Would be travelers on thelookout for cheap travel deals, including cheapairplane tickets, discount hotelrooms, and cheap vacation packages, often wonder how to secure the very cheapestdeals.
If you are looking for thecheapest day to purchase airline tickets, unfortunately there is no universallycheap day. Many experienced travelersbelieve that midweek fares tend to be cheaper.
FareCompare CEO declared lastyear that the best time to find the cheapest fares is on Tuesdays at 3 pm whichis when airlines make price matching adjustments. A 2018 Air Travel Outlook Report from Expediaand the Airlines Reporting Corporation tracked average ticket prices andexamined billions of data points to identify travel patterns. This report found that the cheapest economyflights (both international and domestic) can be found on Sundays and the mostexpensive on Fridays.
Yet another recent study fromCheapAir reviewed 921 million airfares from almost 3 million trips anddetermined little difference in cost from day to day, with the average cheapestfares within $2 of each other.
While there may not be acheapest day of the week to purchase tickets, there are bargains to be found bybooking your tickets in advance. Thoughlast-minute deals tend to be uncommon, best prices can usually be found at leastthree weeks in advance of travel dates.
When you purchase tickets doesnot matters nearly as much as when you fly. Other studies have found the cheapest days to travel are either Fridayor Tuesday and Wednesday. Sundaydomestic tickets have cost at average of $73 more.
Seasonality also has been foundto impact prices. U.S. internationalfliers pay the highest economy fares in December and the cheapest in February,while domestic flights are most expensive in June and cheapest in September.