Finding the Cheapest Route When You Travel Across an Ocean

Can You Game the System to Find Cheap Plane Tickets?

When you purchase international plane tickets that will take you across an ocean, the cost will often come out to more than any other purchase during your vacation.

Even if you score an ultra-cheap economy ticket and take nothing more than a small backpack on the plane, costs these days for “cheap” plane tickets often top more than a few hundred dollars when you’re crossing an ocean.

During the COVID pandemic, it was possible to get tickets really, really cheap, even across the ocean. In the years immediately before the pandemic began, it was also possible to score tickets for just a few hundred dollars, even if you were flying across the Pacific or Atlantic Ocean.

I originally planned to travel to Paris for a few days in March, the same year the pandemic began, but all my plans were cancelled due to the lockdowns. Not only was my Airbnb with a view of the Eiffel Tower cancelled, but my awesome $300 direct international flight ticket from Los Angeles to Paris was also cancelled.

Unfortunately, most of the tickets you’ll find these days are much more expensive – even if you fly on a low-cost carrier. If you plan on flying premium economy or business, you’ll often find stratospheric costs for your flights if you compare today’s rates to those from the last decade.

However, all is not lost. There are some interesting methods you can use to find cheaper tickets. Using a site like Expedia can help you get a good idea of the different carriers that serve your destination, but that initial search is really just the first step.

If you dedicate a few hours to your search, you’ll definitely have the opportunity to find cheaper tickets, and it’s often a case of finding a different route or considering a layover. Let’s dig a little deeper into the process of finding a less expensive flight.

(note: some of the links here are to websites with which I am an affiliate, and your purchases help fund my website!)

Getting to Know Flight Routes to Your Destination

One of the most valuable hours you can spend when planning your international itinerary is getting to know the different flight routes that serve the country you want to visit.

When you conduct a search, you’ll usually see all the major airlines that offer flights on the route, but you’ll need to sort the results in different ways to get the best picture of the available flights.

Try sorting by factors like the length of travel, number of stops, and cost. These are usually the factors you’ll consider when making your final choice for your flight. However, you may also find it helpful to check out the different departure times, as well as whether those airlines also use any nearby airports, too.

When I conduct a search from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), I also usually check out departures from nearby airports like Burbank, Ontario, John Wayne, and Long Beach. You never know when an airline will offer a really cheap flight from an alternative airport.

I used to fly JetBlue regularly, before they were a huge airline that was aiming to buy Spirit Airlines, and they only flew out of Long Beach Airport, a smaller airport that’s about 20 minutes south of LAX.

I flew regularly from Long Beach to JFK in New York and later to Logan in Boston, visiting my parents when they lived on the other side of the country. JetBlue even had pretty liberal carry-on rules then, too, so I never had to pay to check luggage.

A flight on Delta or United would cost upwards of $500 at the time, but I could often get JetBlue fares across the country for about $250 – and that’s during the winter holiday season, too. Now, JetBlue also serves LAX, but their prices are, on average, much higher and usually fall in line with the bigger carriers (although, JetBlue seems like a giant airline these days; definitely not as humble as they once were).

Back then (like mid to late-2000s), a flight on Delta or United would cost upwards of $500, but I could often get JetBlue fares across the country for about $190 – and that’s during the winter holiday season, too.

However, all is not lost. A little searching can still help you find less expensive tickets – the only tradeoff is that you might need to drive a little further to reach the airport for your departure or at your destination.

Comparing Different Dates and Routes

Another option that can help you find a much cheaper ticket is looking at different days of the week. There’s no guarantee that a certain day of the week will be cheaper than another, so you usually need to conduct multiple searches for various dates to check on various fares.

Some airline websites and aggregate search websites actually have a grid-style search, where you’ll see different fares on different dates. If you’ve already done some planning for your international itinerary, you might find yourself backing things up by a few days or pushing things forward, so you can score a cheaper ticket.

