2017 RANKING & REVIEWS
TOP RANKING BEST CHEAP FLIGHT DEALS
Finding the Lowest Airfares and Deals in 2017
When you love to travel, nothing is better than finding the best cheap flights to your favorite destinations. And if you’re traveling to family for the holidays, being able to get the lowest airfare can make a huge difference for your budget.
With so many online options these days, it’s not always easy to know where you can find a low airfare or where to search for the cheapest flights. Do you go with the well-known flight aggregators or try one of the new ones?
According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, U.S. airlines and foreign carriers serving U.S. destinations carried an all-time high of 895.5 million travelers in 2015. A big reason for the increase of 5% over the prior year is cheap airfare deals that allow more people to fly.
Award Emblem: Top 6 Best Lowest Airfares
New search engines that fill empty seats at the lowest airfares available help more people afford air travel than ever before. This is a big reason the world has become smaller and people are able to visit faroff dream destinations. It’s thanks to the cheapest flight deals.
In our listing of the lowest airfares, we’ve looked at all types of cheap flight deals sites to give you a rundown of the six best options to find low fare flights and low fare airlines. These lowest airfare deals combine the best of both old and new sites to give you the ultimate options for finding low air fares.
See Also: The Best Sites to Book Flights This Year | How to Find the Best Flight Booking Websites
AdvisoryHQ’s List of the Top 6 Best Cheap Flight Deals
List is sorted alphabetically (click any of the flight deal website names below to go directly to the detailed review section for that flight deal website):
Top 6 Lowest Airfares | Brief Comparison & Ranking
Best Cheap | Website | Can You | Owned |
| Airfarewatchdog™ | www.airfarewatchdog.com | No | Smarter Travel Media LLC |
| CheapOair® | www.cheapoair.com | Yes | Fareportal |
| Expedia | www.expedia.com | Yes | Expedia, Inc. |
| Scott’s Cheap Flights | www.scottscheapflights.com | No | Scott’s Cheap Flights |
| Secret Flying | www.secretflying.com | No | Secret Flying |
| Travelocity | www.travelocity.com | Yes | Travelscape LLC |
Table: Top 6 Best Cheap Flight Deals | Above list is sorted alphabetically
Best Cheap Flights FAQ 1 | Why Does Pricing Differ with Low Fare Flights?
Have you ever been on a flight and overheard someone else bragging about the low airfare they paid for their seat, even though you paid significantly more?
Even though all seats in the same section get the same service, they may not all be priced identically. Some could be the cheapest flights for one family, while another pays the “list price” and doesn’t get the lowest airfare deal.
Image Source: Cheap Flight Deals
The reason for this is due to a variable pricing strategy called Yield Management, which is designed to maximize profits for the airline. This means that cheap airfare deals are used to fill a flight that’s not yet full.
An airline may alter the lowest airfare deals several times for one flight as they monitor how fast tickets are selling. Their goal is to get the best price for each seat, but they also don’t want to fly a half empty plane, which is costly. If you know where to look, you can grab the cheapest flight deals by booking smart.
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Best Cheap Flights FAQ 2 | Which Days Have the Lowest Air Fares?
Most travelers have found that booking and traveling on specific days of the week give you the lowest airfares. This ties in to the need for airlines to fill seats, so they offer cheap flight deals on days that are traditionally less popular for travel.
Travel days with the lowest airfare:
- Tuesday
- Wednesday
- Saturday
Travel days with the highest airfare:
- Friday
- Sunday
Image Source: Best Cheap Flights
The best time to look for the cheapest flights, according to FareCompare, is Tuesday after 3:00 p.m., because many airlines release weekly sales figures late Monday or early Tuesday, and other airlines are adjusting to low airfare prices to compete.
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AdvisoryHQ’s Selection Methodology
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Detailed Review – Top Ranking Best Cheap Flight Deals
Below, please find a detailed review of each website on our list of lowest airfares. We have highlighted some of the factors that allowed these low fare airline deals to score so highly in our selection ranking.
Airfarewatchdog™ Review
The low airfare site Airfarewatchdog™ is owned by Smarter Travel Media, LLC, a company with twelve different travel branded websites. Airfarewatchdog™ is specifically designed to be just that, a travel alert watch dog for the cheapest flight deals.
