Seven ways to get a cheaper flight (including in business class)

What’s wrong with these statements? “Book your airfare on a Tuesday at midnight”; “Book your flights at the last minute and you’ll get a better deal”; “Clear your cookies and the fares will drop”; “Key your parameters into ChatGPT and it’ll find you the best flights.”

They’re all wrong or, at best, only partially true. There’s no secret formula that works every time to find the best airfare, but there are tools and strategies to put wings on your travel dollars.

Use multiple flight search engines

In the search for the best airfare a flight search engine is your best friend. Not all search engines will give you the same result, some are strong in one area, and none is guaranteed to always find you the best price and quickest flight time.

When it comes to finding the cheapest way across the skies, a few search engines stand out. Skyscanner is a great starting point, and its flexible date tool and “Everywhere” search are tailor made for dreamers with itchy feet and no fixed destination, but some airlines’ flights don’t appear on there. Google Flights is a sharp tool for tracking fares and comparing routes, and its price calendar is hard to beat. Kayak is optimal for stringing together multi-city journeys or keeping your dates loose while Momondo often finds deals that slip through the cracks elsewhere.

Budget airlines such as Scoot and AirAsia are often excluded from their search results, you might need to dig deeper to find their airfares. When you’ve found the best flight, go to the airline’s own website and check their price. If it’s only slightly more expensive, there are some good reasons to buy your ticket from the airline.

The tools of the trade

Fare search engines have a tonne of information at their fingertips that can help you find the best deal. Skyscanner has a flexible date search option. Enter your departure and destination cities, click “Flexible dates” in the date field and “Cheapest month”, or your preferred month and you’ll get a day-by-day breakdown of the cheapest fares.

As soon as you key in your origin and destination, Google Flights shows you the cheapest days to fly in each month, which reveals itself as you scroll month-by-month. Momondo’s flight insights is another data-rich resource. Key in your origin and destination, click on the flight insights tab at the top of the page and a graphical display pops up showing the cheapest month to fly that route, the cheapest weekday to depart, the number of days before departure when flights are cheapest and even what time of day to depart to get the best value.

Set flight alerts

The ideal time to start looking for international flights is between six and nine months before you intend to fly. Most flight search engines have price trackers that let you know when prices change for the flights you’re interested in.

Don’t be wedded to a particular price, it’s not up to you. Air ticket prices are determined by market conditions, essentially supply and demand, and that’s beyond your control. If the price dips, grab it. It might fall further, but it could also go the other way.

Is there a cheap day to fly?

It’s almost impossible to make the case that it’s cheaper to fly on one particular day of the week. If you are so rash, someone will come up with an exception that shoots you down. However, it’s usually cheaper to fly between Monday and Thursday, and usually more expensive from Friday to Sunday.

When to book your ticket

According to Expedia’s 2025 Air Hacks Report, intended to help travellers track down the best deals on airfares, “Booking too far in advance can actually cost travellers. Booking at least three months before their international flight is the sweet spot for savings of up to 12 per cent [compared with] booking more than five months ahead.” This conclusion is based on data collected from airlines across the world, and ticket prices for international flights are often cheaper three or four months before departure compared to prices six months pre-departure.

However, for peak seasons such as school holidays, Christmas and the summer period in Europe and North America, extend your booking horizon to six to10 months ahead as seats sell out months in advance, and prices rise.

Where to buy your ticket

Chances are the cheapest price will come from an online travel agency (OTA) rather than from the airline itself. Although you might be tempted by the flight price offered by “flycheapwithus.com”, you need to weigh up the pros and cons of booking via a third party. In general, you’re better off giving your money to the operator providing the service.

The OTA’s fare might come with more restrictive conditions, such as a reduced baggage allowance, or a higher fee if you need to make changes to your booking, and a much greater cancellation penalty. However, some OTAs do a creditable job. In 2024, I had to book return premium economy flights from Sydney to Rome. China Eastern came up with the best price by a huge margin, but their booking site is a nightmare.

After several failed attempts using three different browsers I gave up and resorted to booking.com. The job was easy, and the price was comparable with China Eastern’s. I subsequently had to change the date of my return ticket and this was accomplished with minimum fuss and at a reasonable cost through booking.com.

Split ticketing

Split ticketing is an air travel hack that can make a big dent in the cost of getting from A to B. Instead of booking a flight from Melbourne to Rome with a single airline for example, it might be cheaper to book a flight to Kuala Lumpur with one airline and with another airline from KL to Rome. Split ticketing works best on long-haul flights, and particularly if you’re looking to fly business class on sectors that don’t get a lot of business traffic.

For example, you could fly business class return from Kuala Lumpur to Paris in March 2026 for $4350. That’s with Qatar Airways, in one of the world’s best business class seats. To get to KL that month from Australia, a return business class seat with Malaysia Airlines would cost about $3400, making the total cost of your trip $7750. This is about $1700 cheaper than a single Qatar Airways return business class ticket from Australia to Paris.

Since it’s unlikely that your first carrier will transfer your checked baggage to your connecting flight you need to collect your baggage from your first flight and check in for your connecting flight. That might also involve passing through immigration and customs for both incoming and outgoing flights. If so, four hours between flights is the absolute minimum.