Conflicting info on fare watcher sites

Each site uses its own set of predictive analytics (based on its own proprietary algorithms) and there's no way to even know that they are both looking at the same exact data or historical timeframe to make predictions. Each site wants to be the authoritative "source" for the consumer, so its unlikely they will produce the same set of standard information. Unfortunately, unless you're a researcher (or similar), there's no way to get access to their methodology to see how they come up with their predictions (I doubt they publish it openly). Do you know if there are any airlines (e.g. budget airlines) they exclude from their fare searches?

I would track prices over a few months to see where they're going. Sept-October is still a long time off, I don't see any downside.

Third party fare watchers can be one tool to use to track prices. I use Google Flights. But I also frequently test my route directly on the airline websites that I am most interested in flying with. More often than not the two are the same but I've seen fares for my sardine class Sept/October 2018 multi destination trip on Google Flights at $5700 CDN when the airline sites shows it at $1350 CDN.

My routing has been floating between $1450 CDN and $1550 CDN. I purchased late last week after an alert from Google Flights at $1330 CDN, and upgraded at seat selection to Economy Comfort at $150 CDN per seat.

I always buy through the airline website directly though.

There's a very good reason Kayak says what it does....it wants you to buy.. Sales 101--make the product seem that if you don't buy now you could be out. No one knows where ticket prices will go.

There's a very good reason Kayak says what it does....it wants you to buy.

Precisely! It seems that whenever I use Booking.com for a place to stay, they make it sound like if I don't book today I'll never find a place to stay in the town.

There's a very good reason Kayak says what it does....it wants you to
buy

How does that explain the other site, which wants you to "keep waiting"? These fare watcher sites probably derive their revenues from sources other than the airlines (do airlines even pay ticket commissions to online travel agents anymore?)

Does anyone have any explanations as to why these 2 sites have
conflicting info and any advice on how long to wait before buying tix?
Thanks!

Any explanations? Yes. Marketing.

Reread...prices "may drop", prices "may rise". C'mon, you know this! :-)

Articles predicting when the cheapest airafares are posted.are worthless and tiresome at least to this person living in a more remote part of ‘merica. How about the authors put up some of their own money and run a contest with several different itineraries over the next twelve months?

Your best bet would to fly out of Orlando. Norwegian Air Shuttle is flying to London Gatwick and you can connect there for virtually any airport in Europe. They also fly into Oslo where you can connect on Norwegian to most major European cities. They also fly seasonally Orlando into Paris and Copenhagen.
And the airfares are ridiculously inexpensive. We have flown out of there 3 times.

I don't use third party fare watchers either, no Kayak, Orbiz, etc and certainly don't rely on them. Norwegian Air has fantastic prices going from Oakland to London Gatwick, which fits into my accommodations (a B&B in Kings Cross) in London conveniently since the Thameslink train goes from Gatwick to St Pancras in one hour direct.

I can't explain why sites say what they do, but I do think they are a good resource to get an idea of normal price variations for a specific route.

What I do is determine how much I am willing to pay for a ticket after watching the ups and downs for a few weeks. If it hits my target price, I usually go ahead and buy directly from the airline in question. And then I stop looking and don't worry if I got the best price.