In this guide8 sections
A good flight price compares well with fares for the same route and trip length on nearby departure dates. On Vollarie, at least 30% below that benchmark is a deal. From the usual price to less than 30% below it is the normal range: a fair price if the trip suits you, but not one to rush for. That 30% line is our rule of thumb, not a market-wide threshold or a prediction of where the price goes next. It covers the ticket only, so bags, stops and getting to the airport can still change the answer.
What counts as a good price
On Vollarie, the benchmark is the usual price: the median of six fares for the same route and trip length, leaving one to six weeks after the trip in question, all checked on the same day. It is not a historical average, and it is not what your exact dates normally cost. It tells you how the fare compares with the next few weeks. You could call it the normal flight price for that route, right now.
| The fare is | What it means |
|---|---|
| Above the usual price | Expensive for these dates. Try another week or another airport if you can. |
| From usual price to less than 30% below | The normal range. Fine to book if your dates are fixed and the trip works, but not a deal. |
| 30% or more below | A deal. Check the itinerary and the total cost promptly. |
Keep the limits in mind. Six nearby dates describe the next few weeks, so a holiday, a weekday pattern or a different itinerary on one of those dates can pull the benchmark up or down. Google Flights uses a related idea with a different method: it says whether prices are low, typical or high compared with past averages for the same route (opens in a new tab). It looks back at past prices, while our benchmark compares departures checked today.
A worked example: €75 to Gran Canaria
On 23 September we found a €75 return from Milan to Gran Canaria, nonstop, for 5–19 November. The usual price for that trip was €129.50. So the fare was 42% below the benchmark, €54.50 under it. By the table above, that is a deal.
Now add what the ticket leaves out. With made-up numbers: a checked bag at €35 each way and €25 to get to and from Malpensa turn €75 into €170. Those costs would be much the same on the benchmark dates, so the fare is still €54.50 under them. Extras change the verdict when you compare different options instead. Say a €95 fare on another airline includes a bag: that costs €95 all in. The €75 fare with two bag fees costs €145. The cheaper ticket is the more expensive trip.
The route matters as much as the number. For a 9–17 November trip from Milan to Porto, the usual price was €63.50. There, the same €75 would have been about 18% above usual.
What changes the verdict
Your travel dates
Even one route has more than one usual price. From Milan to Porto it was €63.50 for a 9–17 November trip, but €95.50 for 28 November–11 December. A few months apart, the gap can be larger, in either direction. For trips of seven or eight nights:
- Manchester–Valencia: €87.50 for 8–16 October, but €136 for 13–20 December, 55% more.
- Milan–Cluj-Napoca: €141.50 for 24 October–1 November, but €76.50 for 29 November–6 December, 46% less.
Comparing with nearby dates takes out some of the season, but holidays and weekdays can still move the benchmark.
Your departure airport
For a week in Santiago de Compostela leaving on 3 December, the usual price was €113 from Paris Orly and €239 from Paris Charles de Gaulle. A €150 fare would have been a deal from Charles de Gaulle, 37% below usual, and about a third above usual from Orly. Between cities the spread is wider: to Porto, the usual fare was around €77 from Milan, Manchester or Rome, and €144–148 from London Gatwick or Stockholm. If you can reach more than one airport, check the usual price from each.
The routing
An extra stop, a long layover or an arrival at an awkward hour can cancel out a low fare. The six benchmark fares are the cheapest on each date, so they can use different airlines or stops from the fare in front of you. We leave out deals with self-transfers, airport changes, overnight connections and very long layovers. You still have to judge the rest.
The total cost
The fare and the usual price are both ticket prices, usually without extras such as checked bags. Add bags, seats and the journey to the airport before you compare two options, as in the worked example.
When a fare may be worth booking
A large gap is a reason to check the itinerary promptly, not a prediction that the price will rise. Book when the dates and the total cost work for you. Keep comparing if your plans are flexible.
If your plans are fixed, a fare in the normal range is reasonable, and a deal is worth taking once the itinerary checks out. I booked an August trip from Milan to Bangkok this way. August is peak season for European travellers, so I started checking about five months ahead, mostly to learn what a normal fare looked like. By three or four months out I knew the range. About three months before departure a return with one stop came in under it, at about €720, and I booked. Outside the holidays I can find the same route at around €550, so €720 was a good price only for August.
If your plans are flexible, keep comparing before you pay:
- Look at nearby weeks. Our deal pages list fares for nearby departure weeks when we have them.
- Check other airports you can reach.
- Set an alert, so you don’t have to check every day.
