For airfare, hotels, cruises, and bundled travel packages, Travel Tuesday is one of the biggest discount days of the entire year.
ABC15 Mornings Anchor Kaley O’Kelley caught up with Christianne Klein, the founder of FoodFamilyTravel.com. She says Travel Tuesday has grown steadily since 2017, when travel companies realized the highest volume of price drops happened immediately after Cyber Monday.
“You’re seeing these huge deals on cruises, on hotels, airlines, a lot of different airfares, and especially to different and interesting destinations."
One of the most surprising bargains this year is a major international deal for Phoenix travelers.
Klein said, “Aer Lingus and also British Airways are offering deals today from Phoenix to Dublin for around $483 round trip.”
For domestic travel, some of the strongest deals she identified include $39 flights to San Diego on Alaska Airlines during spring break, as long as you can travel Saturday, Tuesday, or Wednesday.
Klein says keeping an open mind on travel dates is one of the biggest keys to saving this year.
“By switching that Monday to Tuesday, you can save hundreds of dollars on those flights.”
Her advice includes using what she calls the 30-Day Flex Trick, which means checking an entire month of prices instead of locking into one day.
Klein also recommends searching by price, not destination. She also says Google Flights Explore and Hopper both show airfare drops within the last 48 hours. Both services reveal limited-time-only deals, and they can detect mistake fares, which offer ultra-low prices that only appear briefly when an airline or third-party site accidentally lists a lower cost by mistake.
She recommends checking early and often.
The best time to look is before sunrise.
She also urges Smart Shoppers to download airline ticket smartphone apps and turn on notifications.
Klein also warns shoppers to look out for websites that inflate prices before showing a discount, because some deals may look better than they actually are.
For travelers unsure if a price is truly a deal, she suggests using ChatGPT or similar tools to look at the last six to twelve months of price history. If the current price isn’t the lowest, she says that’s a sign to wait or adjust your travel dates.
Her final piece of advice? “If you’re flexible on price, and you’re flexible on location, and you’re flexible on the date that you’re traveling, you’re gonna have the best deal,” she said.
Check out some of this year's Travel Tuesday deals:
- Avis: Save up to 30% on rental cars and get 15% back as an Amazon gift card. Available to book through Amazon or directly through Avis.com.
- Alaska Airlines: Offering flights for as low as $39 from Phoenix to San Diego on select days through March.
- Booking.com: Save up to 50% on select hotels when you book by Dec. 3.
- Celebrity Cruises: Purchase one full fare, then take 75% off the second guest. The third and fourth guests sail free. Bonus savings available on select dates.
- Expedia: On hotels, save up to 50% on select properties as long as you book by Dec. 2.
- Frontier Airlines: Offering one-way flights for as low as $19 to locations nationwide from Phoenix
- Hawaiian Airlines: Get 30% off with code BF2025.
- Hotels.com: Save half when you book by Dec. 2.
- Hilton: The Hilton Sale: Book by December 15 and save up to 25%.
- Hyatt: Non-members can save up to 25%.
- Marriott Bonvoy: Save 25% when you book by December 2nd.
- Travelocity: Save 30% or more on select hotels when you book by Dec. 3.
- TripAdvisor: If you join TripAdvisor Rewards by Dec. 2, you can get $50 off Things to Do.
