5 step strategy on using Skyscanner to find cheap flights

Updated March 2024

This post is all about Finding Cheap Flights Using Skyscanner.

Cheap flights are the backbone to budget travel and Skyscanner is my go-to for finding cheap flights. Skyscanner is basically a travel search engine, which searches hundreds of airlines and travel agencies to bring you all the options in one place. They also don't just stop at flights, you can also use Skyscanner to find accommodation deals and car rental deals. I've been using Skyscanner for over a decade now and I swear by it, it's where I book 99.9% of my flights. Over the years, I've managed to find some incredible flight deals and I've found that majority of the time it is cheaper than going direct to the airlines or travel agencies. So, here's my exact five step strategy on how I use Skyscanner to find my own cheap flights and how you can use it to find yours!

This post covers Finding Cheap Skyscanner Flights.

Step One: 'Explore Everywhere' Feature

To find cheap flights on Skyscanner, I would recommend not picking a specific destination and instead using their 'explore everywhere' feature. When you go to choose your destination in the 'to' section, it should give you a drop-down menu allowing you to select the 'explore everywhere' feature.

You'll also get the option for a multi-city search feature, this is a fantastic travel tool and perfect if you are going to be flying to an airport that is different from the one you will be flying back from. For example, I used this to book a flight to Quito in Ecuador and a return flight from Lima in Peru. Sometimes, this can even work out cheaper or not that more expensive than flying to and returning from the same destination. Definitely worth a try!

Once you have selected the 'explore everywhere' feature and hit search, then you will be provided with a list of possible countries you could travel too, the cheapest country will be first on the list.

The list of possible travel destinations you could fly too.

Even when you click on the country of choice, you'll get another drop-down list of the possible destinations within that country you could travel too, their price and whether they are direct or have stop-overs. They'll also provide you with an accommodation cost too, if you are interested in booking this through Skyscanner.

I cannot recommend using the 'explore everywhere' feature enough, I've used it loads and I've managed to find incredibly cheap flight deals over the years!!

Possible destinations within Ireland that I could travel too.

Step Two: 'Whole Month' View

If you can be flexible on your travel dates, then you need to use Skyscanner's whole month view for finding cheap flights. Instead of searching for specific dates, you will be able to check the flight prices to your destination over the entire month allowing you to find and select the cheapest flights.

You can switch to searching a full month by clicking on the departure date and switching from specific dates to 'whole month' view.

You'll then be able to select any month within the current year or into next year.

You'll know you are searching in whole month view when your departure and return date are a month rather than specific dates.

Once you hit search, Skyscanner will then give you a months view of flight prices to your destination. You'll select your departure flight first then you'll select your return date, the prices may adjust when you select your departure flight. Using the example below, I could book flights to Marseille from Glasgow on the 14th June (left hand side) and returning on the 21st June (right-hand side) for £46 return, which is the cheapest flights in that month.

Skyscanner used to have an amazing feature, which allowed you to search for the cheapest flights over the whole year. I loved this feature and was so gutted to find out it had been removed from their website. However, from doing some research on Google, I found out that Skyscanner are planning on bringing this feature back. So stay tuned! Fingers crossed they do!

Step Three: Include Stop-Overs

This is a controversial one because there's people out there who will be hell bent on flying direct to their destination and won't even consider a stop-over in their travel plans and that's fair enough, just skip this step and go onto the next one! However, if you really want to find those unbelievably cheap flights, then you'll really want to consider including stop-overs.

To include stop overs in your Skyscanner search, then make sure you have unchecked the direct flight box. This means you will get a list of possible countries you can travel too (like you did in step one of this blog post) but they will include stop-overs to find the cheapest flight.

The direct flight box has to be unchecked like this.

The feature can make a huge difference in price, especially on long-haul flights! For the example below, a flight from London to New Delhi direct costs £519. However, if you include a stop-over it would cost £339, that's a saving of £180. You just have to work out whether it's worth it to you!

Left-hand side are direct flight prices and right-hand side includes stop-overs.

Step Four: Try Various Departure Airports

If you live in an area where there are multiple airports you could fly from, then make sure you are searching them all to find the best flight deal. You could find that one of the airports has got cheaper flights than the other. For example, I live closer to Glasgow airport, however I'm only an hour from Edinburgh and it usually has cheaper flights so I tend to search both airports when trying to find cheap flights.

For example in the pictures below, to fly from Glasgow to Dubrovnik direct in September is £351, whereas to fly from Edinburgh to Dubrovnik direct is £212. That's a saving of £139 and a train ticket/bus ticket for me to get from Glasgow to Edinburgh is approx £10, so it's definitely worth it.

Direct flight prices from Glasgow to Dubrovnik on the left-hand side and Edinburgh to Dubrovnik on the right-hand side.

You'll just have to make sure that it doesn't cost a fortune for you to travel to the airport you've selected as then the cheap flight wouldn't be worth it. Also, make sure you research whether there will be transport links to/from your airport at the time you are supposed to arrive or depart as this could also eat into the cheap flight price, especially if you end up having to get a taxi. This happened to me when I flew from Barcelona to Glasgow Prestwick Airport (which is about 40-mins from Glasgow). We didn't arrive at Glasgow Prestwick until about 11pm or midnight and by that point all the public transport had stopped and our only option was to pay for a taxi up to Glasgow, which was so expensive making our cheap flight not worth it!

You can sign up for price alerts, which will notify you if your flight has increased or decreased in price usually on a daily/weekly basis. However, this feature only works once you have selected your specific destination and specific dates. So, make sure you do steps 1-4 on this list to find out all that information first.

It's worth noting that this feature only works on desktop and not the mobile version of Skyscanner. Once you have searched for your flight on your desktop, then you will get the option to 'get price alerts' on the left hand side of your screen.

Once you click on this, you'll be able to select whether you sign up for your price alert through email, google or facebook/apple and you will start receiving your price alerts on a regular basis to whichever one you select.

Let me know in the comments below if you manage to find any super cheap flights using Skyscanner!

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Kirsty x