Google is not only the search engine you use every day for a specific website or store, but it also offers all kinds of services beyond page or image results. It also helps us on trips. You can find cheap flights on Google using Google Flights whether you are clear about your destination or if you want to get carried away by the best offers.
What is Google Flights
Google Flights is a flight comparator that allows us to find trips by comparing all companies or airlines. You can choose by destination or by date to find something very specific, but it also allows you to access a map where you can see all the prices according to a specific date or you can access all kinds of filters such as airlines, flights, stopovers, schedules, luggage yes or not or interests that you may have when choosing where you want to go, for example. You can choose connecting airports, maximum flight duration … And Google Flights shows it as a table of prices in graph or by dates, for example.
Google does not have its own airline company. That is, it is not a company that is going to take you on a trip. Through the search engine what we get is to access a comparator that gives us information based on hundreds of different web pages and other comparators, unifying it so that we can have everything at hand when deciding one or the other. In addition, the reservation or final payment is not made from Google itself but takes us to the corresponding website, be it the airline or an intermediary or travel agency, where you already fill in the data and the payment.
Find cheap flights
To find flights for your trip there are a series of steps that you must follow from the tool. First, access. Then you can use the different filters to find the trip.
How to access
The first thing we have to do is access Google Flights, which is perhaps a tool that you had not realized until today. In the browser you usually use, such as Google Chrome, you will have to go to the main search page. As you see on Google and how you use it every day, there are a series of tabs: Everything, Maps, Images, News, Videos … But there are also three points that allow us to open a drop-down with more options. When you touch on “More” you get new tabs. Among them, Flights.
Tapping on this option will take us to the main Google Flights page, which you can also access directly by searching Google.com/flights in the address bar.
Search flights
Once inside Google Flights or the Google flights section we will have to fill in a series of data that are the usual ones in any page or comparer like this. We have to decide if we want a one -way or round-trip flight , if we want to choose between several cities or just one. And you will have to fill in how many people you are: adults, children, babies in a seat and babies in a lap. You can also choose the class you want to fly in: tourist, premium business tourist and first.
You do not necessarily have to fill in all these filters to search for a flight on Google Flights, although it is advisable to do so if you are clear about it. That is, if you are clear that you are two adults and a child who want to fly to Paris on a specific date and in economy class. But we are not always clear where we want to travel. For example, you know you want to go to Paris but you don’t care about the date and you want to find the most affordable. Or you have a vacation the second week of September and you don’t care where you go but you want something that is cheap. In that case, we can allow ourselves to recommend leaving any of the previous fields blank.
If you do not fill in the destination, Google will show you the prices for those dates at all airports in the world. So you can decide where you want to travel because it is cheaper. You will be able to see a map of Europe with the nearby destinations and the cheapest price on those dates: Rome, Lisbon, Tunisia … But just scroll through the Google world map to see the cost of the different countries on that day you want to travel . Just tap on the city you want to see all the details of that route: price, airline.
Another option is not to fill in the date. You can choose the option ” Date table ” where you will find the next months with a grid where you see the starting price and the return price. You will be able to square what is the cheapest to leave and the cheapest to return. Then you just have to click on “Confirm” and you will see the details of those flights as we will explain in the next sections.
You can also see a price chart for days and months to know when it is cheaper to travel, as you can see in the image.
You also have the option, once you have searched for your destination, to “follow prices”. You can check the Google button or switch to follow the prices. As indicated on the web, you will be able to track the lowest price for that trip on those dates and you will receive an email message that will alert you if the price is lower than usual.
Book or choose flight
Once you have followed the previous steps, you will see all the details of all the flights that are available for that destination and on those dates. You can choose how you order:
- For better flights
- For better prices
- By departure time
- By arrival time
- By duration
Once you have ordered (the most advisable thing is to do it by “best flights”) all the results and all the details of these will appear. The first thing you will see is the logo of the airline that offers that flight. If you do not identify it, do not worry because you will also see it below, under the schedule. Next to the logo, the departure time and arrival time of the flight you are going to catch. And then the exact duration and the acronyms or codes of the airports on the route: departure airport and arrival airport. You will also see if it is direct or not, if it has scales or not. And finally we will see the round trip price of the flight.
When you like one or want to know more about it, you can tap on the arrow on the right side of the screen to read all the details: the airport (no longer in code but in full) or the plane in which you are going to travel, the exact duration of the trip and other characteristics such as if there is a USB port in the seat or not or how much space there is for the legs or if this marked price includes or does not include the possibility of exchange or refund or if it includes luggage.
If you are not interested, just open each and every one of those that appear to find other rates or other airlines. If you are interested, you can tap on “Select flight”. This will take us to a final page with the selected flights in case of a round trip and with all the details of the same. Here we can choose between several different rates depending on whether or not you want it to include hand luggage or checked luggage , for example. You can choose according to what each airline offers, there is no global choice for all the trips you book.
In addition, beyond the rate we will find the reservation options. Here it may take us to the airline directly to book on their website but also direct us to other websites such as Booking or travel agency pages . You just have to choose “select” so that it takes you directly to it and you can now fill in the data.
At the end of the page we will find a summary of the flight so that you know if it is cheap or not. A graph with colors will tell us if it is likely that we will find something cheaper or how much is usually the cheapest in that destination or in trips similar to that.
Other travel options
Beyond the Google Flights section, the search engine also offers us a series of tools that help us plan our stay in another city or in another country and that helps us decide which one we want to choose for the holidays. There are a series of sections where we can explore and find out information about the destination, where we can search for hotels, see what to do or even book vacation rentals in another city.
To explore
In the Explore section you can see information about the cities. As when searching for a flight without destination, here we will be shown other countries and cities near us with the marked price of the flight on certain dates. But by touching you can not only see how much it costs to fly but you can see some recommended hotels and their prices or recommendations on when to go taking into account high season or low season. For example, you will see which months are the most visited and in which the prices are highest, and you will also see which months are the least visited and the lowest prices. In addition, monthly weather information is added with an average of the maximum and minimum temperature.
Continuing on the left side of the screen we can also see information about the city: discover what is or what is usually the most visited, the best-known monuments, the most popular museums. In this case, using Paris as an example, Google shows us the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre Museum. Tapping on them will take us to a tab where we will find user reviews, photographs or related web results.
At the end of the “Explore” section we will find a series of Google questions that users usually ask. You can put filters if you want to see questions about money, security, means of transport, recommendations from locals, culture …
To do
The second of the tabs or options that Google allows us is the “What to do” section that works in a similar way to other guides such as Tripadvisor and where it shows us the most visited places in each place. If you do not decide on where you want to go, this section helps us see the leisure and cultural offer of each place we are considering traveling. We can go clicking on each of the photographs to see the user score, a description of the site, reviews from other people or even the schedule.
At the bottom, we can filter or choose by categories: to go with children, for lovers of art and culture , museums, history or outdoor activities. You choose the one you want and the filter will be applied according to the exact needs or conditions of your trip.
And, finally, we will find a series of outstanding neighborhoods within that city or districts that are recommended both for their commerce, their gastronomic offer or their cultural offer.
Hotels and vacation rentals
The last two sections of Google are for finding accommodation whether you are looking for hotels or looking for rentals in houses or apartments. In the city you have chosen you will see a list of where to stay with all kinds of places and prices. In each hotel or apartment file you will see if it includes breakfast or not, if there is WiFi or not and the price. If you want more information, Google will send you directly to the corresponding website such as Booking, for example, or the specific page of the accommodation where you can book.
Also on the right side of the screen we can see the map format depending on where we want to find accommodation and with the details of the price of the place to stay.
