1. Keep your searches top secret
You’re not crazy for thinking that a flight price has changed after searching it a few times in your web browser. Based on the cookies in your browser, flight prices do increase when a particular route is repeatedly searched, as the site wants to scare you into booking the flight quickly before prices get even higher. Always search for flights in incognito or private browsing mode to see the lowest prices.
In Google Chrome or Safari, incognito is enabled by hitting Command (or “Control” if using PC), Shift, “N”. For Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer, hit Command (or “Control” if using a PC), Shift, “P”. This will open a new browser window where your information is not tracked, thus not inflating prices as you search. Note: if you’re using an older version of OS X, open Safari then click “Safari” in the menu bar, and select “Private Browsing”.
Your cookies are reset each time you re-open an incognito window. So if you want to start with a clean slate for each flight search (so your previous searches aren’t “remembered”, potentially inflating costs), close all your incognito windows, open a new one, and then perform your flight search.
2. Use the best flight search engines
All search engines have inflated flight costs as part of taking a cut from the airlines. Some search engines (cough, Expedia) consistently inflate much higher than others (listed below). It pays to familiarise yourself with sites that offer the best prices.
Use These to Book
- Skyscanner (our #1 choice)
- Momondo
- Cheapoair (U.S., Canada, U.K.)
- Exclusive coupon for Thrifty Nomads readers: Up to $25 off with promo code THRIFTY25 for 2+ passengers
- TripAdvisor
- Google Flights
Although we’ve listed broad search engines here, note that many do not include budget airlines. If this is what you’re after, do an additional search for regional budget airlines (we’ve listed as many we know of further below).
Finally, no single search engine is consistently perfect (though we find Skyscanner to be pretty good). As such, you may need to try a combination of search engines to ensure you’re not missing any results. There doesn’t seem to be one that gets the cheapest flight 100% of the time.
3. Identify the cheapest day to fly outWhile many theories exist around booking specifically on a Tuesday to save money, the reality is there is no consistent truth to exactly which days are cheapest to fly. Most of the time it is cheaper to leave on a weekday, though this isn’t always the case. Your best strategy is to get a quick visual of prices for a whole month to see what days are cheapest for your specific route. Here’s how:
Step 1. Hop on SkyScanner
Step 2. Enter your departure & arrival cities
Step 3. Select “one-way” (even if flying round trip – you’re just determining the cheapest days to fly out first)
Step 4. Click “Depart” but instead of entering a date, select “Whole Month” so you can see which date is cheapest
Step 5. Hit “search” and see which date is cheapest. Sometimes not all dates have a price listed, as indicated by the magnifying glasses. If you want to see a price that isn’t shown, simply click on the magnifying glass over the date.
Repeat these steps for your return flight if applicable. You can still book a round trip in one cluster, but doing these steps first will let you see which dates are generally cheaper to fly in/out on for your round trip.
Google Flights works similarly to Skyscanner (though you can’t actually book flights on it), plus has a map view as well so you can see where the airport is. For tracking when and where is cheapest to fly, Hopper and Flyr also offer price analysis and track fluctuations (i.e. when is best to fly).
4. Befriend budget airlinesBudget airlines offer significantly cheaper tickets than their full-service counterparts. It should be obvious, but this comes with compromises such as less leg room and no “free” food/drink on-board (which by the way, is normally covered in your higher-priced ticket with full-service airlines).
If you are considering flying budget, which in our opinion is a great way to save, I’d highly recommend reading our guide on 7 must-know facts about budget airlines.
Below is a comprehensive list of budget airlines around the globe. Red indicates true budget airlines while blue implies the cheapest companies available where budget airlines don’t exist or aren’t plentiful.
But First… A NOTE ON BOOKING BUDGET AIRLINES. Always read the fine print and do the following:
- Check where the airport location is (some budget airlines fly to airports further out of town).
- Ensure you’ve booked & paid for your luggage allowance. Adhere to restrictions on weight, height, and # of bags allowed. Some airlines (e.g. Ryanair) will charge hefty fee if you’re over. Newsflash: paying only for the exact luggage space/weight you need is how budget airlines keep their prices lower than traditional airlines!
- Read the fine print. The best example is that Ryanair WILL CHARGE A FEE if you do not print your own ticket or adhere to their strict luggage weight and dimensions. A warning of this fee is clearly stated in all capital letters in the first sentence of your e-confirmation, so no, they are not exactly scammers.
Remember, if you want to book the cheapest flight possible (not service-of-the-year-award-winner), be adaptable, do your research, and know the budget airline’s requirements & restrictions.
Canada
New Zealand
Asia
Europe
- Vueling
- Ryanair
- Easyjet
- Norwegian Air (great rates for flying between Europe/North America)
- Aer Lingus
- Wizz Air
- Aigle Azur
- Wow Air
If you’re heading to any of these parts of the globe, start stalking these airlines. Use Twitter, Facebook or regularly check budget airline webpages to keep you in touch with specials before they sell out. Air Asia, Jetstar, Tiger Air and Ryanair are especially good at having regular deals.
On a side note, Wikipedia has a more detailed, comprehensive listing of low-cost airlines down to specific countries here, though I don’t find all of them to be actual discount airlines. If you’re going to a specific country though, it’s worth checking so you know all your options.
5. Book long-haul flights yourself for less
If you’re flying somewhere that involves a transfer, say from Canada to Australia which typically involves Canada to LA, then LA to Australia, consider that it may be cheaper to book these two legs separately on your own by adding another destination to your trip. It should go without saying that in doing this, you should not book tight layovers. I repeat: do not book layovers that are hours apart! This approach is for those who want to create an additional destination of a few days or more, before catching their next flight.
