match it. They would rather you book direct with them because they don’t pay commissions on direct bookings.
Does this really work? I can never charm people on the phone well enough to pull off this kind of thing.
Well what I can tell you is I work as a sales manager for a hotel and we will willingly do it. I myself have also done it with the airlines. All you can do is ask. If they say no, no harm no foul. Book through the third party if you like the price and too bad for them because they just lost at least 10% of that sale.
Cool man will check it out!
Subscribe to Scott’s Cheap Flights mailing list if you are in the US! It’s free and they send the best deals! Once snagged a $250 round trip to Barcelona.
Thanks to Scott's I've bought round trip flights to Paris, Barcelona and Lima for less than $250 each. I pay for the premium version, but it's so worth it.
I did Scott’s cheap flight premium for a year but unless you have an extremely flexible schedule, none of the advertised deals really work so it’s great for people with flexible schedules but perhaps not worth it if you can’t just pick up and leave.
Jack's Flight Club if you're in the UK.
Rule one about Flight Club...
Lol, before I read your comment I actually read it as Fight Club and thought that was cool AF
Yep! The yearly premium service easily pays for itself.
ITA Flight Matrix
Skiplagged
Seems like most people have given you solid advice, I'll give you two more things on top:
I hate SkyScanner - they typically will show you a super discount flight with a sometimes solid and sometimes shady travel agent - one they really like to push is Travel Merry - do 5 minutes of research to realize why you shouldn't book a deal with them.
Know what the cost of a flight is at specific times of the year. Everyone mostly knows that around USA Thanksgiving and nation wide Christmas flights are expensive, but aside from that, setup some custom Google Flights tracking for flight that look interesting 2-6 months in advance and see how much they change. A cheap flight and a cheap flight on that route are two different things. I have friends who routinely post about the cheap flights they have from the northeast of US (PHL / EWR) to Vegas or LAX and they are excited about paying $350. That's expensive! Know the cost of the flights... my go-to example is that flights out of EWR (one of the near airports for me) to Madrid and Barcelona non-stop are typically in the $350-400 region, so when they start showing up for $221, $249, $301, I know that it's a great deal. I only know this because I hunt for flights on a very regular basis.
Bonus tip: Google Flights doesn't list all airlines, Southwest is never on their list - so if you live near one of the airports they serve, you'll have to manually check them or sign up for their email newsletters. Be aware of that, as local and regional airlines don't always show up and sometimes it's cheaper to book through them.
Bonus tip 2: Stop paying for flights and get into a credit card with points that can be used for travel!
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Wow your racist!
Hey! Could we talk about flights sometime?
I have a combo that I use between TravelZoo top 20 deals on Wednesdays and flyalmostfree's emails. I never have a specific location in mind but if I find an insane deal for somewhere I've never been, I go for it. I got round trip tickets to Tokyo from NY for $600. I've seen them go for even less since.
Definitely recommend those.
can you send me the link to their website, can't seem to get it to work
Skyscanner if you know where you want to go! Secret Flying or the Flight Deal are great if you don’t have a specific destination in mind and just want to see what cheap flights are out there. They find crazy good deals.
Came here to say secreflying. Scored a non-stop LAX to Auckland round trip for $215 on American.
What!
I use goggle flights and then skyscanner. I book on the airline website. Also, I have been using Scott's Cheap Flights.
If you find a good deal on skyscanner but it’s offered by Aunt Betty or Student Universe, can you still get the same deal from the airline’s website?
Kayak’s map tool is brilliant, loads of variables you can tweak and you can end up buying tickets to places you never even considered!
Only downside is you can’t use it for singles, only returns, so can’t really be used for multi-centre trips - in that case I use Skyscanner.
Google flights > Skyscanner
For me anyway. Although I do use the Skyscanner app if I’m not at a computer.
Use a vpn and logon to different locations around the world, clear your cookies etc. Search again.
Momundo and Sky Scanner are what I use.
Try flying into a different airport too, but the problem with that is sometimes it causes you to add on extra costs you didn't expect.
For example it was cheaper to fly into Canada via Montreal, but I was trying to get to Ottawa and I ended up having to stay the night at a hotel because the busses had stopped running when my plane landed.
I second Momondo. Skyscanner I’ve had hit or miss luck with, but I always find the cheapest on Momondo. Google Flights is also great, fast, and very specified.
So there multiple routes ...
Flight attendants get a limited number of passes per year to give out amongst their list of flight guests, but they also have the crown jewel which is their companionship, meaning for free you can get on any flight anywhere anytime (only their airline) but you fly standby meaning a seat must be open for that flight, usually they are able to see the number of seats booked ahead of time and see what your chances of making the flight will be...
I know people who sell the companionships (a few thousand dollars for unlimited flights for the year)
I just happened to go to high school with someone who became one so I ended up on his list.
That offers the ability to buy flights on credit basically for on demand flights...
