4 Ways to Find the Best Flight Deal

Like most millennials, I hate over-paying for flights and try to travel when the best deals come up...but how do you find those deals?

1. TRAVEL DEALS WEBSITES & FACEBOOK PAGES

In Toronto, and most major Canadian cities, there are a number of websites, Facebook pages, and Facebook groups dedicated to finding the best travel deals. My personal favourite is Next Departure due to their speed and ability to keep their deals up to date (will mark deals as expired, where other sites do not). I've also been notified by YYZ Deals on Facebook on occasion and is another site I check on and off for the latest deals.

If you are not based out of a Canadian city, I would recommend doing a search on your own to find a local travel deals website and/or Facebook page. Hunting for travel deals is an addictive hobby and you're bound to find something locally if you look hard enough. For example, when I was in Hong Kong for five months, I learned that Cathay Pacific used to release flight deals on Tuesdays at 8 a.m., a program they called fanfares Tuesdays.

2. TIMING & RESEARCH

Typically, holidays that are associated to slashing prices and sales are usually a good time to look out for flight deals as well. These types of holidays include: Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Boxing Day, Back to School/End of Summer. In addition, do some research to see if certain airlines have repetitive seasonal sales and what their discount was. For example, Air Canada, Westjet, and WOW Air have had a 15% off base fare sale on Black Friday and Cyber Monday for the last few years...and it came back again in this year. History usually repeats itself.

3. GO INCOGNITO

Have you been eyeing a destination for a while now and been checking ticket prices everyday for a week? As you're ready to book, the price suddenly goes up. Yes, I've been there too. Based on the cookies on your browser, online booking agencies and airlines on occasion may hike up airline tickets based on your online behaviour (such as repeatedly checking prices to the same destination) banking on the hope that you'll be booking the ticket anyways, even if the price goes up. One hack I've learned to remedy this is to try searching for the ticket again using Incognito Mode. Incognito lets you browse with no web history, so you are shopping in a 'neutral' space as I like to call it. There is a lot of debate online as to whether or not Incognito Mode actually works, but from personal experience, it has for me. So give it a try the next time you notice your tickets suddenly hike up a few dollars and let me know how it goes in the comments!

4. BE FLEXIBLE

You never know when the best deals are going to come up and where they'll be! Might be during low season of a destination you've been eyeing for a while now, or it might be to a location you never thought of! The luxury of being a millennial is our flexibility of time. So, use that to your advantage, because if you are flexible, the deals will come!

If you are flexible in where you go, but are looking to go somewhere during a specific time period, I love using Skyscanner's Everywhere tool. This tool allows you to find pricing to various locations during a specified time period and departing city.

Do you have any tips on how to find the best travel deals? Let me know in the comments below!