First, do your research: are there budget airlines unique to the country you’re flying out of and where you’re headed to? Booking with a budget Australian airline, then an American one saved us over $400 each when flying back from Australia to Canada earlier this year. This allowed us to create a thrifty five-day stopover in Hawaii on our way back, which was less exhausting and a lot cheaper!
It should be said that a travel agent can be used to do the legwork of booking long-haul flights with strategic multi-day layovers. We have not done this ourselves but it’s certainly worked for others. If you can show an agent a cheaper price online, they may match it, plus include a few days’ stopover in a desired spot if that is what you’re seeking.
6. Find the cheapest place to flyWhether you know exactly where you’re going or you just want to find to the cheapest possible country to fly into, Kayak Explore is a fun little tool to get the wanderlust going and save some big bucks. Hop on their site and enter your departure city, then select a month or season to fly. Approximate costs then appear over hundreds of countries around the globe from your departure point, allowing you to see the most cost-effective place you can fly.
This tool can also be hugely handy to find out how you can cover the most distance for the lowest cost, even if you have a set destination. For example, maybe you want to go to Berlin, Germany from NYC but flying straight there is pricey. There are heaps of budget airlines in Europe, Ryanair being the most popular, so once you’re in Europe you can fly around pretty cheap. What you need to find out next then is what’s the cheapest European country to fly into first, which is where this site comes in handy.
As can be seen in this example, it’s clear that if flying from New York, the cheapest entry point into Europe is Copenhagen, Denmark at $545. But we want to go to Berlin – this is where the savings come in. A quick search on Easyjet reveals that a flight from Copenhagen to Berlin can be bought for ~$53, making a grand total of $598. That’s a whole lot cheaper than the price shown to fly straight to Berlin (likely with a layover anyway), at $862. This highlights the usefulness of this tool – find your cheap entry point then consider budget airline options to make your final connection.
It’s important to note that this approach is not always cheaper, but in many cases where budget airlines, connecting trains or buses exist, it can be. It’s worth investigating especially for Europe and Australia where budget airlines are abundant and where you’re willing to put in some extra brain work.
If you know your desired destination and want a map view like this with prices for specific days of the week, use Google Flights. You will get a map overlay similar to above with prices for various airports, but with the advantage of concise departure dates.
7. Use a travel agent
Travel agents have special undercut rates that are unaccessible to the public, although this doesn’t always ensure they can provide the best price. It is wise to do your own research first, find the cheapest flight, and present that information to them to see if they can match or beat it. This would be especially beneficial for long-haul flights, where even slight savings could equate to a few hundred dollars.
8. Don’t forget about local airlines
While the above search engines are great, they do not always include small airlines, especially in less popularly booked routes and/or in remote regions. If you’re flying somewhere obscure, Google search and ask around if there exists a local airline. While in South America we learnt that the LADE Air in Argentina (flown by military pilots) has crazy cheap flights to Patagonia, which is of course not listed in mass search engines online.
When you do find small airlines, even if they are listed in a search engine results, it often pays to check the company site which may reveal exclusive online offers not found in a regular search engine. For example, when flying in Western Canada, I found that Hawk Air, a small and local company offers weekly deals on certain days. It pays to double check!
9. If you know when and where you’re going, don’t wait to book
Rarely ever do airline tickets get cheaper as your departure date approaches, especially if you need to fly on a certain date. Budget airlines typically offer low rates as a baseline price, and as these tickets sell, the remaining ones increase in cost – very typical in Europe and Australia. If you know when and where you’re going, don’t wait on an unknown sale. More often than not, your biggest savings come from booking far ahead when you can.
10. Check if it’s cheaper to pay in other currencies
Before booking a flight, consider if the rate is cheaper if paid in another currency. Often budget airlines will make you pay in the currency of the country you’re departing from, but this isn’t always the case. An important note when doing this: make sure you’re using a credit card that is free of foreign-transaction fees, otherwise your attempts to save money doing this will be lost! Our article on money matters for world travellers can help steer you in the right direction for the best credit cards for travel.
11. Consider hidden city ticketing
Travellers long ago discovered a trick known now as “hidden city” flights. In a nutshell, sometimes a flight that connects in a city you want to go to is cheaper than flying directly to it. So instead, you book that cheap flight which connects in your desired city and hop off there, not taking the connection.
It should go without saying this is risky for many reasons. If the flight you’re on happens to be the same one continuing to the final destination, you could possibly not be allowed to disembark the plane as one reader described to me their own experience. If your plane ticket only has the final destination printed on it, you may also run into troubles. Additionally, if some airlines detect you’ve not taken your connection, you may not be allowed to fly with them in the future (I’m unaware how this is enforced/tracked, but one reader specifically noted that this is a policy of Spirit Airlines).
There is now a web search engine which finds hidden city tickets for you. It’s called Skiplagged and is currently being sued by United Airlines who is angry about this debatable hack. We have never used the hidden city approach, but I know several who have, and they’ve scored some thrifty savings. Use at your own risk!
12. Use flight points when possible
If you’ve inadvertently forgot about those Aeroplan or Air Miles points you’ve been racking up for years, now’s the time to use them! Stay tuned for an article devoted entirely to how to rack these up. For Canadians using Air Miles, the best bang for your buck is to use your points for in-country travel, as this uses the least amount of points for the distance, though if you are swimming in points (company credit cards can be a goldmine for this), this is a good way to save serious bucks.
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