Check out our favorite sites for booking travel

I love traveling! Nothing is more exciting to me than planning a vacation to a place I’ve never been or hopping on a plane to see friends I don’t get to spend nearly as much time with as I would like.  Each year, travel websites seem to get better and better, whether it’s making it easier to search using multiple departure or arrival destinations, finding cheap deals when I’ve got flexibility, or simply finding the lowest price.  I’ve highlighted my favorite sites below and included some tips and tricks for using each one. The site you use depends on your objective so don’t fall into the habit of always using the same site since each one has their niche. These sites also search hundreds of other sites for the best price so you don’t actually purchase directly from the search engine site but rather the airline directly or travel site.

Google Flights

Google Flights is probably my favorite flight search engine when I’m looking to find a flight for the best price and have some flexibility around my departure and arrival dates and locations. You can search one way, round trip, and multi-city and then limit the results by number of stops, price caps, preferred airlines, and outbound and arrival times. You’ll also get great details such as whether or not the plane has WiFi, what type of plane you’ll be on, legroom, average delay time, and whether or not there is power in the seat.

A general tip and trick that you can use on lots of flight search engines is to search using multiple departure and arrival destinations using the airport code and commas. See my search below where I’m trying to get from Madison (where I live) to Waco (where Baylor University is located) so I can catch a football game at my alum. Madison is the most expensive airport in the nation and Waco has very few flights so I’ve included nearby cities for both so I can try to score a deal.

The thing I love about Google Flights is that when you click on the calendar you can see the cheapest days to fly. Yes, those are round trip prices shown below! Madison to Waco or Dallas would have cost me $520 or $299 but since I’m willing to drive to Chicago, I can get a roundtrip flight for two for only $71 each!

Kayak

The best way to explore deals if you’ve got lots of flexibility in destination and dates.

If your lifestyle allows you to be really flexible with when you leave and return and you’re not dead set on a particular location, then the Kayak Explore feature is tool you should definitely be taking advantage of. Essentially, you’ll just enter your departure location, a particular month or season if any, and then Kayak will show multiple destinations on a map that you can zoom in and out of and great deals to get there. You can then limit your search by price, weather, flight time or activity. Unfortunately, Kayak doesn’t make the Explore option easy to find. So, click on the tile in the top right to find the option. The Explorer option is perfect for retirees or seasonal workers. Google Flights actually has this option too.

Hipmunk

Hipmunk was one of the first sites to provide a really clean look and feel. It’s probably the best view for determining what time you’ll be departing and arriving along with the price. This comes in handy if you are short on time like a quick weekend getaway.

Skyscanner

I used to be a fan of Skyscanner because I would always find the best deal.  However, they don’t let you search using multiple departure and arrival airport codes which I frequently use. Plus, Google Flights recently seems to have better prices.

What’s your favorite flight search engine? Tell us on Facebook!