The site has been recently featured in media such as The New York Times and USA Today for their ability to find the lowest airfare. As a bonus, you can also find great hotel rates right alongside the low fare flights.
How It Works
You can use their search features to looks for the lowest airfare deals, compare several sites, and set up alerts to let you know when there are cheap airfare deals for your desired locations.
Airfarewatchdog™ will connect you to other sites to book the flight; you do not book the low air fares through them. Their specialty is using special algorithms to search multiple places for you to find the best cheap flights.
Highlights That Led to Our Ranking of Airfarewatchdog™ as One of the Best Sites for Cheap Flight Deals
Friendly Feeling
One thing we really like about this cheap airfare deals site is that it has a friendly feel and simple-to-use interface. Travel journalist George Hobica created the site, and his email address is right there on the About Us page.
You can also see all the friendly faces behind this low airfare site on their Team page, so you feel like you’re communicating with real people, instead of just a faceless search engine, when looking for cheap flight deals.
They Include Most of the Low Fare Airlines
Have you ever been searching on a large site for the cheapest flights and wondered why you’re not seeing low air fares from Southwest Airlines? Not all sites capture their flight booking information, but Airfarewatchdog™ does.
They also list the website-only low fare flights, and in addition to Southwest Airlines, they include smaller airlines like Allegiant to make sure you know all your options.
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CheapOair® Review
With a name like CheapOair®, you would expect to find cheap flight deals — and they do not disappoint. This lowest airfare deals site is owned by Fareportal, who is headquartered in New York City, NY and has offices around the globe.
You can find multiple travel related deals here in addition to the best cheap flights. They have search options for hotels, car rentals, cruises, and full vacation packages.
How It Works
CheapOair® is a site where you can book a low airfare and pay without going to a different website. They have 24/7 customer support, and you can either book the lowest airfare you find there online or give them a call.
If you want to find the lowest airfare deals, just click on their “Flight Deals” menu option to find the cheapest flight deals around. You can also download their handy mobile app, which has a flight watcher feature to find the best offers from low fare airlines.
Highlights That Led to Our Ranking of CheapOair® as One of the Best Sites for the Lowest Airfares
Explore Low Fare Flights by Map
Being able to see an overlay of cheap airfare deals on the map gives you a great perspective on where you might want to take your next vacation.
You might just find a brand new place to explore that pops up because they have the cheapest flights there from your local airport.
Best Price Guarantee
CheapOair® doesn’t just say that they have the lowest airfares; they back it up with their Best Price Guarantee. It states that if you find low fare flights on CheapOair® or another U.S.-based website for the same itinerary within 24 hours of booking, they will either cancel and give you a full refund or refund you the price difference.
Expedia Review
Expedia is one of the most well-known booking sites on our list of places to find the lowest airfare deals. According to Alexa, they’re the #4 most trafficked travel site.
Expedia is part of a large network of consumer websites, including Hotels.com and HomeAdvisor. Their large position in the travel industry gives them the ability to offer some of the best cheap flights.
How It Works
Expedia is another of the cheap airfare deals sites that you can book with online or call to book by phone. But they also have a lot of fares that aren’t considered low air fares, so you do need to search around carefully.
We suggest you jump right to their Low Cost Flights link and start your search there for the lowest airfares.
Highlights That Led to Our Ranking of Expedia as One of the Best Sites for Cheap Flight Deals
The Power of Bundling
Because this lowest airfares and travel site also offers car rentals, hotels, cruises, vacation rentals, and other travel perks, they provide the power of bundling to save big when you book all at the same time.
You can visit their page for bundle deals to search out full vacation packages and end up saving on more than just low fare flights.
Points Program
Why just book cheap flight deals anywhere when you can book them with Expedia and earn points to spend on more travel and other great stuff?
They have a points program that lets you get points for every low airfare or travel item you purchase through them. You can earn while you fly and use your points for travel or donate them to St. Jude Children’s Hospital.
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Scott’s Cheap Flights Review
Just who is Scott, and what does he know about cheap flight deals? Quite a lot, it turns out. Scott’s Cheap Flights was started by Scott Keyes, who has a passion for travel and finding the cheapest flights. In less than two years, he built his startup into a successful company that finds people low fare flights.
According to their website, they’ve helped save people over $1 million in travel expense by finding them the best cheap flights. An example of one of their past cheap flight deals is a roundtrip flight from Atlanta, Georgia to Lima, Peru for just $165.
