Wondering when is the best time to buy flight tickets, or what time of the year or season is best appropriate to make a flight booking or buy tickets at a cheaper rate for either (domestic or international) flights? Whether it’s to visit a family member, for vacations, or plans for relocating, there is a wide range of options that have been brought to your fingertips, thanks to online travel agencies (OTAs), the internet, and discount providers.
When buying a flight ticket (Domestic or International), there are certain things you put into consideration such as your current residence, your destination, preferred date, time, and choice of airline. This is because prices differ with location, time, and date either locally or internationally. If you as an individual or as a family are planning a vacation trip during the holidays, or festive season, it is advisable that you buy your ticket ahead of time.
Sometimes, buying a flight ticket (domestic or international) close to your departure date tends to be more expensive than when we buy ahead of time. So the best time to buy your tickets is two months or three weeks before the departure date. Some believe that on a particular day of the week if you buy a ticket on those particular days, say Mondays or Thursdays, the prices will be cheaper. The day of the week you buy your tickets does not determine or affect the price.
The best time to buy your tickets will actually depend on what time of the year you are traveling and your destination also matters. Let’s consider a scenario where a family wants to take a holiday trip during the festive seasons such as Christmas, booking your ticket and that of your family three or two months ahead of departure date is the best option. It will be cheaper and you get to pick your seats all in one booking, but if you buy your tickets during this period a week or a few days before the departure date the prices will have increased and most seats sold out.
Factors to consider when determining the best time to buy your tickets are as follows:
- Do not buy your tickets too early or too late: buying too early might be cheap at the particular time of purchase, if the airlines decides to offer a discount on their airlines to clients, you end up buying at a higher price. Buying your tickets late as well is at a disadvantage because it’s always rush hour for all those traveling on the same date and time because most of these airlines would have been sold out.
- Check prices of other airlines: make sure to always compare airfare of other airlines. A lot of people that buy tickets for (Domestic and International) flights actually have airline preference and as such they just buy tickets without comparing the airfares of other airlines. It is very important to always compare airfares before you buy your tickets, this will help you to determine which of the airlines you should settle for.
- Fly cheapest route: the truth is flying non-stops are more convenient and faster than connecting flights. However, the thing here is that connecting flights once in a while, especially on long flights, can actually give you a 50% cheaper rate most of the time. This helps to reduce the amount that would have been spent booking a non-stop flight.
- One ticket at a time: although this does not work all the time, nevertheless booking group travel and buying one ticket is less expensive than buying single tickets for individuals. Let’s consider a scenario where a group of persons are going for a business trip, conference, school excursions, or a planned family reunion. Rather than make individual bookings, resulting in spending more, purchasing one ticket for all is strongly recommended because you get to spend less than when it is a ticket per individual.
- Cheapest day to flight: as stated above, the days of the week does not really determine or affect the price of tickets. Although prices vary on particular days of the week, even on the same airlines. So when considering the best time to buy your ticket, you can actually go through other days of the week to check for airfares for different days. It will help you decide on what day you would like to fly and at what cost.