Google Flights is an incredibly useful tool for every traveler, whether frequent or not. What sets it apart from other travel search engines such as Skyscanner or Kayak is its array of features that make it easier to book the flights you want, often for less.

The website caters especially well to travellers with flexibility, whether that’s with travel dates or the destination. If your travel plans are fixed, you can still use Google Flights to help you find a cheaper airfare. But if your itinerary is flexible, you can fully leverage its benefits.

Read on to find out why Google Flights should be your first port of call for planning your travel!

How to use Google Flights

Let’s start with a basic walkthrough on how to search for a point-to-point route on Google Flights. We’ll use a simple return trip from Sydney to Melbourne for two people in Economy as the basis of our search.

Step 1: Open your web browser and go to https://www.google.com/travel/flights.

Step 2: In the search box, enter your departure city, destination city and select your travel dates. Note that each travel date has the cheapest flight cost listed below them – helping you to identify cheaper options straight away.

Step 3: Specify the trip type, number of passengers and cabin class (Economy, Premium Economy, Business or First) you wish to search for. The entire search engine will look like this:

Step 4: Click search, so Google Flights will show a list of available flights. You can use the filters on the left-hand side to refine your results by airline, price, number of stops, and more.

Step 5: Click on the flights you’re interested in to view the flight details and fare options. Then, choose a booking platform to complete your purchase.

It is important to remember that Google Flights is not an Online Travel Agency (OTA) like Expedia or Booking.com. Rather, it is a travel search aggregator which lets you book through either the airline’s website or other OTAs.

Sometimes, the price offered via an OTA undercuts the airline’s own website. However, booking through a lesser-known OTA can be fraught with risks.

Google Flights won’t necessarily show every available booking platform for your trip, but it at least gives you a wide variety of options.

In the example above, Jetstar was the cheapest option – although it was to Melbourne Avalon Airport (AVV), rather than Melbourne Tullamarine (MEL). Google Flights will show flights for all the airports near the city specified, unless you choose a specific airport.

If you want to, you can put multiple, rather than a single destination in. Google Flights will then get flights from your origin city to all the destination cities you input.

You can also search for flights from multiple origin airports in a single search, as long as all the origin airports are in the same country.

Understanding the filters

A key feature of Google Flights is the plethora of filters available. Using these effectively is important to narrow down your search and fit your travel needs.

Here’s an overview of the different filters available:

Your active filters will highlight in blue text, and display what you are filtering at the time.

Also, on the top right of the results page sits a “Sort by” button. This allows you to sort the results by various factors, such as:

• Best flights (what Google recommends based on a combination of price, comfort, travel time, etc.)
• Price
• Departure/Arrival time
• Duration
• Emissions

You can use the sort and filter features to mix and match your various travel wants to find what fits best.

Google Flights features to find the cheapest flight combinations

The above instructions explain the basics of using Google Flights for a simple one-way or return trip. But if your travel plans are flexible, Google Flights has some extra features that can help you to identify the best flights.

Finding the cheapest days to travel

As previously said, flexibility is extremely important in allowing you to get the cheapest flights. Luckily, Google Flights has a couple of tools specifically built for this.

The date grid allows you to see the prices of all combinations of dates, three days either side of your selected departure and return dates. Red text highlights the expensive flights, while cheaper flights are in green. This allows you to select one of 49 combinations of dates to get the cheapest possible flight.

To view pricing on other dates, simply use the arrows to move your selected departure and/or return date forward or backwards.

Take the Sydney-London Premium Economy return trip in the screenshot above. If I changed my travel dates to September 11 – September 16, I could fly to London for significantly less.

Meanwhile, the price graph shows a maximum of 60 days, representing the cheapest option on a given date of departure. The trip length is simply the same as the initial search. Note that you can change how long your trip is for, which will update the results accordingly.

Both the date grid and price graph tools have their pros and cons. The date grid has a limited range of days to search from, while it’s difficult to adjust the date of return on the price graph.

