Best air fare sites for travel from the US to Glasgow - Sorry!

Buy from the AIRLINE when you do buy the ticket.

Use the 3rd party sites, kayak, expedia etc to do research.

In the meantime to ease the shock, and alleviate the pain, have a glass of your favorite single malt while shopping.

It’s called Glasgow

A glass? Keep the bottle handy. Just booked some local US fares that three, four years ago always ran in the $300 range, now over $600.

Also, consider flying to Edinburgh as well. It is a larger airport so you might find more flights there.

Taking the train to Inverness to start your journey home could reduce the total price. (A loophole in UK airport taxes.)

Just so you have a point of reference, look at British Airways flights to Glasgow. We’re pretty lucky having Denver as an airport with direct flights to London, then an easy, quick connection to Glasgow. Hopefully you’ll have a suitable airport for starting your journey. American Airlines is a codeshare partner with B.A., so sometimes there are A.A. flights out of Dallas or Philadelphia (or others?) that will show up in a B.A. search.

Glas-gow like cow? Or like coe? Sebastian Coe.

Googleflights.com

When are you going and returning? Your dates can make a huge difference in prices. See below for the test I did using Google Flights.

Using Google Flights you can find potential itineraries, see pricing trends and set up different route options to be monitored for price changes.

I've flown from Seattle to Europe and back many times and it's never been cheap. It's typically been between $1000 and $1300 RT each time. I always do a nonstop from Seattle to the major European hub with the best connections to my final destination. That's because I prefer the flight path from and back to Seattle. Last summer it was multi-city Seattle to Dublin via London Heathrow and LHR back from London to Seattle.

Your hubs might include Dublin (Aer Lingus), London (American/British Airways), Amsterdam (Delta/KLM), Frankfurt (Lufthansa/United) or Reykjavik (Icelandair).

As a test, I tried a simple RT Seattle to Glasgow, departing Seattle on Tuesday, July 25 and returning on Tuesday, August 22nd. I got this note: "Prices are currently low — $511 cheaper than usual for your search." The best 4 flight options were nonstop between Seattle and the airlines' hubs. The RT prices ranged from $871 to $1073. The Seattle to Glasgow flight times ranged from about 12 hours to almost 15 hours.

By choosing RT, you can click on the dates option and see a grid with the departure date across the top and the return date on the right side. The intersection of the 2 gives the RT price. You can see how different pairs of dates change those prices.

If you try this, as you choose your potential flights be sure to click on their down arrow to see the flight details. That's where you'll see who's metal you'll actually be on (might affect baggage rules and seat selection) and how much time you have between your arrival at the hub and departure for Glasgow. For examples: the shortest flight indicated a layover at LHR of only 1 hour and 25 minutes, the longest one had a layover of almost 4 hours. Goldilocks says the short one is definitely too short and the long one might be too long.

Another thing to be careful about is what the cheapest prices include, especially as it affects baggage, seat selection, etc. For example, I flew British Airways last summer. You can pay for seat selection in advance or you can wait till 24 hours before the flight leaves and choose your seat for free from what's still available. I did the latter both directions and lucked out. I was able to select an aisle seat (my preference) each way. As a solo traveler it's easier to get a decent seat than it might be for a couple or more traveling together.

Also, sometimes to get the cheapest price you have to do 2 stops on the way home. You might have to bump the cost up a bit to have only 1 stop. It's been my experience that it's worth the money to be able to have only 1 stop each direction. In your case, that probably means Seattle to London Heathrow to Glasgow and reverse. Or Seattle to Dublin to Glasgow and reverse. Or Seattle to Amsterdam to Glasgow and reverse.

Finally, you can test clicking through from your flight itinerary choices to the appropriate airline to buy your tickets to see exactly what's covered without buying anything. You can also use what you find out at Google Flights to go directly to the airline. Note that if you decide to buy by clicking through, the airlines must honor what Google Flights is showing you. I did that last year. I suppose it's possible that going directly to the airline might result in cheaper prices, but I didn't try that.

Good luck with finding flights you can live with and have a great trip.

Wow! Thanks for all of the good suggestions (especially the one about the single malt...).
The trip is still in the talking stage, so dates are fuzzy, etc. I will use your suggestions and recommendations when we get closer to booking our travel in the Summer of 2024.
Thanks again - be well - travel safely.
Steve

Lo, good point about the prices. I've seen them lower on Google Flights than on the airline's website. So, you're suggesting that we tell them of the lower price elsewhere and the airlines will comply?