When Flights Are Cheapest
When costs are the lowest priced, the latest white paper from Expedia indicates before departure as the day. Report from CheapAir shows that 47 days to death is the minute. There are more comparable studies all giving different answers. The general tendency is that booking is the best strategy, although there is no response about the number of days. It is quite an exception than the rule, although there are opportunities to discover a special promotion or sale afterwards. For cost airlines that are effective, such as Southwest, EasyJet or Ryanair, the strategy differs. They use more competitive yield management calculations to increase or affordable prices based on the current supply and demand.
So it is fairly common to see costs that are higher time and after that costs whether there is need, dropping. To illustrate this behavior we've published the following articles about EasyJet and Ryanair. Do Ryanair flights go down in price? Day to book flights - studies suggest that time of day of booking and the day of week things for finding the lowest priced airfares. The studies agreed that booking enables odds of finding the cheapest airfares. Researchers disagree about that days is the best for purchasing. Thursday, while others suggest some appear to emphasize Tuesday. This also depends upon concrete airlines.
The week theory our study of Ryanair prices confirms. Day of departure - In case your travel dates are flexible, it's advocated to avoid weekend departures, that are usually less affordable than flying on weekdays. During holidays, school holidays or special events flight costs always go up. So if you've to fly on these dates and aren't flexible, it's best to book early. This is true even when flying with cost effective airlines, which alter prices according to current demand. For holiday flights departing 2-3 days earlier\/later than rush hour days, could save you even up to 200% of the ticket price.
Tools that might help - It's not trivial to take all of these factor into account and continuously analyze cost changes during long time periods. There are tools on-line that might help finding the best time to book tickets. Price Alerts - Available at Kayak, Sky scanner and several other web sites - Flexible flight search - Using flight internet search engine that can search more multiple airlines, flexible dates and alternative routes. Airfare predictors - Some web sites predict whether it's a good moment to purchase a ticket or it's best to wait. Kayak has an overall prediction model available for some flights.