$2000 one day, $8000 the next: Why airfares vary so much from day to day
A reader recently sent me an email with an alarming attachment. It shows the cost of an economy class ticket with Japan’s ANA in November 2023, return from Sydney to Paris.
Flying out on Sunday, November 5 and returning on Sunday November 26 would cost $2162, but flying out the previous day, Saturday November 4, and returning on that same Sunday in late November would cost a whopping $8002.
An economy class ticket to Paris with ANA could cost as much as 270 per cent more if you choose the wrong day to fly. Credit: Bloomberg
That’s an increase of 270 per cent. How is that even possible? A little extra research shows a very different picture. Fly out one week later, on Saturday November 11, and return on Sunday November 26 and the price drops massively, to $2371.
The conclusions you might draw from this – for example that this November, Sunday is the cheapest day to fly economy from Sydney to Paris, Friday and Saturday are the most expensive – do not apply to other airlines operating Sydney-Paris flights in the same month.
For the same economy class Sydney-Paris return flights in November, Singapore Airlines is charging between $2522 and $3785. That’s a difference of less than 50 per cent, vastly different from the price fluctuation of flying with ANA in the same month.
Fares for flights from Sydney to Paris with ANA in November.
How airlines set prices
Once upon a time, the price an airline charged you for a ticket depended on whether you were travelling in high, shoulder or low season. Today that price depends on a huge number of variables including how far in advance you buy that ticket, competition on a particular route, the number of seats available on a flight, the demand for those seats, the day and even the time of day when you choose to fly.
A holiday season or a special event – a Taylor Swift concert, the 2024 Paris Olympics – will cause a bump in demand for air travel, and since those events are anticipated, prices will be set higher.
These are just some of the factors that combine to cause ticket prices to change quickly and, to the consumer, unpredictably. Unless the passenger sitting next to you is travelling on the same booking, the chance they paid the same fare as you is close to zero.
Airline ticket prices are set by revenue managers whose job is to analyse and predict the demand for each individual flight and adjust prices according to that demand to earn maximum revenue for the airline.
To that end, they rely on a vast trove of data, historical as well as predictive. Ticket prices are generally released 11 months in advance and the availability of seats is constantly monitored to allow adjustments to be made in real time, moving them up or down according to demand and availability.
In the case of the ANA ticket from Sydney to Paris, it’s likely that the airline has very few seats available on the first and second Fridays in November and the first Saturday, and that would explain the extraordinary price.
Looking at a single airline’s prices for your intended route and dates is unlikely to help you find the best deal. You’re better off using a search engine that canvasses multiple airlines over a nominated period.
One of the most informative is Skyscanner’s ‘whole month’ search tool, which looks for the cheapest day to travel to any destination according to the months of outward and return journeys.
Skyscanner’s monthly guide to airfares for November.
Key in your dates and select “whole month”, choose the chart display rather than the calendar and you get a neat graphic showing the cheapest dates for outward and return journeys.
In the case of a Sydney-Paris flight in November, Wednesday is consistently a less expensive day to start your travels while weekend departures cost more.
The information for return dates is more sketchy, it only becomes clearer as more data becomes available closer to the date of travel – but Tuesdays get a tick. It’s a very different story from the ANA results.
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