Priceline: Again offers many package deals. Often can secure prices even cheaper than listed throug

In a little while we ll be posting some tips we ve found on  how  to book the best flights and hotels for the cheapest prices. But before you can get to that, you need to know  where  you ll be doing the booking. There is a veritable slew of websites which all offer similar airline-booking and trip-planning services, but we decided to take a look at each and find out how pricing and features are distinct among them.
The best way to compare prices between different services is to request the same product from each, then take a look at the results. We did just that for a combination of several departure car rental phoenix az zones, destinations, and dates, including both domestic and international flights:
As you can see, Priceline and Travelocity generally offered the lowest rates for domestic flights, while Bing and Yapta seemed to offer lower fares for any given international flight. However, there are other factors to consider. For example, Kayak did not offer the cheapest fares for the given flights, but automatically offered cheaper alternatives for people willing to alter their routes (by flying into or from nearby airports rather than the planned ones). In fact, here is a quick breakdown of additional features which could make some of the ostensibly more expensive websites worth using:
Orbitz:  Offers a comprehensive, comparative report of available flights and prices of each airline, including non-stop and 1+ stop flights. Can be used for hotels, cars, and activities as well as different packages involving these (select flight + hotel, flight + car, hotel + car, or all three).
Bing:  In addition to showing flight deals, allows users to view historical pricing of similar flights to know how their deal compares. Also allows users to search for the dates with the lowest fares and explore multiple routes at once, and analyzes trends to predict if fares for a given route are going to rise or fall that week. For example, in a test search from DC to Los Angeles, the site suggests car rental phoenix az you wait before buying tickets—as it predicts with 64% confidence that fares are going to drop.
Hotwire:  Includes car rental phoenix az a number of features, including a price calendar (showing fare prices for the flight on each date of the month), an e-mail car rental phoenix az signup for notification when prices drop, and alternate routes from/to nearby airports or on cheaper, nearby dates. Also offers car rental phoenix az package deals. Sometimes offers the cheapest deals available along with a few other sites. However, for one-way flights and international flights, it does not do its own searches—it just links to other sites on this list.
Kayak:  Does an aggregate search of many other travel agency sites (including Orbitz, Travelocity, and Hotwire) to offer results, and allows you to sort those results by price, airline, takeoff, landing, and duration. Never seems to offer the cheapest price but each search does provide cheaper alternatives automatically—making it a good resource to map out the best route.
Priceline:  Again offers many package deals. Often can secure prices even cheaper than listed through its unique "Name Your Price" feature—it will ask airlines to match your price below the published fares. This comes at the risk of your price not being accepted, car rental phoenix az and you do not get to choose the carrier or flight time.
TripAdvisor: car rental phoenix az Specializes in entire trip planning, but also offers comprehensive flight information. Provides car rental phoenix az up-to-date and detailed reviews and tips from recent travelers. However, never offered the cheapest fares.
Note that there are other tools out there for booking your flight. Sometimes, the cheapest tickets are available only on the websites of the airlines themselves (in fact, Southwest is not included in any of the above sites). And you can always try your luck with a good, old-fashioned travel agent; chances are, they know what they re doing better than you. Bottom line: buying airline tickets is no different than buying any other product. Don t get the first one your see; shop around.