No matter how often you fly, you should be signed up for a reward program. You don’t need to do any extra spending either. I earn over a million miles a year — without flying or spending extra money. That translates into dozens of free flights (often in business class) for myself and my family.
If you are smart with your money and collect points and miles (the art of “travel hacking”), you can travel around the world for very little (and often free). Here are some articles on travel hacking that can help you get started:
If you’re traveling with friends or family, don’t search for or buy multiple tickets in a single purchase. Airlines always show the highest ticket price in a group of tickets which means you’ll end up paying more money.
Airlines have tons of different price points for tickets (these are based on a variety of factors). They want to sell tickets in the highest fare bucket possible and, when they group tickets together, always list prices in the highest fare bucket.
For example, if you are a family of four and you’re searching for four seats, the airline will find four seats together and show your fare based on the highest ticket price. So if seat A is $200, seats B and C are $300, and seat D is $400, it will price those tickets as $400 each instead of adding up the individual ticket prices. If the price difference is large, that translates into a sizeable extra expense.
For that reason, always search for tickets as a single person. Afterward, in the checkout process, you can pick your seats so you and your family are sitting together. And even if you end up not beside one another, that’s a fair trade for saving a few hundred dollars.
If your country’s currency is currently strong compared to others around the world, search airfare in a country where the currency is weaker.
For example, when the US dollar was strong and the New Zealand currency weak, I found a one-way flight from Australia to NYC for $1,000 USD. However, when I searched on the New Zealand version of the airline, I found the same ticket for $600 USD.
It was the same airline, same flight, and same booking class — it was just booked in a different currency. This tip does not always work, but it works often enough that it’s something worth trying if your currency is currently doing well.
Airline fares keep rising the closer you get to departure, but there is a sweet spot when the airlines begin to either lower or increase fares based on demand. Don’t wait until the last second but don’t book far, far in advance either. The best time to book your flight is around 2-3 months before your departure, or around five months before if you are going to your destination during their peak season.
This isn’t a hard and fast rule, though, so use it as a guide. I could go on forever about airline pricing models but airlines raise prices closer to departure because the people who book last minute tend to be price insensitive business travelers so they will pay whatever. So don’t book last minute!
This is a more advanced (and riskier) way of finding cheap flights, but if you’re adamant about spending as little money as possible, it’s worth looking for hidden city fares. This is when you book a flight that has a layover in your desired destination. You then get off the plane and exit the airport at the layover city instead of continuing onto the final destination that you booked the ticket for.
For example, say you want to fly from Austin to Atlanta. A flight from Austin to New Orleans with a stop in Atlanta might be cheaper than booking Austin to Atlanta directly.
As you can imagine, this practice can get complicated and tricky. There are a few crucial elements to keep in mind, namely that once you skip a leg, the airline cancels the rest of your trip. That means that you cannot buy round-trip flights and do this practice on your departure flight, because your return flight will be cancelled. Also, you cannot check bags, as they will end up in the final destination on your ticket, not where you get off.
Additionally, airlines strongly frown upon this practice, so you don’t want to advertise that this is what you’re doing, and you don’t want to do it often, otherwise you might get flagged.
All that being said, you can save hundreds of dollars with hidden city flights, and it’s perfectly legal. It’s easy to search for hidden city flights on the website Skiplagged. Just do so at your own risk!
Finding a cheap flight is all about being flexible and getting creative. It may take some effort, but the deals are out there if you’re willing to look. Follow the tips above to get started, but don’t waste hours and hours hunting for a cheap flight. If you’re spending more than an hour booking a flight, you’re spending too much time.
Once you find a flight deal that you’re happy with, book right away, as airfares change by the minute. Remember that you have a 24-hour window to cancel in case you need to.
Use the tips above on how to get a cheap flight to get the ball rolling. Do that, and you’ll always get a great deal!