I’ll often conduct multiple searches on different websites within one browser window, where I’ll have something like 40 tabs open for various searches. If you keep the tabs open for each of your searches (not just airlines, but hotels and activities too), you’ll find that you can hop over to those other tabs and figure out whether the other parts of your itinerary will fit with alternative flight dates.

When I create my itineraries, I usually book everything at the same time. However, you can definitely book things early if you find a refundable activity or a hotel stay with free cancellation or changes.

Since your plane tickets will often cost more than any other single facet of your trip, basing the rest of your itinerary on the least expensive tickets is definitely a move you may want to consider, unless your travel dates are set in stone because of a particular activity or event (like a destination wedding).

Changing Your Itinerary Significantly For Cheaper Tickets

Putting all the elements of your vacation itinerary together are mildly difficult when you’re booking hotels, flights, activities, and trying to find taxis, places to eat, and domestic travel options.

However, you may find it helpful to conduct searches into other major airports in the country where you’re traveling. If you’re headed to the British Isles for a few weeks, don’t just look at Heathrow – there is actually a secondary major airport in London (Gatwick), as well as some small airports, too.

Further, if you’re headed to England, Scotland, and Wales, and plan on taking the ferry over to Ireland, too, don’t just assume you should fly in and out of Heathrow. Check out flights into Edinburgh and Dublin, too. Maybe your itinerary that starts in London right now will eventually end in London instead.

I’ve actually found some really affordable tickets into Dublin, so it’s definitely a location you want to consider if you’re spending time in both Ireland and the United Kingdom.

This is where I’ll offer the expertise in my book to you for your itinerary planning. Getting all the facets of your itinerary arranged, booked, and settled is quite a task, but I offer step-by-step instructions in my book to help you. Check it out!

Small Domestic Airlines for Your Destination

When you travel internationally, you usually have up to four different travel options within the country. You can choose from taxis, rental cars, trains, or domestic flights to get you from place to place.

You can even walk, I suppose… I’d actually love to walk across the planet. Wouldn’t that be an amazing experience? So many miles to look forward to in my Zero Shoes.

(I actually wear Zero shoes all the time – exercising, walking, travel, work, everything. I highly recommend barefoot travel! Super comfortable, especially on airplanes, too, where you don’t want bulky shoes)

It definitely depends on the sort of trip you’re planning (like, road trip versus non-road trip), but looking into some domestic flights as part of your itinerary can really help you arrange your primary tickets from home in a different and more affordable way.

I encourage you to look at a list of all the airports in your destination country. Even the tiny little regional airports often have options when it comes to convenient flights. Don’t forget, too, that some activities you book will actually pick you up from the airport, which can make regional airports an even more appealing option for domestic travel.

Examples of Using Domestic Airlines for Better Itineraries

Let’s take the trip I booked to Colombia. We were only there abut eight days, so I had to carefully plan our activities in each city. As I researched where to go and what to see, I settled on visiting Bogota, Medellin, and Cartagena.

If we’d traveled there for something like two or three weeks, I would have added some additional outlying villages and places, but I decided to stick (mostly) to the major attractions throughout the country.

Since Bogota, Medellin, and Cartagena all have international airports, I could have flown into any one of those cities to start our vacation. As it was, I booked a flight that went direct into Bogota, where we stayed for a few days to start.

This is a little different from the approach I took on our Vietnam itinerary, where I was waffling back and forth from flying into Hanoi and starting our travel there versus flying into Ho Chi Min City and immediately taking another flight to a smaller town to begin our travel.

After conducting a search for our international tickets from Los Angeles to Vietnam, it simply made more sense (financially and seat-wise) to book our tickets into Ho Chi Min rather than Hanoi, to start.

So, the name of the game when it comes to getting affordable international tickets?

Search, search, search, search.

Search different airports, days, carriers, and classes. Use every website you can find, from the direct websites of the airlines to the bigger websites that give you all the results.

You never know when a premium economy flight across the ocean will be cheaper into one city than a regular economy flight would be into another. Your searches may not only save you money, but give you the opportunity to upgrade for the same amount of money!

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