How to Save Time & Money with Google Flights Price Tracker (2024)

• Updated: 10/28/2023
• Janice

Google Flights has two great featuresyou might not be using that could save you significant time and money.

The first—Google Flights Price Tracker—monitors the ups and downs of airfares for you. Idetail six easy stepsto use it to its fullest potential below.

The second—Google Explore—shows all the places you can fly and drive from your origin point. Learn more about it in my article, “Travel Better: How to Best Use Google Flights Explore.”

Google Flights is a top airfare search engine. And it is the first travel planning website many seasoned airline travelers go to research route options and fare prices.

Using theprice tracker toolfoundin Google Flights allows you to follow theups and downs of a specific route or fareby receiving emailed alerts.

Once you see a price you like in an alert, you canbuy your ticket directly from the airline or an OTA(online travel agency)—Google Flights does not sell them.

Though—this works best when you have time before your trip and when you can use the tracker to watch the fare pattern over several weeks or months before deciding to buy.

If you need to purchase a last-minute ticket or even a few weeks out, skip using the tracker. And instead, buy the best ticket price you can find at the time.

As the date of your travel approaches and the supply of available seats shrinks, you can—at best—expect fares to stay flat. It is far more likely that airfares will increase.

1. Go to the Google Flights website.
2. Log into your Google account.
3. Enter your flight information.
4. Customize your search results.
5. Click on the “Track prices” switch.
6. Get your price alerts and updates.

You must log into a Google account for the price tracker feature to display. Google willonly send alerts to the email associated with your Gmailaccount.

If you do not have a Google account, sign up to get one here.

Input your departure and destination airports and travel dates to kick off your search. Also, specify the type of fare (e.g., round-trip, economy, etc.).

Watch the brief video below for a demo.

In the example above, I input a route from Chicago to Rome. Once I enter my return date and click “Done” in the fare calendar, Google auto-generates my fare results page, as shown below.

Although the fares are looking well-priced, I am buying for four people. So, even if I can use the price tracker feature to save $50-100 per ticket, it is worth it.

Before I turn on the price tracker, I want to customize my search to display only flights that meet mytravel needs and preferences.

In my Rome example, I want to find an affordable and shorter-duration flight. We have limited time to travel. So, I would love to avoid spending a chunk of my vacation on a flight with a long connection.

• Number of stops
• Specific airline
• Number of carry-ons or checked bags
• Price: set limits for what you are willing to spend
• Flight times
• Emissions: search for flights with less emissions only
• Layover duration: set time limits for your layover
• Connecting airport: select your preferred connecting airport
• Separate tickets: opt to hide multi-leg tickets booked on different airlines

Because Chicago does not offer non-stop flights to Rome when I want to travel, I am looking forshorter flights with one-stop.

From the filter buttons above, I click “Stops” and select “1 stop or fewer” from the drop-down. And from the “Duration” button, I set the drop-down slider to “under 15h.”

Customizing my search allows me toeliminate 29-hour flightslike the one below. This way, I avoid including fares with unnecessarily long layovers in my tracking results.

Once I click the “Track prices” switch, I receive Gmailalerts for price increases or dipsfor the fares that meet my customized search.

In my example, this will include all flights from Chicago to Rome with one-stop or fewer and under 15 hours.

View the short video below for a demo. Notice the Google notification indicating you will receive price-change emails at the bottom of the screen.

You can also set the tracker fora specific flight.

For example, I can already see from my fare results that I like the United and Lufthansa ticket. The price is affordable, has a shorter duration, and leaves later, which helps me keep the kids in school that day.

Plus, I have the lowest level of elite status on United Airlines. A round-trip ticket to Europe will help me retain my premier standing for next year.

Because the fare is running more expensive than the others, I would like to track it. And ideally, buy it when and if the price falls.

In the video demo below, I show where to turn on the price tracker for a specific ticket. I also show where to adjust “Fare options” to see regular Economy ticket pricing.

Although many travelers prefer to purchase Basic Economy tickets to save money, I find them too restrictive for family travel. So, I pay thepremium for the regular Economy ticketto check bags, bring carry-ons, and select seats.

If you prefer regular economy tickets too, know Google Flights price tracker will alwaysdefault to showing the basic economy farein your tracked results.

To view the regular economy fare, youmust manually select the regular economy ticketfrom “Fare options” each time you look at your tracked results.

Google will sendprice tracker alerts to your Gmailaccount address. You can wait to receive them—or viewtracked activity on your Google Flights main pagewhen you are signed in.

See the brief video demo below for the two places to find your tracked flights.

Tostop receiving updates for a tracked flight, visit the Google Flights main page and view your “Tracked prices” section, shown in the video above. Once on your tracked prices page, click the trash icon to remove the fare you no longer want to follow.

In your “Tracked prices” section, you will also see the price history for your tracked flights.

In my Rome example, my ticket history shows fares were running under $400 just over one month ago, indicating that I should have bought them then.

Looking at the history helps me gauge fare patterns, giving me helpful information to make buying decisions.

Google Flightsdoes not track fare pricing for all carriersand all flights.

You will not see fare pricing for US-based Southwest airlines and a few Asian airline carriers. Find anup-to-date listof airlines not included in Google Flights fare results on Scott’s Cheap Flight’s website.

Depending on your destination, you may need to search for fares on individual carriers to get a complete picture of your travel options.

Google Flights Price Tracker is an excellent time and money-saving fare monitoring tool.

It takes a few minutes to set up. And it works best for travelers who plan their trips with time to spare and can wait out flight price ups and downs before they make their purchase.

If you are looking for moreGoogle travel tools to help you save time and money,check outGoogle Explore,an open-ended fare and travel search.

Use it to scan all the domestic and international fares quickly and easily that you can afford to fly from any departure point—and identify driving trip options for local trips.

Learn more about it in my article, “Travel Better: How to Best Use Google Flights Explore.”

Or read from my collection of other helpful how-to and travel tip articles below:

• Google for Travel: Plan Better with These 8 Tools
• Why You Will Love Google Maps for Trip Planning
• 5 Proven Ways to Simplify and Organize Your Travel Research
• 25 Expert Packing Tips to Help You Travel Better
• Travel Insurance Simplified: 4 Reasons You Need It
• The Top Travel Apps I Use for Better Travel

Or check out my complete collection of travel planning resources on my “How to Plan Better Travel” page.