The 10 Best (and Worst) Airfare Search Sites for 2024

Aggregator

This year’s new #1 is a comeback story. Knocked from its formerly perennial perch at the top spot in 2019, by last year it had drifted to #6. Now Momondo is back on top, perhaps because of something to do with its merger with corporate cousin Kayak. (You now get exactly the same results from both Kayak and Momondo, but since Kayak leads its list with a “sponsored result” ad and Momondo’s design is easier on the eyes, Momondo gets top billing.)

Momondo secured the best price a whopping six times, the second-best four times, and only dipped below average rates twice. Beyond price, Momondo has by far the most complete set of filters in the business, including a “Booking sites” list so you can weed out the results from shady OTAs, and it offers 13 ways to sort the results (compared to 3–8 elsewhere). You can even select or exclude aircraft types. The one filter that sets Momondo apart is the ability to select how many carry-on and checked bags you will bring so it can fold those fees into the price quotes. Only Kiwi and Google, way down at # 7 and #10 respectively, give you the same option, but the base airfares on those aren’t as low as they are on Momondo.

Momondo has transitioned from pure aggregator (matchmaking customers with travel sellers) to include its own OTA selling its own tickets. It’s transparent about that, and you have to turn on this direct booking option in the filters sidebar.

Momondo’s results screen is one of the most complete in the business. It offers a ton of intel at a glance, including bar graphs showing the relative cost of flying a week and a half to either side of your chosen dates (if you mouse over the columns, you’ll see actual prices). When you click its dropdown to see the flights offered by various sellers—including ones sold directly by the airlines—Momondo helpfully indicates each booking agent’s average customer rating.

Like Skyscanner, Momondo produces initial popup booking calendars that color codes each day to indicate the cheapest, median, and priciest days to fly in those months. Momondo also offers “Fare insights,” a popup of graphs and charts showing price trends over time for any given city pair, bracketing the overall ticket costs and advising how far out to book to snag the best deals. It’s like having an expert travel agent right there.

Momondo’s downsides? It can be a bit slow, and CheapOAir beats it (and everyone else) on last-minute fares. Other than that, you really don’t need to visit any other site.

This year, Momondo is the #1 place for airfares on the internet.

Pros: Solid results overall; can include baggage fees in prices; nifty fare calendar graph shows average prices for a wide date range; “Flight insights” feature offers price trend breakdowns for your city pair; “when to buy” advice; compares pricing from multiple OTAs/airline sites; open-ended “Anywhere” option

Cons: Only average performance on last-minute fares; a bit slow; some OTA sellers it finds may be unfamiliar, so you may need to check reputations before purchasing