Image Source: Scott’s Cheap Flights Lowest Airfares
How It Works
This site alerts you of the lowest airfares from the U.S. to an international destination only, so you won’t want to use them for domestic low air fares. They offer a free or paid Premium subscription, and with the paid option you get more perks. It cost $39 per year if paid annually.
Key benefits you get with their Premium plan:
- Choose departure airports
- No ads
- Text message alerts
- All the best deals
- First to know
Highlights That Led to Our Ranking of Scott’s Cheap Flights as One of the Lowest Airfares Sites
Incredible International Deals
Even though you can’t get domestic low fare airline flights here, it you want to travel internationally, they have some of the best cheap flights around.
A few of their low fare flights deals in the past include:
- New York City, NY to Paris for $260
- San Francisco, CA to Bali for $364
- New York City to Milan for $280
Scott Also Has an Ebook
If you’re curious as to how Scott of Scott’s Cheap Flights finds all these amazing cheap flight deals, you can check out his ebook, “How to Find Cheap Flights,” which will give you some of the secrets that make his best cheap flights website so successful.
Secret Flying Review
Another site that may not be on your radar but that can help you find the best cheap flights is Secret Flying. The site is run by a team of passionate travelers who live for finding people the lowest airfare deals.
They claim that they can save you up to 80% on flights around the world by finding the lowest airfares, and all with no signup fee. It’s completely free.
How It Works
This is another of the cheap flight deals sites that will find you the best cheap flights and tell you where to book them, but they don’t do any booking transactions themselves.
They do both international and domestic travel, but many of their lowest airfare deals listed are to overseas locations. They post the cheapest flights on their website and also have an email newsletter.
Highlights That Led to Our Ranking of Secret Flying as One of the Best Sites for Cheap Flight Deals
Great Latest Deals
They make it easy to instantly see their “Latest Deals” that include some of the lowest airfare deals around. Some of the current round trip cheap airfare deals include:
- Dallas, Texas to Hawaii for $526
- Montreal, Canada to Berlin, Germany for $278 (CAD)
- Atlanta, Georgia to Zurich, Switzerland for $318
Entertaining Travel Blog
If you like to keep up with interesting international stories, then after you’re done searching for the lowest airfares, you’ll want to take a look at their blog.
What makes it special is that it is not just a promotional blog about the best cheap flights. It includes interesting travel stories from around the world, like the one about the Saudi prince who booked 80 plane seats for his falcons.
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Travelocity Review
We round out our list of the top six best cheap flight deals with another company that is well-known in the industry, Travelocity. They’re under the Travelscape umbrella of companies, that is actually connected to Expedia Travel.
Image Source: Travelocity Lowest Airfares
Being another well-connected site in the travel industry means that Travelocity can offer the lowest airfares mixed in with those that are a little higher. They also have the ability to do bundling that can save you on a bit more than just the lowest airfare.
How It Works
You book your flights directly on Travelocity once you’ve found the best cheap flights for your trip. They offer the same type of customer support and ability to book or cancel by phone as well as online.
In addition to booking cheap flight deals, you can also book hotels, car rental, cruises, and full vacation packages.
Highlights That Led to Our Ranking of Travelocity as One of the One of the Lowest Airfares Sites
Worry-Free 24/7 Support
Something that is definitely a bonus of searching for the best cheap flights on a well-known site like Travelocity is the expert 24/7 customer support that they offer.
You aren’t just left on a trip without backup after you purchase your low fare flights. They provide support before, during, and after your trip with all travel bookings.
Things to Do Search
You’ve decided which destination you’re going to with your best cheap flights, but now you’re not sure what all there is to do there.
Well, Travelocity has you covered with their “Things to Do” search. You can check out any city, put in your travel dates, and it will tell you what’s happening that you don’t want to miss.
Conclusion – Top 6 Best Cheap Flight Deals
If you can find the lowest airfares, it means you get to travel more and go to those places you’ve always dreamed of. Cheap flight deals can definitely make a big difference in the places you can visit and people you can see.
With email notifications and text alerts for low fare flights, you don’t have to spend a lot of time searching; just put in your initial wish list and let the best cheap flights come to you.
And whether you long to go Paris someday or just want to see your family on the other side of the country more often, these six websites can help make that a reality by finding you the best cheap flights to get there.
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