Looking for the cheapest airfare for your next travel?
Well, you are at the right place!! Using these hacks, I have saved 100’s of dollars…every time!
There is no silver bullet to get the cheapest airfare, you will have to browse through multiple Online and offline options in order to get the best rate.
| Cheapest Countries To Travel | Best Hotel Deals | Avoid these airport expenses |
Table of Contents
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Looking for the cheapest airfare for your next travel?
- Best Day to buy airline tickets to get cheap flights
- Steps to get the cheapest flight tickets:
- How to get cheap international flights?
- Cheapest flight tickets from the USA to India:
- Tools to find cheapest flight rate
- Hack to find cheapest route
- Travel trend for 2021
- Days to avoid flights in 2024
- FAQ:
- Conclusion:
To help you save the trouble of browsing through 100’s of websites, I have listed my cheat sheet you can refer.
Let’s get started and save you some time and money…
Avoid booking flights at last moment, these last few seats are the one that make lots of money for airlines.
Business travelers do not care what the flight rate is as their travel is time sensitive and these last moment bookings mostly get filled by them!
In case you missed booking early, see if you can travel on the festival day.
Most people want to be home to celebrate festival, hence flights may be cheaper.
Best Day to buy airline tickets to get cheap flights
Here is my cheat sheet, you may have yours if not, you can use mine. Using this cheat sheet I have saved money on my flights.
| Day | Booking website | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | Avoid | Rates may be on the higher side, CheapOAir if its unavoidable |
| Tuesday | CheapOAir | My personal experience, buy after 3pm CET |
| Wednesday | Skyscanner | My personal experience, buy between 6pm-9pm CET |
| Thursday | Google Flights | Any time of the day |
| Friday | Qatar Airways | Make sure its Friday in Qatar!(in case you are in a different time zone) |
| Saturday | Avoid | If you have to, try Google Flights, CheapOAir |
| Sunday | Google Flights,CheapOAir | Google Flights, CheapOAir recommended |
| Last moment booking | Avoid | If you have to, try Priceline Express Deals on flights |
Steps to get the cheapest flight tickets:
- Make sure it’s Wednesday evening (6pm-9pm central time).
- Open browser in Incognito mode
- Navigate to skyscanner.com
- Enter source and destination, select Flexible dates check box.
- If you like the cost, book the tickets
Get Cheap Flight Tickets On Skyscanner
I was able to get the best rate using this technique, every time. Keep on reading to know What is the best day to buy airline tickets on other flight booking websites.
In my experience, all the websites have that one day when tickets are cheaper than others, and you guessed it right- different providers are cheaper on different days!!.
It’s just a matter of finding that day.
How to get cheap flights on Skyscanner
How to get cheap international flights?
The trick to get cheap flights on domestic route is different than the one used for International flights.
Here are few pointers that you will find useful while using International flights.
- You can get good deals if Source and destination are busy International airports like SFO, LA, Atlanta, Newark, Chicago, etc
- In case you are looking for exploring Air China, Source should be Newyork, Newark, SFO, LA
- If you want to explore more options before actually booking, make sure you do it on incognito mode
- Cannot wait till Wednesday, try booking on ChepoAir.com
- While booking on Friday, check for Katar airways.
- Travel dates should not be weekends or holidays
- Book at least 1-1.5months in advance. Set price alert on Google Flights
- In case of last moment bookings, try Priceline.com Express deals
- After every air travel, make sure to claim your miles point. It can be used in the next ticket booking or upgrades.
- If you like a particular provider, enroll in their rewards program, get a credit card from them.
Cheapest flight tickets from the USA to India:
I have been staying in the USA for 2years now. It so happens that I end up traveling to India every year and this lead me to research the means and ways to get the cheapest flight tickets from the USA to India.
I was able to get a return ticket from the USA to India for $650. If you think this was a good deal, keep on reading.
The steps I shared above will get you the best rate but nothing can beat Air China when it comes to the cheapest flights.
You can get return tickets for $500 as well in Air China using the technique mentioned above, with one caveat- the source should be LA, SFO, Newark, New York.
The problem with Air china is there is very little English speaking staff and if you need something or there is a change in flight, it’s very difficult communicating with them
Using this technique, you can get the cheapest tickets from any source and destination but since I have used it only between the US and India, that’s what I have shared here
Tools to find cheapest flight rate
Use Google Flights and check out Google Flights Flexible dates.
You will get the price in graph form or calendar form and decide for yourself which dates are cheapest to fly.
Do the same with Skyscanner and you will be surprised to see the airfare difference on a particular day!
As mentioned above, different websites have different cheap fly days!!
In case you need to travel at short notice, nothing can beat Priceline Express Deals Flights
Hack to find cheapest route
Google flight offers
many tools to find the cheapest route, only catch is you should be flexible with your travel dates and travel destination!!
This tool will upfront show you the cheapest route and dates, you just have to enter your origin city.
Travel trend for 2021
Airlines Reporting Corporation (ARC) and Expedia released their collaborated 2021 travel trend report .
Here are few highlights:
- Average airfares are low if we discount the seasonal surge.
- Sunday bookings got cheaper
- Flexibility has become the norm.
- Health and safety are at the forefront.
Days to avoid flights in 2024
As per Investopedia, the following are the “Do Not fly days in 2023“
| Winter | Spring | Summer |
|---|---|---|
| January: No dates to avoid after 2nd Jan | April: Avoid weekend flights to save around 40% | Late June: Avoid June 13 and beyond as peak summer season starts |
| February: Avoid around Valentine’s week | May: Fares are generally higher | July: Avoid the entire month |
| March: Avoid Weekend travel | Early June: Pricy pre-summer season starts, avoid 13June onwards | August: Avoid till 24th Aug, cheaper airfare starts with the fall season |
FAQ:
Which is the cheapest month to fly to India?
I found February and April to be the cheapest month to fly from The US to India.
On which website can I get the cheapest flight tickets?
There is no one correct answer for this. Different Online travel agents may offer the lowest rate depending on the day of the week.
Eg: I found Skyscanner to be the cheapest on Wednesday evening CET time, similarly you may find the cheapest tickets on Katar Airlines on a Friday.
Conclusion:
The suggestions in this post are from my personal experience.
My verdict:
There is no silver bullet to get cheap airline tickets, but you can find a good deal by doing some digging around the steps mentioned in this post.
Enjoy your travel, Bon Voyage!!