Cheap FlightsI start all my searches with Skyscanner because they search all major AND budget airlines, non-English websites, English websites, and everything in between. Even if you aren’t sure your plans, it’s best to start searching for flights today. People who wait to book are people who end up spending the most.
Airfare pricing is extremely complex, with algorithms changing fares minute by minute. It puts the average consumer at a significant disadvantage and far too often results in travelers overpaying for flights.
That's why I started Going. After I snagged the fare of a lifetime—$130 roundtrip to Milan—I wanted to help others explore the world for less and show them how to get cheap flights. Today, my team and I spend hundreds of hours every week searching for cheap flights, and when we find them, we let our members know. We also publish guides like this so that whether you book one of our deals or search for flights on your own, you never overpay again.
Be flexible with where and when to go. If you’ve picked out your destination, picked out your dates, and don’t have flexibility, 95% of what you can do to bring down the cost of airfare is already out the window. Flexibility is king. Plus, as we'll discuss below, once you get to Europe or Asia or wherever, it’s really easy to hop a budget flight to your final destination.
Sidenote: If you're looking to book the cheapest flights, be sure to search more than one date. (Clicking the calendar in Google Flights shows you cheap tickets for two months at a time.)
Our three favorite tools to search for flights are Google Flights, Priceline, and Momondo. There are also some more complex ones like the ITA Matrix, SkyScanner, and various plugins, but for most folks Google Flights, Priceline, and Momondo are plenty.
One of the reasons we love Google Flights so much is because it makes it really easy to see tons of options. First, you can input up to seven airports in the departure and arrival fields, so if you can fly from any airport on the East Coast to any airport in Ireland, voila, just put in the corresponding airport codes and you can see the route that'll be cheapest.
One of the reasons we love Google Flights so much is because it makes it really easy to see tons of options. First, you can input up to seven airports in the departure and arrival fields, so if you can fly from any airport on the East Coast to any airport in Ireland, voila, just put in the corresponding airport codes and you can see the route that'll be cheapest.
Just put in your departure airport and leave the destination open (or select a region, country, or state like Europe or Asia or Bali or Florida) and a map will populate with all your options. You can search select dates or browse weekend, one-week, or two-week trips in the next six months.
Another handy feature of Google Flights is that it's easy to see if moving your dates can lower the price. When you select your dates, Google Flights will show you two months worth of dates and highlight which ones are the cheapest days to fly based on the length of your trip. Often times shifting the dates by even a day or switching from a six-day trip to seven days can cut the price in half.
What are the cheapest days to travel? In general Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday are the cheapest days to travel. Friday and Sunday are usually the most expensive days. These aren't always the cheapest days to book—cheap flights can pop up anytime!
If you want to get the cheapest flights possible, focus on getting the cheapest fares across the ocean, even if it’s not from your home airport or to your ultimate destination.
Two itineraries are frequently cheaper than one. Plus you can stay and explore another city for as long or short as you like.
Here's a personal example: I used to live in Washington DC, but the best ticket I ever purchased was the ticket I mention, above, a Mistake Fare from NYC to Milan for $130 roundtrip.
It was well worth the $20 bus ride up, and I even got to spend the weekend with friends in NYC. If I had insisted on flying to Milan from Washington DC (not NYC) the ticket would’ve been around $800, not the $150 I actually paid.
The next best fare I’ve gotten was from DC to Brussels for ~$250 roundtrip. So nice I bought it twice! Even though I didn’t have that much interest in Belgium, I knew once I was in Europe, I could easily find budget flights to other European countries.
For one trip I bought flights from Brussels to Norway (~$60 roundtrip) and for the other trip I bought flights from Brussels to Dublin (~$80 roundtrip). If I had insisted on flying from DC to Norway or Dublin (without stopping first in Brussels), I would have paid around $750 roundtrip, not the $310 and $330 I actually paid. And I wouldn’t have gotten a day in Brussels to boot! Rome2Rio makes it easy to check out local transport options between destinations.
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