How to work out the usual price yourself
- Search your route for the trip length you want, for example seven nights.
- Note the cheapest return fare for five or six departure dates spread over the following six weeks.
- Sort the fares and take the middle value. With six fares, average the middle two. That is your usual price.
- Compare your fare with it, using the table above.
Nearby dates take out some seasonal differences, but holidays and weekdays can still move the result. Google Flights’ date grid and price graph (opens in a new tab) make the searching quick. The price graph shows fares by week or month, and Google’s low, typical or high label compares them with past averages. That is price history. The usual price compares nearby departures checked on the same day.
Fares we observed
We observed these fares in our feed on 24 September 2026. Each row shows the usual price we had for it and when we last checked the fare. Prices and seats change between a search and a booking, and bags or other extras can raise the total, so confirm the final price, with the bags you need, on the booking site before you pay.
| Route | Fare found | Usual price | Below usual |
|---|---|---|---|
| Milan → Porto9–17 Nov · nonstop · checked 21 SeptMore deals: Portugal from Milan | €41 | €63.50 | −35%€22.50 less |
| Milan → Gran Canaria5–19 Nov · nonstop · checked 23 SeptMore deals: Spain from Milan | €75 | €129.50 | −42%€54.50 less |
| London Gatwick → Agadir12–21 Dec · nonstop · checked 19 SeptMore deals: Morocco from Gatwick | €51 | €127.50 | −60%€76.50 less |
| Stockholm → Muscat3–10 Dec · 1 stop · checked 22 SeptMore deals: Oman from Stockholm | €243 | €482.50 | −50%€239.50 less |
| Amsterdam → Atlanta1–9 Nov · 1 stop · checked 19 SeptMore deals: United States from Amsterdam | €373 | €596 | −37%€223 less |
| London Stansted → São Paulo7–22 Nov · 1 stop · checked 24 SeptMore deals: Brazil from Stansted | €718 | €1,255 | −43%€537 less |
€41 to Porto and €718 to São Paulo are both deals, even though one costs more than seventeen times the other. And the biggest percentage is not always the biggest gap in euros: Agadir was 60% below its usual price, €76.50 under it, while Atlanta was 37% below and €223 under it.
When we have enough comparison data, each deal on our live deals page shows the same three numbers: the fare, the usual price and how far below it the fare is.
What our deal data shows
Across the 1,713 deals in our feed with a usual price, the median fare was 47% below it, and half were between 37% and 58% below. The largest gaps were about 75%, on eight short-haul routes such as Vienna–Kraków (€30 against €119.50). That is also our ceiling, because we don’t show a usual price more than four times the fare. The largest gap in euros was Istanbul–Medellín, with two stops: €805 against €2,270.50.
The usual price itself depends heavily on where you are going:
Our method and its limits
Vollarie watches hundreds of routes from the airports you choose and emails you when a fare is far below its usual price. For this guide we took every deal in our feed on 24 September 2026, 2,026 in total. Of these, 1,713 (85%) had a usual price. The regional figures use the 1,399 of those priced in euros from European airports. The season and airport examples compare individual trips from the same feed. The fares we feature are all at least 30% below their usual price. How it works explains how the usual price appears beside each deal.
The usual price is a same-day, nearby-date benchmark: the median of six fares for the same route and trip length, leaving one to six weeks after the featured trip. It is not a historical average, and not the price for the featured dates. Fares often rise as departure gets closer, so later dates tend to be cheaper, which usually makes our discounts smaller. Not always: a holiday, a different weekday or a different itinerary on a comparison date can move the benchmark either way.
We show a usual price only when we trust it. At least three comparison fares have to come back. The usual price has to be at least 15% above the fare, and no more than four times it. Our own check of the deal’s dates also has to roughly match the advertised fare. If any of those fails, the deal appears without a usual price, and you can work one out with the steps above. A few of those deals still show a percentage. It comes from where we found the fare, such as Google Flights’ comparison with its own average or the site that first reported the deal. It is not our benchmark, so treat it as a hint.
The limits:
- This is one day’s snapshot of deals we chose to publish, not every fare on every route. It shows what a deal looks like, not how often one appears.
- Six dates describe the next few weeks, not a full year.
- The long-haul groups are small, so treat those medians as rough guides.
- The season and airport examples are a few trips each. They show that the usual price moves, not how much it moves on average.
- The 1,713 deals cover 1,172 routes, and some appear more than once. Counting each route once gives a median of 46% below usual (not 47%), and €153 within Europe (not €148).
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