Is there a best day to get the lowest price on a flight?

有没有买到最便宜机票的最佳办法？

Many travelers think the magic day is Tuesday, long lauded¹ by travel deal sites and various publications, including this one, for its fare sales. Other travelers may have heard pundits² declare Wednesday the ideal day. In December, Expedia and the Airlines Reporting Corporation, which processes ticket transactions for airlines and travel agencies, announced that weekends are the new best time.

很多旅行者认为周二是购买便宜机票的绝佳日子。长期以来，周二得到了旅行交易网站和各种出版物的赞美（包括本刊）。还有些旅行者可能听到权威人士宣布周三是最理想的日子。去年12月，为航空公司和旅行社处理机票业务的艾派迪(Expedia)和航空报告公司(the Airlines Reporting Corporation)宣布，周末成为了新的最佳时机。

But is there really a preferred day to buy?

但是，真有更适合买机票的日子吗？

“I just want to drive a stake through the heart of that myth,” said George Hobica, the founder⁴ of the deal alert site Airfarewatchdog.com, who has been looking at airfares on popular routes every day for more than 20 years, with the rare exception of a vacation where he doesn’t have Internet access.

交易提醒网站Airfarewatchdog.com的创始人乔治·霍比卡(George Hobica)说：“我真想戳破这种故弄玄虚的说法。”20多年来，除了极少数时候在度假无法上网，他每天都在关注热门航线的票价。

There are too many variables at play for there to be a universally ideal day to buy an airline ticket. Price depends on a variety of factors, including the route; the level of competition on the route; surrounding holidays and events (like a convention or the Super Bowl); and the days of the week you plan to fly. During a single week in March, for example, a recent search for a round-trip flight between New York and Miami turned up ticket prices as low as $174 and as high as $314. Besides, nowadays we have fare calendars at our fingertips and websites such as Kayak and Travelzoo that alert us to low fares and sales — and those sales don’t always take place on the same day of the week.

机票价格波动的原因太多，没有哪天一定是买票的最佳日子。价格取决于很多因素，包括航线；那条航线的竞争水平；是否在假日和赛事前后（比如某个大会或超级碗[Super Bowl]）；你计划飞行的日子是星期几。比如，前不久我查的时候发现，在3月的同一周里，从纽约到迈阿密的往返机票的价格最低174美元，最高314美元。另外，如今我们随时都能查机票价格日历，还有Kayak和Travelzoo这样的网站向我们推送低价票和特价票——特价票不一定总是在一周中的某个日子。

Mr. Hobica pointed⁵ out, for instance, that on a recent Thursday, Virgin⁶ Atlantic lowered nonstop winter flights to Heathrow Airport in London from John F. Kennedy International Airport or Newark Liberty International Airport to about $504 round-trip. Economy fares had been running $900, Mr. Hobica said, then $800, then they went back up, and after that they dipped to around $680.

比如，霍比卡指出，在前不久的一个周四，维珍大西洋航空(Virgin Atlantic)把从肯尼迪国际机场(John F. Kennedy International Airport)或纽瓦克自由国际机场(Newark Liberty International Airport)到伦敦希思罗机场(Heathrow Airport)的冬季直飞往返航班的价格降至约504美元。霍比卡说，经济舱的机票本来是900美元，后来降到800美元，后来有所回升，之后跌至约680美元。

Airlines (and the above example is but one of many) are perpetually tweaking prices, making predictions difficult. Expedia said as much in its report. Even though its latest research asserts that weekends have the best fares, consumers who spot a good deal on Thursday shouldn’t wait until Saturday to buy it with the hope that the price will tumble even further. “If you find a fare that looks like a good deal, grab it,” the report said, “regardless of the day of week.”

航空公司（上面讲的例子很常见）一直在微调票价，所以预测起来很困难。艾派迪在自己的报告中也是这样说。尽管它的最新调查表明，周末的票价最优惠，但是如果你在周四发现了很便宜的机票，不要想着周六价格会进一步下跌，等那时候再买。报告说：“如果你找到了一个看起来不错的价格，那就赶紧买，不管你是在星期几发现的。”

In addition to recommending the best times of the week to book, Expedia and other sites such as FareCompare publish suggestions about how far in advance of a trip to book to score the lowest fare. For instance, Expedia reported in December that the optimal⁷ time to buy an economy ticket for travel in North America is 57 days in advance, resulting in a potential savings⁸ of about 10 percent versus⁹ the average fare. Recommended lead times for travel to international destinations, including Europe and Asia-Pacific, were even longer.

艾派迪和FareCompare等网站除了在报告中推荐一周中预订机票的最佳日子，还就提前多久能买到最便宜的机票给出了建议。艾派迪的报告称，12月份时，在北美旅行买经济舱机票的最佳时机是提前57天，可能会比平均票价低约10%。报告还建议，前往国际目的地的话——包括前往欧洲和亚太地区——要提前更长时间预订。

Travelers shouldn’t think of predictions as rules, though. There are flights to Asia, for example, that are $500 cheaper when booked at the last minute as opposed to months in advance, Mr. Hobica said.