So either hang out at the airport and play by the law of averages (the more you talk to the more likely you find one person that gives you what you want)
Convince a friend struggling with their path in life to become one. (Make sure they are single so you can get the companionship ;))
Or buy one a pass for the year of unlimited flights (internationally)
I have access to some ppl selling those.
So no one said Hopper yet? Is it less brilliant than I currently think it is?
Google flights
Student Universe. I graduated a while ago but they don’t know that.
was it safe?
Can anyone use it? Or only students man
Besides the apps or websites mentioned, I’ve also started to use Skiplagged. Great app if you’re not checking any luggage and are only bringing a carry-on. Just got flights from ATX to LAX for $80 round trip
I'm gonna have to check out these flight suggestions
r/churning for mastering the art of frequent flyer bonuses for signing up for credit cards, but most of us shoestring folks don't fly that often. there are another subreddit or two for cheap flights that i dont remember what they are called. i like spirit, and i'll megabus to chicago if it makes it cheaper to fly. the only time i fly is to visit family in hawaii. i think southwest and alaska airlines tend to decent rates to hawaii.
I live in New Orleans and it has very expensive international flights. I look for flights abroad from cities that I know are cheap to fly to from New Orleans. (It's $100 round trip to Chicago, a flight to Europe from Chicago might be $500, whereas it might be $1200 from New Orleans to the same place in Europe) So I book two separate flights.
https://skiplagged.com/
Never used it myself but it’s got a lot of good press on Reddit, seems like they have really good deals
Google flights
Scott's cheap flights for notifications about places I'm not tracking; Google Flights for tracking specific places/dates or just researching, plus it often can send you directly to the booking on the offical airline sites without having to refind it; and ITA Matrix (which google uses for Flights I think anyway) for more complex searching. I've used a ton of different trackers but honestly if you're willing to do a lot of the legwork yourself I find Google Flights and by extension ITA matrix can find just about anything, maybe minus some bargain airlines on ITA.
The site you use is pretty irrelevant. They all pull from the same 2-3 data sources.
Finding cheap flights is more about how early you book, when you plan the trip (be flexible), and how trafficked are the airports (bigger airports are usually cheaper).
I like Google Flight + Kayak Map for getting general ideas about what destinations may be cheap when I have no specific destination in mind. Kayak is one of the only sites that has a decent flex-date option. It's not perfect but helps sometimes.
Another option, if you don't mind the cheap seats, is going to all the discount airline websites (Spirit and Frontier in the US as example) and see their deals. They'll often have really cheap tickets to select locations.
I’ll be booking a flight for the end of feb so it’s super close soooo I probably won’t find much of a cheap flight as id hope. I’m booking a trip for my girlfriend and I so cheap seats is a plus of course
Yeah you're probably a little late. Next time start looking 4 months out if possible.
Yea. It was a last min trip idea for her birthday
Where are you located and where are you trying to go? Skyscanner and google flights have been our go to for our RTW trip. Also, as others have said, book with the airline directly. Almost got screwed in Costa Rica. Would’ve been a $600 lesson or more.
We booked with a third party site (exploretrip.com, would def not recommend) and didn’t receive our flight check in details till we basically arrived at the airport to catch our flight. Not a fun 48hrs leading up to take off. We had no idea if we’d even have seats on the flight.
Some of these third parties will sell a cheaper ticket, hoping they don’t get screwed on the back end if tickets skyrocket. I’ve read some horror stories where people will book 4-5 months out, only to have there ticket cancelled days before they depart...
Might be a little extra but worth it to book on airlines site, as they say if it’s too good to be true..
Best of luck! Enjoy your travels!
Momondo
SkySkanner and search multiple combinations of popular airports. If I want to fly, say, Berlin to New York, I will search Berlin to everywhere and see which country and city combinations are the cheapest. And be flexible on dates! A flight may cost €100 on Tuesday, but €20 the following Saturday.
Omio (app) gives you the cheapest option for travel for either bus, train, or plane. I've only used it for travel within the EU but I'm sure it works well everywhere else.
Jack‘a flight club is really good. I actually pay for the yearly membership because it isn’t too expensive and saves me more than it costs every year!
A combination of Google Flights, going direct on the airlines websites (unless there is a significant savings I prefer booking direct instead of through another party), Momondo, and Skiplagged. I like Kayak too since I can enter if I will be taking a carry on bag, or/and a checked in bag. Because no seat assignments seem to be included in flights anymore I have to then go on to the direct airlines' sites. While I try to find cheap tickets, I'm not willing to compromise comfort on flights or shitty flight times/connections.
Momondo. It's like Skyscanner, but I like it better.
Also Skiplagged and Kiwi.com can help.
Flighthub.com -easy website to use but don’t just stick to this one website. Try multiple others.
YYC Deals -if you leave in Calgary, Canada, this subscription letter mail is very useful. They send you very cheap flights and tours to various locations
Subscribe to direct airline companies likes WestJet and Air Canada -lately, they have been sending out emails on their cheap (round trip and one way) flights