You know where you want to go, but the big question is – when to buy? Ah, if only everything in life could be so simple.

Best Day to Buy is Tuesday

We’ve looked at this question from many angles, and right now, typically Tuesday is the best day to buy airline tickets.

Here’s the reasoning behind this: many airlines launch airfare sales on a Monday night. Other airlines see this, and not wanting to be left in the position of charging more, will ultimately match the sale prices on Tuesday (at least on their overlapping routes) – match and sometimes beat the sale prices. The airlines know consumers compare prices and they don’t want to lose your business.

This “matching” of prices is generally completed by Tuesday afternoon (typically by 3pm eastern time), and that’s when you’ll find the most carriers offering the most good deals.

Smart Tips for Getting the Cheapest Deals

Again, while Tuesday is usually the cheapest day to shop, airfare sales and specials can crop up at a moment’s notice (AirTran for instance will sometimes launch a 24 hour airfare sale). So you should be prepared to move at a moment’s notice, and the following easy steps will help you stay on top of airfare sales:

• Sign up for our alerts – let us do the heavy lifting for you by sifting through all the airfares and letting you know when prices drop, either via airfare alerts on Twitter or we can alert you to airfare price drops via email.
• Keep up with the sales – follow an airline airfare sales and deals blog like ours which is updated daily (and using an RSS reader is a great idea here).
• Shop with a “flexible calendar search“ – this will show you deals for an entire month and beyond, so you can instantly see the cheapest days to fly.

Best Days to Fly

By the way, when you do shop and buy your airfare tickets on Tuesday, you will notice that many of the sale prices are restricted to flights on certain days, usually Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays – these are generally the cheapest days to fly anytime you travel – good to know, if you are intent on getting the best deals. And saving the most money.