When Is the Best Time to Book Flights?
For short-haul flights the cheapest fares are most often found around one to three months before departure; for long-haul, roughly three to six months out. Last-minute international fares are rarely cheap — airlines price scarcity upward, not downward. And no, there is no magic booking day: departure day and booking window matter far more than the weekday you press buy.
When Is the Best Time to Book Flights?: questions people actually ask
Do flights get cheaper closer to departure?
Usually the opposite for international routes — airlines raise prices as seats fill. Last-minute deals exist mostly on off-peak short-haul routes.
Is it cheaper to book flights at midnight?
No credible evidence supports time-of-day booking myths. Fare changes are driven by inventory and demand, not clock time.
How far ahead should I book long-haul flights?
As a working rule, three to six months before departure; earlier for peak-season and holiday dates.
Do flights get cheaper on Tuesday?
Not as a rule. The Tuesday effect described an old scheduling artefact, not today’s continuous pricing. Departure day and booking window are what move prices now.
Is it cheaper to book flights at the last minute?
Almost never for international routes — scarcity prices upward, not downward. The last-minute bargain is a rare exception on odd dates and near-empty flights, not a planning assumption.
What is the cheapest month to book?
No universal month exists — prices track demand for the route and date, not the booking month. The usable version: book short-haul weeks ahead and long-haul months ahead, and never book peak-season trips at the last minute.
The booking window, honestly stated
There is no single magic day — airline pricing is dynamic. But the general pattern holds across studies of fare data: short-haul European and domestic fares tend to bottom out weeks rather than days before departure, while intercontinental fares are usually cheapest several months out, when both leisure and business demand can still be balanced by inventory.
What reliably costs you money: booking international flights inside two weeks, or assuming January sales apply to peak-season summer travel.
Seasonality beats cleverness
Flying midweek, avoiding school holidays, and travelling in shoulder season (May–June, September–October for Europe) shift prices more than any booking-day trick. A Tuesday departure in late September is routinely cheaper than a Friday in late July on the same route.
Does the day you book matter? (The Tuesday myth, tested)
The old “book on Tuesday” rule is a leftover from an era when airlines filed fare updates on fixed weekly schedules and Tuesday often carried the freshest sale inventory — travellers who saw the pattern were observing real machinery. Modern pricing is continuous: fares adjust by the hour against demand, competitor moves and remaining seats, so the “cheap weekday to book” no longer exists. Studies comparing booking days today find differences so small they vanish against route and timing effects.
Three variables dominate instead: how far ahead you book (the window differs by route type), which day you fly (midweek departures routinely undercut Friday–Sunday on leisure routes), and the season you travel in. One habit from the myth survives: check prices more than once. Because pricing is dynamic, the fare at 6am is not always the fare at 6pm — a price alert across a few days gives you the visibility the old rule promised, without pretending a weekday has magic.
Price alerts and flexibility
Set alerts on your route, be flexible by a few days where possible, and compare nearby airports — London alone has five, and New York three. The comparison tools on this site cover every combination.