Lessons from Farecast

Oren Etzioni is the brain behind Farecast, a predictive engine for airline tickets, and he shared eight tips for finding the best fares. To give you an idea of the magnitude of Farecast, if you’re not familiar with it, it tracks 175 billion fares at 79 airports. That’s a lot.

So what’s the advice? Don’t buy far in advance unless it’s a peak time like Thanksgiving and Christmas, otherwise the best fares are between eight and two weeks away. If you see a price drop, buy ASAP because it’ll likely be gone in two days. Midweek flights are cheaper than weekends and price drops come most often at the beginning of the week. Lastly, add an extra day and you can save some money.

Tracking Air Fares: Elaborate Algorithms Predict Ticket Prices [Wired]

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