If you’ve put off your holiday travel booking, don’t wait any longer. This summer, travel demand soaring. And, it shows little sign of slowing down this holiday season. Unfortunately for customers, the surge in demand also means an explosion in travel costs.
Airfares, hotel stays, car rentals and more are at some of the highest levels in years. Finally, you want Act sooner rather than later if you’re planning to travel around Thanksgiving and the December holidays. But before making any decisions, make sure you know the best tips and tricks to not get stuck when pay a small amount to fly around the holiday season.
Whether you’re planning on traveling across the state, across the pond to Europe, or cross-country, there are tips to ensure more affordable flights. We’ve put together a list of the five best methods for finding cheap holiday flights – here’s what you need to know.
Traditionally, flights are most expensive on days when everyone wants to travel. While there There is no best day to book your flight, there are better days to travel than others. During most of the year, traveling on weekdays or midweek tends to be cheaper than traveling on Fridays or weekends.
Especially around the holidays, you’ll want to avoid peak travel days. For Thanksgiving, that means avoiding the Sunday before and after the Thursday holiday. Better yet, if you can travel on Thanksgiving day itself, you can save a lot. For Christmas, try flying on Christmas Eve or before December 22 to save. On your return flight, try to depart before New Year’s Eve to get a cheaper flight.
Finally, if you have the flexibility to work remotely, consider traveling a few days before your holidays begin.
For example, if you’re looking to travel from New York to Dallas for Thanksgiving, a return flight that departs the Tuesday before the holiday and returns the following Sunday will cost you $548 with United Airlines. .
However, if you can work remotely – or have extra time to take off – and can travel from the Sunday before Thanksgiving to the Tuesday after, you can get direct flights with United for just for $248 – $300 less than itineraries on peak days.
Of course, not everyone has the flexibility to allow them to travel on the cheapest days. There are many business travelers who can only be absent from the office during “traditional” travel days. However, if you’re a teleworker, you should definitely consider extending – or shortening – your trip to potentially save a few hundred dollars on flights.
Many large urban areas have many airports for customers to choose from. New York has LaGuardia (LGA), Kennedy (JFK) and Newark (EWR) airports; Chicago has O’Hare (ORD) and Midway (MDW); Houston has George Bush-Intercontinental (IAH) and Hobby (HOU); And the list goes on.
When you’re looking for flights, check to see if your destination has a secondary airport serving the area. Many times, it can be cheaper to fly to those smaller airports instead of the main airport serving a certain area.
For example, if you want to travel from the Boston area to Orlando on key travel dates during Thanksgiving, you can do this for $463 round-trip fare if you’re flying from Boston Logan International Airport (BOS) with JetBlue Airways.
Or you can fly from nearby Hartford (BDL) for a more reasonable $344 round-trip on the same day as Frontier and Breeze, however, note that you’ll have to book a separate ticket and return with Breeze with a stopover short in Charleston (CHS).
If you have not set foot in a specific destination for your vacation travel but only know that you want to go far, you should use Google Flights Discover. The free service lets you see which destinations have the cheapest airfares.
The Explore function allows you to search with specific dates or with flexible dates in a given month. You can choose your city of origin and let Google do the work for you. From there, you can simply click on an attractive and affordable destination and proceed to book your flight.
Google Flights also allows you to set fare alerts, and it will email you if and when the cost of a certain ticket goes up or down. This is especially helpful if you put in months notice before you intend to travel so you can get a good deal if it arrives.
In addition, there are services that help you find cheap flights. Thrifty Traveler Premium and Scott’s Cheap Flights are two of our favorites Membership-based tools help you identify cheap deals. With each service, you can sign up to have flight deals delivered to your inbox every day.
Many low-cost airlines have made strides in recent years to improve both operations and the customer experience. However, while they may offer cheap fares, they have a reputation for charging substantial fees for any extras you might want. checked baggageseat selection, hand luggage and in some cases, even water.
And while “legacy” service providers like American, Delta and United simulated a low-cost experience with basic economy fare, you can avoid them simply by buying a “regular” economy class ticket. But if you choose to fly a low-cost airline, you run the risk of being delayed or even stuck if weather or other factors get in the way of your flight.
Legacy airlines typically have larger fleets and greater flight frequency, meaning you have a better chance of reaching your final destination if something goes wrong on the day of travel.
Put your points and miles to use
If you don’t have much luck finding flights that fit your budget, you can switch to any number of points or miles you have while flying or from spending a travel rewards credit card.
All major US airlines have their own loyalty programs. If you have flown with American, Delta, United, Southwest or JetBluefor example, in the past and have added your frequent flyer number to your booking, you will be rewarded with points and miles in return for your business.
And if you already have enough points and miles saved in your account that haven’t worked during the pandemic, the holidays could be the best time to use them.
For example, you can put United Airlines MileagePlus miles to use on a flight from San Francisco to New York this Thanksgiving. A round-trip nonstop flight around Thanksgiving will cost you 51,500 miles and just $11.20 in taxes and fees instead of $538 for similar flights.
While it’s not always possible to get the best value out of your mileage, if you’re interested in saving money, it’s unquestionable.
Also remember that if you don’t have enough United miles in your account right now, you can also transfer them in from Chase Ultimate Rewards Program. If you have a Chase Sapphire Card and earn Ultimate Rewards, those points are transferred at 1-1 to United Airlines instantly.
In general, it’s easier to use points and miles to book flights during popular travel times when you’re booking far away, but as the example above shows, if you’re flexible and save money points and miles, you can find good deals even at this stage of the game.
The holiday travel season has arrived, and millions of Americans are celebrating. If you haven’t completed your travel plans yet, now is the time to do so. While the holiday season is often an expensive time to travel, you can still find affordable flight tickets for this year.
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