8 Simple Tricks to Book Your Next Flight for Less!

Travel can be expensive enough, but these few simple tricks can help you to save BIG! Since your plane ticket is probably going to the the most expensive thing besides your accommodation, saving big here can leave you with more spending money, a better accommodation or maybe even enough for a whole other trip!

I’ve compiled my top 8 tricks to save money on flights:

1. Private Browsing & Incognito Mode
2. Google Flights
3. Prepare for less than desirable hours
4. Be flexible about location
5. Be flexible about dates
6. Book quickly and early
7. Fly during the week
8. Fly during the off season

8) Fly during the off season

Depending where you are flying, there is probably a “peak,” or busy season. This usually depend on the location, with most peak seasons occurring when there is warm weather or when there is a major local holiday or tradition. Just like flights down to Florida would be more expensive during spring break, a flight to Germany around the time of Oktoberfest would cost more!

You can normally find the peak season of a location by just looking up “[location] peak season.” You can still find deals during peak seasons, it just might be less likely or less of a deal than during off peak.

7) Fly during the week

One of the easiest ways to save on a flight is to fly during the week, especially on Tuesdays, Wednesdays or Thursdays. Most people will leave for a week long vacation on a Sunday or Monday and return on a Friday or Saturday, while most shorter overnight trips would be contained to the weekend.

Since airlines will typically have a lot more seats available during the middle of the week, they will often sell the tickets for less. If your schedule allows you to leave or return on a weekday, you will most likely save a reasonable amount on your flight!

6) Book quickly and early

Planning ahead is a super easy way to save money while booking flights, because the price of flights often increases substantially as the departure date grows closer. Normally I will book at least three weeks in advance for more localized flights (i.e. one European country to another), and maybe a month for an overseas or long distance flight.

And once you find a good deal that fits your schedule and budget, buy it up quickly! Those deals don’t usually last very long, because the airline will either raise the price or all the seats offered a the deal will sell out.

5) Be flexible about dates

Especially if you have a certain location in mind, being flexible about the timing and the length of your trip can greatly increase your savings! Google flights has a feature where you can punch in how long you want your trip to be, and the prices shown in the calendar will be auto adjusted to show you trips from that amount. I have found that even changing that figure by one day could save a reasonable amount of money!

4) Be flexible about location

If you can’t be as flexible with your dates, then be flexible with your location! One week a trip to Ireland (from Liverpool) would have cost me almost $200 dollars, and a few weeks later a trip on the same says through the same airports only cost me $35! The price to fly too a certain location changes, just like with different dates!

With leisure travel, rather than choose a specific destination, I look at the time I would have available to go, and punch all the different locations I am interested in into google maps! Plus, nothing says you can’t fly into a near by city and take a day trip!

3) Prepare for less than desirable hours

Choosing the Cheapest flights can sometimes mean less than desirable hours. It normally isn’t a huge deal, and I’ve only had to wake up at an ungodly hour just a few times, it might mean arriving to your destination at a later hour, or having to leave in the afternoon

For longer trips this its not that noticeable, but for shorter, few day trips, it definitely puts a dent in your itinerary!

2) Google Flights

Google flights is one of the best tools for finding the cheapest flight! It is literally the only site I use to find flights! Google flights has so many features that can save you money including, but not limited to:

• choosing several airports to depart from/ arrive to
• setting a “trip length”
• shows cheapest flights on calendar
• setting time of departure or arrival
• an indicator to show if prices are normal, low or high for the location

Google flights is one of the handiest tools to book flights for so many reasons, and will definitely cost you less time and money compared to airline sites directly!

1) Private Browsing & Incognito Mode

And the MOST IMPORTANT trick to save you money soon your flight is to put on Private browsing mode (apple) or Incognito mode (google). To open this, open a normal internet tab, then hit Ctrl+Shift+N or Command+Shift+N for an apple computer. This will open new window which will keep your history private.

This is an important step, because many sites that sell airline tickets will raise their prices if they see that you have looked for accommodation or other things in whatever location you are looking at. I have seen this happen real time, where my mother and I went to get overseas tickets after looking for accommodation in a non private mode, and the price shot up bu nearly 150%!

Having private mode on is the thing that will the and time again save you the most money on flights!

The Roundup

Travel is expensive, but saving money on your flight, even if its just a little but, will definitely add up! This list is just a small taste of all the ways you can save on airline tickets! What if your favorite trick to save while traveling? How many of these tricks did you know about? Comment below! And subscribe for weekly posts!