Book flights online - the best tips
Finding the cheapest flights online is more difficult than Rainer Calmund suggests. Here we give you tips for booking.
Find and book the cheapest flights
- First, search for your flight using several flight search engines such as "Sky Scanner", "Momondo" or "Matrix Airfare Search". Avoid flight search engines where you can book flights immediately.
- Do not trust the prices in the overview, but always call up the desired price individually. Many flight search engines save costs by displaying outdated prices. Others do not show mandatory fees in the overview.
- Check the price of the flight found on the airline's homepage. In this way you gain a bit more certainty that you got a good price. Of course, you cannot check flights in which several airlines are involved.
Book a return flight together
- Especially for long-haul flights, it is cheaper to book a return flight together.
- With a so-called fork flight, your departure airport is different from the arrival airport. If you travel through a country, this is usually cheaper than getting back to the starting point.
Flexibility: a guarantee for cheap flights
- Airfares often vary greatly from one day to the next. So sometimes you can save a lot of money if you postpone your departure and arrival by a few days.
- Flights are particularly cheap on some public holidays because they are unpopular as a day of departure. One of these days is New Year's Eve, for example.
- Frequent flights are offered several times a day. You can also save here if you book a less popular time.
- Do not commit yourself to an airport, but also include airports further away in your flight search. A bargain is often waiting, especially in nearby foreign countries.
- You pay the best prices if you fly outside the main season. However, this differs from destination to destination.
Booking time: When do you find the cheapest flight?
- With the conventional flight providers you get the best prices usually two months before the flight.
- It is worth being even earlier for price warriors like Condor. Here you get the cheapest flights shortly after they are listed.
- Don't rely on last minute offers. Actual bargains can only be obtained at the last minute with a lot of luck. You should only take the risk if you like to play poker or have the option not to fly at all.
- Flexibility also plays an important role here: flights that you can rebook or cancel without great effort are more expensive than flights for which you do not have such an option.
Cheap flights: The airline makes the price
- Research regional low-cost flight providers in your arrival region. These often do not appear in flight search engines. You should also find out about the reliability of the provider and read testimonials.
- The major airlines often launch special campaigns with customer loyalty programs and newsletters to reduce flight costs. It is therefore worth subscribing to the newsletter.
Save money on your next online booking with discounts from various airlines. In another practical tip, we will tell you what Google Flights is good for as a flight search engine. Tip: Save money on your next flight with discounts.