The Best Flight Deals
Best flight deals may seem somewhat elusive and nearly impossible to find most times, but you can locate them.
For the vast majority of travels, airfare happens to be the most costly part. Although rates for transatlantic airline flights have seen a general reduction over the past few years, they could yet eat up a huge portion of your traveling budget. Whether you are an economy, solitary journeyer or a family planning to go on a vacation in Europe or elsewhere, seeking the cheap air flights could ultimately make or destroy your travel plans. Look, if your current flight to wherever is rather on the pricey side, you're far more prone to continue to put the trip off; this is the normal behavior of many would-be flyers.
And still each passing day, airlines publish hundreds of incredible deals, ranging from announcing mistaken flight fares, special holiday promotions to offering flight tickets half off to beat their rivals. Cheap flights do exist and they could help materialize your dream trip--if you are properly informed about where to start searching.
Today, I will teach you the set of skills needed to find a cheap flight, regardless of destination. In fact, these are the same steps experts have been using for a decade required to book the cheapest flight. If you pay close attention and apply these same steps as well, you will never be that individual paying excessively for a flight ticket!
How to Get Best Flight Deals with 6 Killer Tips
Here's your "magic wand" for getting a cheap flight regardless of where you wish to travel:
1. Don't Mind the Myths
The initial and main fact to know whenever locating a cheap flight is there exists no magic trick for achieving this objective. There are however, many myths floating online about certain ways how to seek cheap flights. Without doubt, you must have run into a lot of them while searching for the best flight deals.
Take it from me: most of them are lies and will only confuse you with conflicting information. Why is this? Because the majority of websites commission uninformed reporters who just end up recycling ordinary and outdated myths. Want a few examples?
- It isn't cheaper to purchase flight tickets on a Tuesday.
- There isn't proof searching incognito results in cheaper deals.
- There isn't a specific date or exact time frame in which to buy airfare.
- You could not predict flight rates and experts or gurus who do are making an educational guess.
Airline companies use advanced technology like computers and pricing algorithms for determining flight prices and offer deals based on various factors like time of the year, weather, time of day, passenger demand, fuel prices, competitor prices, and others. These myths and similar ones will lead you astray.
2. Be Flexible in Respect to Your Travel Times & Dates
Airline flight rates vary a lot depending on upcoming holidays, day of the week, and time of the year. August is a major month for flying to Europe, and plenty of people are planning to travel somewhere hot during winter or fly while the kids are taking a break from school.
In summation, if you're traveling when everyone is also flying, then logically your flight price will be higher.
Try not to be too rigid with your dates, but flexible. If you're determined to visit Paris, travel there in the spring or fall, for a lot less people fly there and flight tickets are cheaper.
But if you wish to fly in mid August? You are unlucky. Hawaii over Christmas? Fat chance! Flight tickets will cost much more.
The solution to beat the high prices is to travel off-season. Look for alternative dates to capitalize on the ideal day. The less flexible your plans are, you'll be less likely to find a deal.
Besides, it's nearly always cheaper to travel within the middle of week instead of a weekend on account of the majority of flyers choosing to fly on the weekends and all the airlines increase their rates then. If you haven't already noticed, flight tickets are cheaper when traveling right after a big holiday as late night or morning flights are often cheaper since less people wish to fly then. Mondays and Fridays are often more costly since that's when the majority of business flyers travel.
Airlines are not stupid. They are on the lookout for holidays, a festival, a big sports event, and of course, like any business that wants to make a profit, they raise flight rates accordingly.
Be flexible with both your times and dates and you'll certainly find "discount airlines."
3. Be Flexible Where You Go to Get Cheap Flight Booking
If for some reason or another you cannot be flexible with the time factor of your flight, then try to be flexible with your destinations. It's ideal to be both. However, you still can save a lot of money and find a cheap flight by being flexible with either factor.
You don't have to conduct manual searches, going city by city and day by day. Websites such as Google Flights, Skyscanner, and Momondo provide explore tools and permit you to add your nearest airport and see a world map with all the possible flights on it. This helps you to quickly compare many destinations with no need to brainstorm each potential option.
If you're flexible with your destinations, here are the steps to take to turn Google Flights into a cheap flight finder:
Step 1: Search for Google Flights and then click on its map.
Step 2: Add your departing city and date. Then look at a broad range of options appearing on the map. If you do not have a certain date or destination, search through the "Flexible dates" option.
If you're flexible enough about your destinations, you'll always find a deal. But when you are set on one particular location, you are at the mercy of whatever rate pops up. But as soon as you become flexible, the whole world suddenly widens to you and you'll discover great airfare deals.
4. Fly Budget Carriers
Many years ago, you were generally stuck flying with traditional costly airlines. That's not true anymore. Budget airlines today service both short and medium-haul routes all over the world.
For example, AirAsia provides incredible cheap flight deals around Australia and Asia for less than $150 dollars! Indian and Middle Eastern air carriers sell cheap flight tickets throughout Africa and the subcontinent.
Nowadays you could travel most of the route around the world using a budget airline. They may be less comfortable and you might have to pay for upgrades such as meals and checked bags, but these airlines can take you anywhere without wiping out your savings account.
5. Don't Always Travel Direct
Being flexible with your route you'll be flying is another way to find a cheap flight. For instance, at times it's cheaper to travel to London and use a budget airline to Amsterdam instead of flying directly to Amsterdam from the actual departure city.
To utilize this approach, learn how much it costs to fly directly to the target destination. Next, open Google Flights, type in the destination's details like country name to see the rates to nearby airports. If the difference happens to exceed $150 dollars, find out how much it actually is to fly from the 2nd airport to the main destination.
You could repeat this for departing as well. It may be cheaper to travel out from a close by airport. It may be a good practice to search other airports just to see if it's more affordable to take a flight/car/train/bus there and then fly to your ultimate destination.
6. Book Early
Although flight rates continue climbing the nearer you get to departure, there exists a great spot along the way when airline companies start to reduce or increase flight prices based on demand. Do not wait till the last moment but do not book too far in advance. The ideal time to buy your flight ticket is about 2 to 3 months prior to your departure, or even about 5 months prior if you're flying there in their peak season.
This is not an absolute rule, but use it more as a guide. Airlines generally raise rates nearer to departure since people booking last minute are usually price-numbed business flyers so they'll pay the going price without protest. Moral lesson is, don't book at the last minute.