Using the plus or minus a few days is one of the oldest tricks in the book being used by constant travelers when booking airline tickets. Searching flights using flexible travel dates is the best. However, because new regulations have been in place by the US DOT, some airline and travel websites have made changes which affected this trick. If you look at the numbers, a lot of airline ticket buyers ignore these flexible searches. Maybe they just need to fly on those set dates or whatnot but whatever the reason, they need to realize that they can save up to hundreds of dollars by flying one or two days later or earlier than what was planned originally or maybe even postponing a particular trip. So before you go any further and read out the options you have in searching for flexible date fares, make sure you are really open and able to change the dates of your trip.
In Travelocity’s website (travelocity.com), before January 2012, they had a function that allows you to search a 330 day flexibility in travel dates. This function has been deactivated because of the new regulations but they still have a minus and plus flexible search option between 1 to three days.
Cheapair (website is cheapair.com) is another website that offers this function and is possibly the only website that allows you to search for flexible travel dates for a maximum of 330 days ahead. Of course, the estimated price you get is not going to be entirely accurate because they only place in estimates of the fees and taxes but it is good to have a bit of an idea on how much you will be paying for a trip you are still planning a long way ahead. Also, this 330- day option is only for domestic flights.
Orbitz (orbitz.com) also had one of those useful flexible search functions that can extend for up to 30 days. However, like the one previously offered by Cheapair, they have some limitations such as the fact that some airline are excluded in the search function (the airline being Allegiant, Southwest Airlines, Ryanair to name a few) and a lot of international flights are excluded from this tool too. All you have to do is search the link that says “flexible dates”which is located at the blue box in the site’s lower left corner and then just choose one out of three options. Cheaptickets (cheaptickets.com) is owned and managed by Orbit and since they pretty much use the same program, most of the time you will get the exact same results as Orbitz. As for Hotwire (hotwire.com), it also has 30 day increments in their flexible date search tool but they have one other advantage: using this tool will allow you to view Hotwire’s consolidator fares. These fares are most of the time great deals, especially if the7 up to 21 day of advance purchase does not apply to your booking.
There are other websites that offer you similar tools and functions but so far these are my favorites. Do check them out.