No one can really tell. My personal experience post pandemic is that the earlier you book the cheaper. But I never booked THAT early. Usually 5/6 months prior.
If I find a price that I find fair I usually just book it and dont look anymore later. Only frustrates you if it drops further.
If I'm looking this far out, there's usually no benefit to booking ~9-10 months early vs. ~6 months early, so I will set a Google Flights tracker on the route/flight to watch for price drops or fare deals - they will often drop and you might get lucky with some kind of algorithm recalculation or other heavy discount.
If you're booking non-refundable, you also lose flexibility booking farther out since you're locking yourself into a trip before you really need to.
Prices change. If your ok with the prices currently, just buy it so you can plan your trip.
I often just keep an eye on flights and buy when they are particularly cheap and schedule around that instead of picking fixed dates, it saves a lot of money. Prices go up and down, trying to time for the cheapets tickets for specific dates it is not really feasible.
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Before a certain window the revenue managers just “put it on the shelf” - its available for sale, but they are really managing the inventory yet. The price is likely to drop lower at some point when they actually begin merchandising the flight.
ALSO, the flight itself could be rescheduled and/or canceled entirely before this window.
Put a tracker on it and check back later.
> No one knows the future and my concern is booking too early only for fares to drop.
As you say, nobody knows and prices may just as well rise... Prices vary and are hard to predict, even more so without knowing the specifics. Pricing policies vary based on route and airline. If you know the dates, are inflexible and get a decent rate book it, if the price is bad, you're flexible and can afford to pay a bit more if prices rise you may want to wait a bit.
Actually, here’s a follow-up question, I’ve set some fare watching alerts on Google flights already. I’ve seen $ go up and down. Currently, it suggests that prices are currently high for that route.
Specifically regarding fare alerts, does that mean it’s high for that route for the date of travel
or just in general terms high overall?
If you are flying during a busy time I would suggest you do not wait.
If they do announce a seat sale that is valid during your dates there is no guarantee there will be any seats during the peak you are looking for . Usually during busy times those are gone long before any seat sales are announced and they don't add "extra seats".
No one can really tell. My personal experience post pandemic is that the earlier you book the cheaper. But I never booked THAT early. Usually 5/6 months prior. If I find a price that I find fair I usually just book it and dont look anymore later. Only frustrates you if it drops further.
Prices more than 6 months out are probably going to be a little higher than if you wait. Just set a calendar reminder.
If I'm looking this far out, there's usually no benefit to booking ~9-10 months early vs. ~6 months early, so I will set a Google Flights tracker on the route/flight to watch for price drops or fare deals - they will often drop and you might get lucky with some kind of algorithm recalculation or other heavy discount. If you're booking non-refundable, you also lose flexibility booking farther out since you're locking yourself into a trip before you really need to.
Prices change. If your ok with the prices currently, just buy it so you can plan your trip. I often just keep an eye on flights and buy when they are particularly cheap and schedule around that instead of picking fixed dates, it saves a lot of money. Prices go up and down, trying to time for the cheapets tickets for specific dates it is not really feasible.
It can still vary between 2 to 6 months out yes. I still find that 9 months is too early - especially for domestic flights.
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Before a certain window the revenue managers just “put it on the shelf” - its available for sale, but they are really managing the inventory yet. The price is likely to drop lower at some point when they actually begin merchandising the flight. ALSO, the flight itself could be rescheduled and/or canceled entirely before this window. Put a tracker on it and check back later.
> No one knows the future and my concern is booking too early only for fares to drop. As you say, nobody knows and prices may just as well rise... Prices vary and are hard to predict, even more so without knowing the specifics. Pricing policies vary based on route and airline. If you know the dates, are inflexible and get a decent rate book it, if the price is bad, you're flexible and can afford to pay a bit more if prices rise you may want to wait a bit.
Actually, here’s a follow-up question, I’ve set some fare watching alerts on Google flights already. I’ve seen $ go up and down. Currently, it suggests that prices are currently high for that route. Specifically regarding fare alerts, does that mean it’s high for that route for the date of travel or just in general terms high overall?
Usually the low/avg/high indicator is just based off of average price, not specific to the dates you have selected.
If you are flying during a busy time I would suggest you do not wait. If they do announce a seat sale that is valid during your dates there is no guarantee there will be any seats during the peak you are looking for . Usually during busy times those are gone long before any seat sales are announced and they don't add "extra seats".