The cost of flights has gone up significantly in the past year – mainly because everyone is wanting to get back out there and explore our beautiful world after not being able to for nearly two years. Flights are expensive, hotels are expensive, there’s little award availability, and it seems like everything these days costs a fortune. Thankfully, there are still ways you can find inexpensive flights and hotels, and I’m not talking about low cost carriers or 1 star hotels.
There are several resources out there on the internet where you can find good deals on flights – some of these services are free and others are paid. Do note that while you can definitely still find good flight deals, sometimes they may not be from your home city and a positioning flight would be needed – this is probably not worth it on domestic flights.
will you find an inexpensive flight for your next holiday?
Social Media Alerts for Inexpensive Flights
There are several accounts/pages on Twitter and Facebook which you can follow/like and they will automatically show you inexpensive flights on your social home pages – you can even set up alerts to be notified when the account/page posts a new post so you will always be on top of the latest flight deals. Since you can follow social media accounts for no fee, most of these services will be general and post flight deals from random cities to random cities.
Subscription-Based Flight Alert Services
There are several websites out there on the internet which allow you to subscribe to their services and they will automatically notify you when a cheap or inexpensive flight is found from your home city (or you could potentially tell them to track a certain route). Some of these services are free and some are paid and you can find them by simply Googling the type of service for flight alerts that you would need.
The alerts would most likely come to you in the form of an email or text message and often if there is a really, really good flight deal, it is best to book it ASAP instead of waiting. Remember that in most cases you have 24 hours to cancel your ticket and receive a full refund – restrictions on this do apply, depending on where you book, what airline/route you book, and how close to departure you book.
Google Flights
Google Flights is amazing and I can’t remember what life was like before it. It is simple to use, yet powerful – with a bunch of filters, you can find exactly what you are looking for. In addition to being an awesome flight search tool, you can actually set trackers on flights and Google will email you when the price drops – this is really cool for tracking a certain flight. Best of all, you can track as many flights as you want and it is free.
FlyerTalk Forums for Good Deals/Inexpensive Flights
There are plenty of discussions about how to find cheap or inexpensive flights on FlyerTalk. There are even dedicated forums on the site which you can track and check for great flight deals – there’s one for Economy Class and another for Premium Cabin travel. They are not updated that frequently, but if there is an amazing deal, especially in the premium cabins, it will definitely appear on FlyerTalk.
Airline Newsletters and Flash Sales
Airlines frequently send out newsletters to their frequent flyers and those who have decided to join the airline’s mailing list, with good deals on flights. These probably won’t be fascinating deals where you’ll have to drop everything and book right away, but nevertheless, you can definitely still get a good deal with potential flash sales that airlines do offer from time to time.
Note that airlines do sometimes drop prices significantly on tickets without sending newsletters or advertising it as a sale – this is why you should check frequently other travel websites which can track flight prices and alert you.
Online Travel Agencies
While I generally stay away from booking flights on one of the online travel agencies (because if something goes wrong, their customer service is usually horrible), their websites are often great for finding good deals on flight, hotels, and beyond. OTAs do advertise inexpensive flights and deals, where you can potentially find a great flight at a great price that works for you. You can always sign up for their newsletters and/or check their websites frequently for the latest offers.
inexpensive flights still exist, but it takes more work to find them
All in All: Inexpensive Flights
Finding inexpensive flights these days is more work than it was before – while airlines have brought back most of the flights that were suspended (and even added more), the demand for flights is still relatively high as people are still constantly wanting to get back out there. The rising cost of travel expenses can be hard for a family to take a well-deserved trip and therefore you should utilize the services mentioned to find good deals on flights and beyond. Do note that there are plenty of other services where you can find cheap or inexpensive flights and this list above only mentions our favorite ways to check for flights, so it obviously won’t include all available services to you. Have a look through the various travel websites and blogs, and you will definitely find plenty of other ways to find great deals on flights.