a white cell phone with a search engine

These are like the best new features, ever…

Everyone thinks they know the best places to search for flights, and if you actually know, you say Google Flights. Not on a Tuesday at midnight, or after lightning strikes, in fact any time is just fine. The interface may look simple, but there’s a handful of features which make finding amazing flight deals, or filtering out the ones that get your hopes up easier than operating a Nespresso machine. Google Flights just added two cool new features, and you should really use them…

Beautiful sakura cherry blossom light up and Tokyo Tower landmark at Chidorigafuchi TokyoYou Can Give Google Flights A Budget

And it will show you the world. Or at least the parts you can afford.

Want to travel on your birthday, don’t care where, but have a strict budget? No problem. Google has expanded its inspiration tool, with a budget slider. You simply enter your starting point and your travel dates and Google Flights will show you prices for every destination. Who knows, maybe a place half way around the world is cheaper than half way across the state? In fact, it probably is.

a screenshot of a mapTo use this new Google Flights feature, simply head to Google Flights, and then tap the menu in the left hand corner to press “Explore Map”. This works on desktop, but if you’d like it to work on mobile tap the “share” menu icon at the browser navigation area on your Apple or the browser menu bar on Android to switch to the desktop site version.a screenshot of a phone

The slider will appear and you can start finding your next great journey based entirely on the budget you set. These days, who knows how low, or far, you can go?

a white cell phone with a screen showing flight informationYou Get An Idea Of How Good (Or Bad) A Deal Is

Unless you’re already using some of your flight deal wizard skills and tracking flights, it’s hard for most people to know what’s actually a good deal. Google Flights now helps with that.

a screenshot of a flight scheduleWhen you search for a flight, you’ll get a “hot or cold” slider which gives a ballpark based on historical data of whether this is a scorching flight deal, about average, or way worse than usual. If you want it now, switch your location to USA at the bottom of Google Flights on desktop, or in the top left menu bar on mobile.

This is a great way to book with more confidence, knowing that prices are around as low as they’ve ever been, or if they’re higher than usual and you should maybe wait. Google started rolling this new feature out months ago, and it’s definitely been tweaked for the better. They crunch a lot of flight data, so expect it to be pretty accurate.

Gilbert Ott

Gilbert Ott is an ever curious traveler and one of the world's leading travel experts. His adventures take him all over the globe, often spanning over 200,000 miles a year and his travel exploits are regularly...

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