Is it too early to book flights to Rome from NY ( JFK) for mid September? Last week I looked and saw an excellent American Airlines direct flight RT for $600 now the same flight is $979 !! ( yes kicking myself)
Will they go down, or just up?
Will flights be added? We went direct if possible but want to pay under $800 of that is possible. 5 people flying together.
Thank you,
Erin
Prices go up AND down (even in the same day, with no way to predict when and by how much), no need to stress over missing out over a single airline quote - it's still a long time before mid-September, and flying out of NY airports already puts you at an advantage. You'll get another chance, many chances actually. Book when the price is at least acceptable (and ideally really great) to you.
It's always a throw of the dice , I booked open jaw JFK - FCO ; CDG - JFK , leaving late August , returning mid November , last January - $ 760 per person .
wow good to know, so the flights they are showing now they will add more?? we want to leave- late afternoon so we arrive early am Rome so we can take a train to Florence.
Only the airlines know whether they'll add flights or not in the future (I wouldn't count on it, the flights don't vary a lot except for truly seasonal flights to some select destinations like the Caribbean or ski resorts, etc) ....BUT the less you you are wedded to a specific itinerary (meaning time of arrival, connections, airport, airline, and exact dates), the more options you'll have to getting a better price. It's like doing a wide open web search on something vs a very, narrow specific one....you'll get more results with the former and more choices at different price points. You can use this website to look months out and track over time: https://matrix.itasoftware.com. I would leave the query as wide open as possible so you can see the trade-offs. Don't forget to also check budget airlines which don't always show up in these third-party comparison sites.
My advice is to set up fare alerts for several acceptable itineraries on your preferred airfare website. I use Google Flights, but there are several others. Being a non-trusting sort, I also try to do a manual check every day or so while I'm flight shopping. It's not a human being tweaking the fares, it's a computer program, and sometimes it produces very odd short-term results, at least for some routings. I've seen $500 upward spikes followed 24 or 48 hours later by $500 declines. A few days ago, a flight I was watching earlier in the year went from under $900 to over $5000. Wacko. A brief fare drop could happen at any time.
It would be a good idea to expand your search to include one-stop options, just in case. Non-stops are popular, so if people keep buying tickets on the non-stops to Rome, it's possible there will not be much of a drop, at least not early enough to help you. I assume you do not want to still be flight-shopping in late August, right?
As already noted, a bit of date flexibility can also be helpful. I've seen price differences of $250 or more (round-trip) as a result of shifting one of the flight dates by just one day.
Check Norwegian Air. I plugged in two dates in September (19th outbound and 28th inbound) round trip from Newerk - $250 each way for their base fare.
our dates are firm so that is not an option. I did see Norwegian Air had a good flight, but I was hoping for us to arrive in the morning. So don't want to fly out at 11:30 pm. :(
hi erin
"Too early" is comparative to when to book. When you find a fare you like, book it and don't look back. I really doubt more flights will be added. September is still considered high season for italy travel. What are your exact dates? I've used kayak.com Doing a "dummy" round trip (9/12-9/27) and 3 airlines have direct (JFK-FCO) under $700 and gets in early (7am) air france, delta or klm. maybe worthwhile to check it out. happy travels
aloha
My flight to FCO from JFK is non-stop ( Delta ) . I think there were only one or two non-stops . The flight is a late flight which is perfect for us , getting in late morning , we will probably be able to check in shortly after arrival , A late flight for you wouldn't be bad ,from Termini , the Frecce train to Firenze is about 1 1/2 - two hours , You could be there mid afternoon . Beats sitting around for a transfer , even a short one , and then having to get into town from the airport on that end
That Norwegian Air flight arrives in Rome at 13:40. What is wrong with that? You would have plenty of time to get to Florence, even after going thru immigration, etc.
For direct flights you do not have that many options. If you are that picky about arrival time, be prepared to pay more and maybe accept a plane change somewhere. Me, I would go with Norwegian if I cared that much about price. Just be aware of the add-ons.
