Airfare theory: Two-month rule generally true?

I've seen "best airfares" all over the calendar before my trips to Europe...there's no hard and fast rule.

If only there was a way to know for sure... :)

I find that there are often good prices 4-6 weeks before a trip...BUT I mostly travel alone and rarely have set dates.
So my experience is of course different than many other travelers.

I find the price you wrote high...but I am not familiar with prices out of Philly...I have never paid that from California to Europe in the Fall/Winter. But there are a ton of flights from SNA or LAX...

Perhaps check out Norwegian Airlines FB page or website site since they now fly to London I believe.
I got an pretty good price with them to fly LAX to Scandinavia last November/December.

Bon voyage!

I found my best fare about 4 months in advance. Round trip from Newark, NJ to Milan was $800. The hard part is when you find what appears to be a "good" price do you grab it or wait for a better price? I lost a $750 fare by waiting to discuss it with my wife. Came back 2 hours later and it was gone.

Bob Sheldon

There used to be someone here who advocated for buying two months out, claiming that was the "sweet spot." He was so convincing I followed that advice for a family trip to Europe and ended up paying over $1000 MORE than if we had bought earlier like we usually do.

Then I tracked prices on our favorite airline (BA) just out of curiosity, starting in late December for a hypothetical July trip to Switzerland. Prices did nothing but go UP from the time I started watching until one week before the flight, when I stopped watching. Price started around $1500 and was almost up to $2000 by early July. there never was a drop like that graph you posted shows.

I checked BA prices for a 3-week trip in December and it turns out is is about $100 cheaper if you reverse your trip, going to London first and flying back from Rome. It has something to do with taxes imposed for flights departing from Heathrow. (I noticed when I was tracking prices that RT fares were cheaper when one flew beyond London, say to Zurich, than for London itself.)

For the dates I checked, the price to fly into London from Philly on BA, and then a direct flight back from Rome on USAir (bookable on BA.com) , was $1150. I should go back and check if the reverse is offered (going to Rome on USAir to avoid the London thing). I'll do that and let you know.

OK, so a Philly to Rome flight does not show up on the outbound trip, but maybe for a different date it would. But maybe you should consider reversing the order of the trip anyway, going to London first, because it is a shorter flight, so a good way to start a honeymoon. Then you could take the nice Eurostar train to Paris.

Have you been to these cities before? How are you planning to get from Paris to Rome? Or Rome to Paris if you go in that direction?

Thanks for the great advice. We've never been to any of those cities before. Essentially, we are planning to train through Italy, fly to Paris from Venice, take the train to London from Paris and fly home from London. I figured there wasn't going to be a hard-and-fast rule regarding when to purchase the airfare. I guess I was more so wondering if $1,350 per ticket was high or about right considering we're leaving between Christmas and New Year's Eve.

We basically said if the airfare dips below $1,200 we'll jump on it. Just not sure if that's realistic or not for that time of year.

Thanks again!

I just checked a 3 week trip from Philly dep 12/29 and ret 1/19. Best price going to Rome and returning from London was $1215 on Lufthansa, changing in Frankfurt on the way over and Montreal on the way home (Air Canada actually). Going to London first and returning from Rome was $1064 on United, changing in Dulles on the way over and Frankfurt on the way home (Lufthansa actually).
source ITA Matrix Software

This was a recent topic and someone responded with a link to an article saying that the sweet spot for buying tickets for US to Europe was 151 days on average. The caveat, of course, is that you're buying a real ticket, not an average of prices, and there's no way to know what your real ticket is going to cost.

Personally, if there's a specific flight I'm interested (usu. Delta because of their nonstops from Seattle), I monitor how the seats are filling up. If it starts to get tight and prices haven't gone down, I'll go ahead and buy.

All good advice above. From Seattle to Europe, I have often paid $1200-1300 by buying the airline ticket in summer for October (no way to plan further ahead). Fares usually come down for later departures, or fall/winter specials are advertised as it gets closer, such as the one Dick already saw, but holiday dates are often blacked out on those specials.