Flight Price Comparison Apps

Nothing helps the review process unless there is some vested interest in the apps youíre about to roundup. In this instance Iíve just been invited for a weekend away in Scotland and as the train is about to cost me £158 and driving would take the best part of 11 hours the only option I have is to look is flying. So here is a small roundup of applications to compare flight prices.

I’ll be testing applications that work both on the iPad and the iPhone To try and find the most cost-effective flights from my local airport to Scotland.

SkyScanner : Free

Searching supports airport abbreviations so if you know the 3 or 4 digit code associated with your airport you can enter them instead of the full airport name. Other filters are available like setting the outbound all return departure times. On the iPad buttons and functions have been clearly designed and take full advantage of the iPad display.

By default flights are displayed with the cheapest at the top and you can change the filters by clicking on any of the headers. You don’t need to book your flight choice within the application; instead you’re rooted into your respective agent’s website. With limited testing, most of these sites tend to work well enough on the iPad. Downsides are that it doesn’t show you any neighbouring airports to see if there is a better deal. This limits the scope of driving to a neighbouring airport and availing best options. Also, a price alert system would’ve been nice as that seems to be quite common on the desktop versions of these applications but this is the same for all apps on test here. This application must be credited for remembering your search history so the frequent flyers reading this won’t have to keep entering their flight details over and over again. One final skyscanner bonus is that you won’t be swamped with Google adverts as you do in the desktop versions

Kayak Mobile : Free Edition

For those who are using it, they might notice that how metro-esque app looks and feels, not that’s a bad thing here. If you’ve used a Windows 8 mobile phone you’ll know exactly what I mean. Once again airport abbreviations are accepted and just like skyscanner when it comes to making your booking you are booted out from the application and taken to the agent’s website.

Kayak is perhaps a little more versatile than the sky scanner application allowing you to book hotels, cars and even track flights but that feature only works if you’ve booked through the app. Your booked trip ticket can also be saved meaning that there is no need to be fumbling around looking for paperwork whilst you’re stuck in the airport queue with about 100 people behind you glaring into the back of your head. If airlines are going to accept your flight information on a screen rather than a printout is another matter entirely. Everything is nicely spread out, icons are clear and easily decipherable and common sense so you know what they’d tend fore without having to look them up. Hotel or car searches are made easier with those searches remembering your flight preferences. Best price found for this trip : £164.98 via Ebookers.  KAYAK is available at the App Store

TripAdvisor.

Initially trip advisor annoyed me a little. Before I’d even got to anything useful it was trying to get me to signing with Facebook instead of letting me get on with things. If I’d wanted to broadcast the fact I’m going on holiday so that anyone untoward could come in break into my house, I do that myself thank you. Although this one is clearly aimed more at the on the road travellers as it’s the 1st application to actually use my location to find the nearest airport so it does redeem itself a little bit.

And again it clearly shows you searching for flights yet the results which are pulled back tried to shove me on a train first rather than offering me the flights. I’ve mixed feelings about this as I can see the point of a general travel search. Ok so it’s good to know my alternatives but I’d have preferred an overall search which presents the hybrid results and then a dedicated flight search. Not sure if that would work but I’m sure I’m not the only one to be stranded somewhere thanks to airports, weather, ash clouds etc. Playing with Trip Advisor you feel it’s less of a proper application but more of an app displaying webpages. Knowing that I had already decided on taking the playing and selecting flight option in trip advisor and I was surprised to see that initially they were offering me multiple train-based routes instead of flight information. I can see how this would be handy.  TripAdvisor Hotels Flights is available from the App store.

EasyJet – iPhone App

The EasyJet app drops you straight into a scroll wheel selection which isn’t that bad as they do only cover a limited amount of departures and destinations. Again the app looks very Metroesq (windows phone style) with the presentation of flight results. This works extremely well on the device sized intended for and even on the iPad it doesn’t look too shabby despite a lack of retina graphics.

As always with budget airlines, fares might look cheap to start with but soon mount up when you start adding luggage to the equation. £128 initially soon becomes £156 by the time baggage allowance is tacked on. It may be a cheap budget airline but their application offering works due to simplicity. If I were out on the road this would stay on the iPhone whilst on my travels. The simple, select, next, select next is more than ideal for the airlines offerings. Again there’s not mention if they will accept proof of your flight just with the iPhone or iPad so there is scope for improvement. I don’t see why if you book your flight, pay for the dam thing via the phone you would be unable to use that for checking in. Best Price £125.98 From A Different Airport but adding luggage allowance is an extra £26 easyJet mobile on the app store

Momondo – iPhone App

Just as this article was being finished I stumbled across this app by accident for the iPhone. Somehow managing to be even simpler than Easyjet’s offering, Momondo does all the inputting at the front page and within a few clicks flights were being offered.

Being an iPhone only based offering you’ll find yourself stuck with portrait mode which makes sense for the formatting of the flight information. Flights are searched for your chosen airport and nearby locations to get the best deals. Of course there’s no iPhone-app booking available but it does offer once of the nicest interfaces out of the roundup for the iPhone beating the Easyjet offering (despite them being the cheapest) because of its nearby airport and multiple airline searches.  momondo – app store link

Overall

Originally I’d started out on this review to see if I could save some money on my flights using my iPad or iPhone yet it soon became apparent that most of the apps pull the data from the same sources. If you’re looking to save money on your flights then check out my hints and tips below. There isn’t really one application that stands head and shoulders above the others meaning it all comes down to personal preference. Annoyingly there are some applications which aren’t available to the UK market which provide a much better job and will let you book flights for the UK just in USD. So if you’re the clever type and know your exchange rates you can save a few pounds that way as well. Take a look at Hipmunk.com for a refreshing take on airline travel searching. If you do book online with your iOS device don’t rely entirely on all the information being on your iPad. Both iPhone and iPad screens have problems being scanned by barcode scanners so keep a print out on you just in case. It might be a pain to try and print from Apple devices but it’s good to have a backup plan. We all know what airlines can be like.

How To Save Money On Your Flights – CashBack

I’ve tried my hardest to check on flights, pricing and availability of flights but seeing as all the pricing is the same I head back to the desktop to save some money. There are cash back websites that, as the name implies, will give you cash back on purchases made  TopCashBack.co.uk is one great example and cash back amount varies on offers available at the time.  I was able to net 5% cash back on my flights in the end To save money on your flights AND a whole lot more.  Head to TopCashBack.co.uk, sign up, do a search on the booking agent you’ve decided upon, click their link, book and in a few weeks time you receive some lovely cash back. I’ve been doing this now for a number of years and highly recommend this practice. If you have any apps or websites you can recommend please contact us Other noteworthy sites. Momondo (www.momondo.com) is another price comparison sites that takes into account nearby airportsthe two best aggregate performers by a narrow margin. For the vast majority of searches, little separated prices found by Kayak (www.kayak.co.uk), Skyscanner, Travelsupermarket.com, Fly.com and HipMunk.Com