Airline pricing is dynamic and demand-driven, not a fixed schedule of discounts on specific days — but a few patterns hold up consistently enough to plan around.
Booking window matters most: for domestic routes, fares are typically lowest 3-6 weeks out; for international routes, 2-4 months ahead. Booking too early or too close to departure both tend to cost more, since airlines price the earliest seats cheap to build demand, then raise prices as the flight fills.
Flexibility on dates is worth more than almost any other lever — shifting a departure by even one day, or flying midweek instead of a Friday or Sunday, can noticeably change the fare. If your dates are fixed, flexibility on the connecting airport (nearby cities within a few hours' drive) sometimes opens up a meaningfully cheaper routing.
Bundling flights with your hotel and transfers, rather than booking each separately, often works out cheaper than it looks — airlines and hotels both offer better net rates through package pricing than either would give you alone.
We compare fares across airlines before booking anything, and we'll tell you honestly if waiting a week is likely to help or if it's time to lock in the price you have.