āHave you booked our flights yet?!ā
Thatās Christine yelling at me as I continue to scour the Internet, falling deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole, searching for the next best flight deal that never seems to come. I tell myself the perfect budget flight is just around the corner, but that was a few hours ago and Iām not having any luck.
Sound all too familiar? Youāre not alone! Youāre one of the millions of people every year looking to find the best flight deals for that next big adventure! You know the feeling, the more you search, the harder it becomes. But finding the perfect flight recipe doesnāt have to be that difficult. Two parts destination, a cup of designated dates, a sprinkle of preferred departure time and then liberally apply a ton of savings!
Narrowing Down the Flight Search
With the amount of flight booking websites and apps out there, itās no surprise people are having a hard time digesting information in the quest to find cheap, flexible flight deals. Even for us, as frequent flyers and world travelers for over five years, the plethora of options can be a tad overwhelming when we begin to plan for our next big trip!
Thankfully, weāve now been able to narrow down our search for flights to just one super handy search engine that has time and time again provided us with the cheapest flights with flexible dates.
Enter Skyscanner, Savior of the Flight Searchers, First of its Name. Guaranteed to help you find flights that suit your timing, budget and journey of discovery all in one. Originally created as a website, Skyscanner also comes in a very functional and user friendly app that makes finding that amazing flight deal even easier when youāre already on the go.
āSo whatās so good about Skyscanner?ā
Glad you asked! I know your time and attention is limited, because youāre preoccupied thinking about that next adventure, so Iāll jump straight into it.
Super Flexible Flight Searches
A lot of flight search engines let you toy with a few days here and there, maybe let you check for airports near your destination, but Skyscanner gives you full creative control of when and where you want to go in the world. And for us, this is one of the most important qualities when booking a trip.
When we were leaving San Francisco for Mexico, we didnāt waste any time searching for individual cities in Mexico, checking and rechecking which city was the cheapest at different dates. We simply jumped on Skyscanner, searched San Francisco Airport to āMexicoā and got a listing of all the cheap flexible flights available, for all cities. This feature is awesome for finding super random cheap deals to an airport you didnāt even know existed.
Whatās even better than being able to search for flexible cities? Flexible flight dates! Another awesome feature is the ability to look for the best deals within a whole month. If youāre one of those āgo with the flowā type travelers like us, youāll love this! The search engine will literally pull all the available flights for that whole month and give you an easy layout to see which is cheapest. On the app you get a super simple color-coded chart on the dates. Red means too expensive, yellow is getting there and green means its time to get going!
We use this feature to find the best flight deals, and then we generally build our itinerary around that. For us it always works out to be the cheapest way to fly around the world. In 2015, when traveling through Southeast Asia we used this function a lot. It helped us save a bunch on flights from Vietnam to the Philippines by being open about when we could fly.
Added Inspiration and Adventure
Feeling extra adventurous and spontaneous? Take advantage of the āSearch Everywhereā function where you can literally pull the best round the world flight deals straight to your phone or computer. Simply enter your departure airport, search dates (specific days or month) and away you go!
The results will rank the countries by cheapest available flight within the month or date. You just pick which place you want to go and Skyscanner will show you which cities and dates are the cheapest. This flexibility definitely adds an element of excitement to the whole trip planning journey. The idea that you could just pack up and hit the road on a killer deal within the week really gets us excited about travel.
In the Skyscanner app, this is made even easier with the Top Deals feature. Theyāll find the best low cost flights based off your closest airport and send a notification directly to your phone. All you have to do is kick back and get inspired for that next exciting trip.
Warning, this feature is bound to induce wild impulsive flights to exciting new places youāve never even heard of. We take full responsibility for the amount of awesome times youāll have!
Personalize Your Flight Search
A great way to utilize all the best features of Skyscanner is to download the app, set up some price alerts and let the app do the rest. Planning on a holiday this summer but donāt want to search for cheap flights to Europe every day? Finally headed on that backpacking trip around Central America and want the cheapest deals? Tell Skyscanner and theyāll look after you, sending out notifications to your phone whenever your ideal flight pops up on their searches. You can now spend more time kicking it by the pool instead of checking your phone.
Price alerts are not only convenient, but theyāre exciting! Itās like receiving a message from someone saying ātime to go see the worldā, and we couldnāt agree more!
To start your next adventure, jump onto Skyscanner and start planning your trip today! Or grab the app and get lost in the deals in the next boring office meeting you have to attend.
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Disclosure: We love Skyscanner, and not just because theyāve helped sponsor this post, but because for years theyāve been our number one go to search engine for booking budget flights. We would never promote a company we didnāt fully trust, support and use ourselves. Itās just happens that they support us as well!
I always struggle when it comes to finding the least expensive tickets. These tips are worth noting down, Julian!
Love this post! I’ve defiinitely used a lot of these methods. Whenever I book a flight I go through tons of different searches and websites before I pull the trigger. Especially when it comes to flexibility. It suprises me sometimes when people book tickets 2x much on Sunday, when they could have booked it much cheaper on Monday or Tuesday.
thanks for sharing this article.I always use skyscanner for my flights. As you said it is really good, you can find cheap flights. If you are travelling much, One can search each details. Your advices are nice and helpful.
I use Skyscanner too – once it helped me find great offer from Bremen to Porto for Primavera Festival š Now I mostly look for occasions on my FB feed, because I follow many blogs about cheap travels. And in Poland – where I’m from – the cheapest lines are Ryanair and Wizzair, which sadly have very limited destinations. Still, it’s nice to go somewhere for a weekend for a couple of Euros š
Love these tips.
Thank you so much!