Best strategies for getting flights from the US to Paris

If you live close to an airport served by Air France, sign up for their newsletter to see when they have sales.

Check your local airport for what direct routes are on offer, or the best alternative. Then monitor for sales from the specific airline. I start searching about five months out, usually purchase about three months out.
You might consider if you have any points with any airlines, or if you have time to get a credit card and rack up some points, if thats is something that could help you upgrade.

Make sure you're getting sale alerts from your preferred (or most convenient) airlines, and be ready to jump if you see a sale. If you start monitoring the prices over time, you'll learn what is "normal" and what is too high or a really good deal. You have a lot of time - I am a very early booker because I like to get the seats I want and even I wouldn't be looking to book until early 2022 - so you have a long time to monitor and get a feel for it.

You might also try booking directly through the airlines website only. Though many people have no trouble booking through third party companies, if there is an issue it may be easier to solve working directly with the airline of your choice. I use Kayak and some other sites to get a general idea of pricing but always book directly with the airline. I have found that when comparing apples to apples the airlines are rarely more expensive.

What is your departure airport?

Realistically, it is way too early to be booking flights. With the uncertainty of COVID restrictions, and without any assurances that there will be flights to Paris which suit your schedule and are reasonably priced, my advice would be to wait and see what is in the wind.

It's not really complicated to schedule your vacation, but it does take some amount of real time planning. I recommend you start off by purchasing a few guidebooks, including the Rick Steves' guidebooks on this website. They are great for planning purposes and for getting the lay of the land. As other posters correctly state, Kayak.com is a good source to get general ideas of flights, but the booking should always be done with the actual carrier.

With all that said, it's never too early to start the planning process.

Airfare starts being available 11-12 months out, so even if you wanted to you couldn’t buy your tickets yet. Right now think about your dates. You are going on a tour - what day do you want to be there? Many people arrive a few days ahead of time. Do you plan to do that? Do you have flexibility on how many days early? What day of the week? Remember almost all North America - Europe flights are overnights, so you leave one day and arrive the next. So if you want to be there on Tuesday you have to put Monday as your departure day.

Set up alerts on google flights and start browsing kayak to see what flights tend to look like from your area. You can do this now, just to get ideas of what is available in general. COVID is making this difficult but you can still get a little bit of a sense.

Then figure out a price you are comfortable with and parameters like do you need non-stop flights or are layover(s) ok? How long? Preferred airlines, like if you have a frequent flier account? Also it is recommended to buy your flight on the airline website, not through a third party sight. This makes changes and customer service much easier.

Once you see a flight you like for a good price, buy it. This might be 9 months before, it might be 4. In my experience prices are often very high at 10-12 months then drop and bounce around for months, then rise at 1-2 months ahead. But it’s kind of a guessing game - buy when you are comfortable and don’t look back.

Start broadly and then narrow down. Google Flights is a very useful tool that, once you figure out how it works, is good at showing price trends. Just remember, airlines tend to look backwards when setting pricing but old rules rarely apply anymore. They're often just plugging numbers into the system just because there has to be a number. Pick a route and sign up for price alerts. Also look at pricing graphs and calendars to see how wildly they can vary month to month, day to day. They're also influenced by demand and capacity, and airlines have warehouses full of computers constantly crunching data and resetting prices. It's called dynamic pricing, and boy is it ever. It's very common to see a price once, and never see it again. For better OR worse.

It really depends on where you live. I live in MN. I rely on Delta and Iceland Air. I feel like right now, and in the next year or so, the ability to cancel is super important. I can't speak to the other airlines, but Delta will cancel/change any flight except the Basic economy classification. If Delta works for you, you could actually book a ticket when the price looks good. If prices drop, you can ask them to refund the difference (as long as you did not buy Basic economy tickets)

And if this truly a "first" for you and you've never flown (or haven't flown very far), there's no shame in talking to a travel agent. They're hard to find but the Auto Club still has them. Also consider breaking up the trip, you will get the best deals most often from major East Coast cities so consider a short flight to one of those places.

Don't depend on sale notifications from airlines. Fares bounce around all the time. I haven't found the best fares for my destinations to be linked to any announced airline sales. Once I figure out my travel dates, the city I want to fly into and the city I want to return from, I try to check Google Flights every day, hoping to spot a good buying opportunity. As already explained, you have to watch fares for the flights you're interested in for some time in order to know what is a good price. Incidentally, it's common for some days of the week to be cheaper than others.

Sign up for a free subscription to Scott's Cheap Flights to see what fare sales are going on from time to time -- and check this board where people often post about sales.

Determine your tradeoffs -- nonstop flight versus multiple airports at possibly lower prices and longer travel time; economy class versus premium economy versus business; checked baggage or carry-on only. The "best" fare for you may not be the one that is lowest cost.

I would start to use Google Flights & Skyscanner to see what's available. One very useful tool in Google Flights is to search nearby airports (if that's an option). It can get overwhelming, though - I'm in upstate NY so I'm in 3 hrs driving distance to Montreal, Boston & NYC, as well as Hartford, CT (where EI used to fly from, not sure if they're going to start that up post Covid).

Wondering when to start looking for flights, best strategies for getting best fares, etc.

Lot of good advice so far in the thread. I'll add that instead of looking for "best" fares, aim to look for a good one. As others have suggested, get a feel for what the normal fare range is. People can torment themselves trying to find the absolute "best" fare. There is one, the lowest you could have possibly paid for that flight, but it's only going to be apparent in hindsight. On the other hand if the fare is normally around $1200 and you see it dip to $900 that's a bargain even if it goes lower than $900 later.

Something you can do now is start thinking about the days before/after your trip. It's a good idea to arrive in advance so you have a chance to start getting over jetlag and as a buffer in case there are any flight delays. I'd suggest at least 2 days given this sounds like your first trip. Also since you'll already be in Europe you might want to think about staying longer after the tour (if it works with your vacation time and budget). The airfare is already paid so you're spreading that cost out over more days. You might want to take a high-speed train from Paris to another part of France for a few days (Nice, Strasbourg, Dijon, etc) and perhaps fly home from there, or maybe go to London for a few days via the chunnel, you could get to Amsterdam by train in a little over 3 hours, etc.

Don't depend on sale notifications from airlines.

This is another one where it depends on what your priorities are. I have gotten amazing SkyMiles deals for Delta One (Delta's business class) through Delta email alerts. I live in Delta country so for me there are no other valid options. If you're just looking for the lowest fare, you're correct (of course) that daily googling is the best strategy. I try really hard not to sit in the back of the plane. :)

Don't depend on sales notifications from airlines

More accurate: Don't depend only on sales notifications from airlines.