不过，旅行者不应该把预测当做规则。霍比卡说，有些前往亚洲的航班，在最后时刻预订比提前数月预订便宜500美元。

And talking about the “average fare” isn’t necessarily helpful because that doesn’t take into account the quality of a flight. Is it nonstop or does it have a 34-minute connection in a busy, sprawling¹⁰ airport like Atlanta? Is it an 18-hour layover in Dallas that will require you to spend an additional $300 in hotel bills and meals? Are you flying in an aisle¹¹ seat in a Dreamliner or in the middle seat in a MD-80? And if that cheap ticket you found is on a discount airline like Spirit or Frontier, chances are you’ll have to budget another $30 to $100 to check a bag. In other words, you probably don’t want the average fare.

另外，谈论“平均票价”不一定有帮助，因为那没把航班品质计算进去。是直飞航班还是需要在一个繁忙庞大的机场（比如亚特兰大机场）中转34分钟？是否需要在达拉斯中途停留18个小时（这就需要再300美元住店和用餐）？是梦幻客机上一个靠近过道的座位，还是MD-80上的一个中间座位？如果你找到的便宜机票是精神航空(Spirit)或边疆航空(Frontier)等廉价航空公司的机票，那么你很可能需要再花30美元至100美元托运行李。换句话说，你很可能不想要平均价格的机票。

If you want to sit next to your companion, be a safe distance from the bathroom, put your bag in an overhead compartment¹² instead of the belly of the plane, and have enough time to make a connection, what you really want are good fares that may not be the absolute cheapest, but give you the experience you want.

如果你想和同伴坐在一起，离卫生间足够远，把行李放在行李架上而非机舱腹部，有足够的时间转机，那么你真正想要的是能给你带来你想要的体验的好机票，而不一定是最便宜的机票。

So how do you find these fares?

那么你该如何找到这些机票呢？

Almost every major airline (Delta, United, JetBlue) has a good flexible date search option on its website that you can use to see which travel dates will get you the lowest prices, along with the time and comforts you need.

几乎所有的大型航空公司（比如达美航空[Delta]，美国联合航空公司[United]和捷蓝航空[JetBlue]）的网站都提供非常灵活的日期搜索选项，你可以看看在哪些日子旅行机票最便宜并且符合你想要的时间和舒适条件。

To search multiple airlines at once, there’s Google Flights, which has simple calendars that allow users to easily see if they can save by flying a day or two earlier or later. The tool offers tips to that end. During a recent flight search for New York to Cancún, a message appeared saying that if I adjusted the travel dates by a few days, I could save $246. While the site has international and domestic flight information for nearly every airline, you won’t find Southwest there, so be sure to look at the airline’s own fare calendar on its website.

要想同时搜索好几家航空公司，你可以用Google Flights，它有简单的日历，用户能够轻松看到提前或推迟一两天旅行能否省钱。这个工具提供这方面的提示。前不久，我在搜索从纽约到坎昆的航班时，弹出一条消息说，如果把旅行日期调整几天，能省246美元。虽然该网站提供几乎所有航空公司的国际和国内航班信息，但是不包括西南航空(Southwest)，所以你必须去这家公司自己的网站上查看它的机票价格日历。

To keep abreast¹³ of private sales and low fares (as well as hotel deals), you can search or sign up for alerts on Airfarewatchdog.com. Email alerts include low fares for a particular route that interests you, or all of the affordable¹⁴ round-trip flights departing from your local airport.

为了了解私人出售和低票价（以及酒店优惠）的最新情况，你可以在Airfarewatchdog.com网站上搜索或者申请提醒。电子邮件提醒包括你感兴趣的某个航线的低价票，或者从你所在地出发的所有的便宜往返机票。

Because prices are constantly fluctuating, keep checking airline websites and Google Flights to see the latest fares. The ticket price you see before lunch may be different a couple of hours later.

因为价格经常变化，所以你要不断查看航空公司的网站和Google Flights，以了解最新票价。你在午饭前看到的价格可能跟几个小时后的不一样。

Even after you buy a ticket, you still have a chance to save. If you go to My.yapta.com/airline-refunds, you can sign up to receive free notifications if your ticket price drops. (TripIt Pro³ has a similar service though it’s part of an annual $49 membership.) With Yapta, if the price drop is greater than the cost of your airline’s change fee, you can call the airline and pocket the difference. If the price drops and you booked your ticket within 24-hours, you can simply cancel the ticket free of charge and rebook at the new, lower rate. And if the price on the ticket you purchased goes up? You have something even better: the satisfaction of knowing you nabbed a deal.

即便在买完机票之后，也有机会省钱。你可以去My.yapta.com/airline-refunds网站申请票价下跌的免费提醒（TripIt Pro也有类似的服务，不过它是49美元年费所含的一项服务）。如果你通过Yapta发现票价下降的钱数比改签费还多，那么你可以给航空公司致电改签，省出差价。如果是在预订后24小时内发现降价，可以免费退票，重新以较低的价格预订。那如果你买的机票涨价了呢？那就更好了：为捡着便宜而偷着乐吧。