Christmas and New Year’s Tickets – Time to Shop

The holidays are coming – are you ready?

Get going: you can start shopping now for Christmas and New Year’s flights with our Holiday Flight Finder.

Before you start, please check out our “peak travel day” surcharge chart for airline fees, below.

What the Airline Surcharge Chart Can Do for You

Take a look at the air travel chart below, then refer to it as we delve a little more deeply into it.

Notice all the dates with surcharges.

Many are the dates you want to fly (which is the whole point, as far as the airlines are concerned). What you want to do is avoid those dates, or at least fly on the dates with the cheapest surcharges.

Surcharges for Dates for Christmas and New Year’s

Notice how several airlines blanketed a wide swath of dates around the Thanksgiving holiday with surcharges; you’ll see the exact same thing around the December holidays – from Dec. 17 through Jan. 3.

The only date of the travel period with no surcharge? Christmas Day. We saw the same thing in November – there was no surcharge on Thanksgiving Day.

Four Ways to Save on Christmas and New Year’s Flights

Take a look at these tips to help you save on holiday flights:

1. Fly before Dec. 17 and after Jan. 3 (no surcharges)
2. Fly on Christmas Day (no surcharge, though there are surcharges for New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day)
3. Fly on the cheapest surcharge days (look for $10 surcharge days instead of $30)
4. Fly a surcharge day one-way, and a non-surcharge day the other leg of your trip (better to save a little, instead of nothing).

If you’re curious, take a look at how surcharges were applied earlier this year (and that included most dates during the summer). And give us a shout out on Facebook to let us know about your holiday tickets.