The date grid is more useful when your trip time is flexible, but you only have certain days you can travel (such as school holidays). The price graph is much more useful for identifying particular days when flights are cheaper, within a longer range.

Use Google Flights Explore to find the cheapest flights

The Explore function of Google Flights is its single best feature. It allows you to leverage Google Maps to see the prices of flights to any destination in the world.

Are you sure you want to travel, but not sure where exactly? Or just in need of inspiration? Google Explore has you covered.

You can search for flights to a particular region, such as Europe, by typing this in the “Where to?” box. You can also specify particular dates, the cheapest flights within a particular month or even in the next six months.

There are a couple of extra filters in Explore mode. Interests is one, displaying popular destinations for things like beaches or skiing. Travel mode is another, which specifies cities reachable by plane.

Once in the map view, you can adjust the search range by zooming in or out. If you zoom out too far, Google will only return major airports.

Let’s say you want to travel from Melbourne to Washington DC for a two week holiday in October, in Business Class. Instead of simply searching for Melbourne to Washington DC, try looking at flights to the USA in general, and then zoom in on the North-East.

Instead of flying to Washington DC directly, you could fly to New York and save almost $3,000! You could then purchase another flight, or perhaps a train, to Washington DC.

You can also just leave the destination field blank and drag the map over different parts of the world. The available airfares will update as you move the map or zoom in or out.

Using Explore to help pick your destination can inspire you to travel to somewhere else, or simply just save you money. It’s also handy for identifying error fares.

Cons of Google Flights

Despite all these features, Google Flights isn’t perfect. There are some airlines that do not appear, or their prices don’t show. This includes Bonza flights, which you can only book via their mobile app or a brick-and-mortar travel agent.

Also, sometimes a cheap fare displayed on Google Flights may experience a sudden price hike, either while you’re conducting the search or after you’ve chosen your flights. This often occurs when one of Google’s booking partners modifies the price.

The six month limit to the flexible search is also frustrating, as many people wish to plan their travel well in advance.

Tips for getting the best out of Google Flights

Here are some final tips to ensure you get the most out of Google Flights.

Use your filters effectively

Using filters is key to getting the most out of Google Flights. For example, if you have Star Alliance Gold and Oneworld Sapphire status, you can filter out Skyteam airlines. Likewise, if you’re a good airplane sleeper, you may prefer an overnight flight out of Australia, so set your departure times to be later at night.

The Explore view unfortunately has limited filters available. However, you can access the full suite of filters by doing the following:

1. Search for a destination within the region you’re looking to travel to, for example Berlin (for Europe)
2. Set up your filters exactly how you’d like
3. In the destination box, type the region e.g. Europe, and it will take you to the Explore view with your filters still intact.

Be flexible in your travels

Being flexible in both your date and destination will really allow you to make the most of the features offered by Google Flights. The date grid and price graph tools are really useful for finding the cheapest date to travel to a particular destination. Meanwhile, the Explore feature is very powerful for finding cheaper destinations.

Instead of flying direct to a popular destination such as London, you might take advantage of cheaper flights somewhere else, like the recent Etihad Business Class deal to Copenhagen. You could then simply purchase a separate flight from Copenhagen to London, or enjoy a stopover, and still be well ahead!

Change your departure port

Flights from Australia are notoriously expensive, especially to popular long-haul destinations such as Europe and the USA. You may find cheaper flights by changing your origin port to either a major city or somewhere in Asia or New Zealand. For example, it might be cheaper to fly from New Zealand to the USA via Australia than it is to fly directly from Australia to the USA.

Wilson McTaggart

Wilson's love of travel started from a young age, but his love for points developed after figuring out ways to travel on a gap year for less - leading naturally towards Australian Frequent Flyer! Wilson's hobbies include skiing, cricket and planning trips, both with and without points.

Wilson posts on the AFF forum as @WilsonM.