Skyscanner Review: Is It Legit or a Scam?

Want to seek out low cost flights with out having to spend hours looking on-line? Skyscanner is a flight search engine based mostly in Edinburgh, Scotland that searches hundreds of on-line journey companies and reserving websites for the most affordable flights, lodges, and car rentals.

But is Skyscanner legit, and may you belief it that can assist you evaluate flights? Join us for an trustworthy breakdown of what Skyscanner is, the way it works, and the way it stacks up towards comparable choices.

Our Skyscanner Review Approach

Our objective is to provide you all the data it’s essential determine for your self if Skyscanner is best for you. Along the way in which, we’ll present rankings based mostly on each private expertise and suggestions from different customers.

Each writer at ViaTravelers is a real traveler – we’ve been to 100 nations and each state. Traveling that a lot can get costly, so we’ve used our justifiable share of on-line reserving platforms seeking the very best deal.

We’re massive followers of Going.com, however Skyscanner is one other business big, and one of the crucial well-liked flight serps. The following assessment displays our experiences.

We’ll spotlight the great, the not-so-great, and every thing in between. You’ll additionally get an intensive breakdown of precisely how Skyscanner works, what it does and doesn’t do, and tips about methods to use it when you really feel so inclined.

How Does Skyscanner Work?

First, let’s take a more in-depth take a look at the completely different options that Skyscanner brings to the desk. The excellent news is that Skyscanner is extremely straightforward to make use of, whether or not you need to search flights, guide a resort, or discover an excellent deal on a car rental.

How to Use Skyscanner to Find Flight Deals

When you first arrive on the web site, you have got the choice of making a free account by clicking on the “log in” tab on the higher right-hand facet of the display screen. Even when you select to proceed as a visitor, ensure you click on on the icon to the left of the login, so you possibly can set your most well-liked language, residence nation, and forex.

If you realize when and the place you need to go, merely fill within the particulars and choose what class of airfare you’d want. One factor that makes Skyscanner a cool choice for digital nomads and versatile vacationers is that you may additionally discover offers utilizing rather more open-ended search standards.

If you don’t have a particular vacation spot in thoughts, you possibly can search flights to actually in every single place or slender it all the way down to multi-city journey choices. You may also use Skyscanner to seek for the very best offers on particular dates or throughout whole months.

Whether you need to fly first-class or lower your expenses by booking a flight in financial system, merely choose your alternative from the dropdown menu. Specify the variety of vacationers who want a ticket on your journey, hit search, and watch for the magic to start.

If you select an open-ended search, Skyscanner will current you with a listing of choices from everywhere in the world. You can then use the filters on the high to rearrange your outcomes by least expensive flight, direct flights, suggestions for you, or locations with the bottom restrictions.

Now, let’s think about your journey plans are a bit of extra particular and also you’ve determined you need to fly from Los Angeles to London, however aren’t fairly positive when. Skyscanner has acquired your again relating to discovering flight dates with the very best offers and highlighting them utilizing a useful coloration coding system.

Last however not least, let’s try what occurs when you have got particular dates in thoughts. Simply enter them into the Skyscanner search engine and your outcomes will look a bit of one thing like this.

You can use the dropdown menu on the high to kind them by least expensive flight, quickest flight, or departure/arrival instances. Over on the left-hand facet, you’ll discover additional customization choices that let you filter your search outcomes by every thing from particular airways to what number of stops you might be or aren’t prepared to endure alongside the way in which.

Not fairly able to guide your ticket simply but? If you need to keep looking out for cheaper flights that pop up throughout your required journey dates, then contemplate making a price alert.

If Skyscanner spots cheap tickets or great flight deals on your desired dates, they’ll ship you an alert to let you realize. If you might be able to guide, nonetheless, then transfer on to the subsequent choice.

Select the deal you’re taken with from the flight search choices, and also you’ll be taken to a web page like this, the place you’ll discover all of your precise reserving choices. While Skyscanner contains rankings alongside every airline or journey company, that is the place it’s necessary to do your due diligence.

While you’ll normally discover journey offers from websites you’re aware of, don’t be shy about researching those you aren’t. Upon choosing a deal from a good third-party reserving platform, you’ll be redirected to the platform itself to finalize your ticket buy.

Simply fill in your contact info, confirm your flight particulars, and fill within the essential fee info to guide your subsequent journey. If you do select to take a look at the offers obtainable from reserving platforms you’re not aware of, be certain to verify for hidden charges and ensure the cancelation coverage of the airline, simply in case.

See Related: Jack’s Flight Club ReviewCECK : Is It Legit?

How to Find the Cheapest Month to Fly

If you need to go to a sure metropolis or nation, however aren’t positive when the cheapest time to fly may be, then do that enjoyable Skyscanner hack. Click the “discover” tab from the menu on the backside of the location and select based mostly on the nation, metropolis, or airport of your alternative.

On the subsequent web page, scroll down previous the few preliminary flight offers that can seem. About halfway down the web page, you’ll uncover a useful chart that breaks down the cheapest month to book flights.

Click on the most affordable month and also you’ll discover a calendar breakdown that lists the cheapest flight on every date. Or choose the “chart” choice to get an outline of which dates have the very best offers total.

See Related: Ways to Book the Cheapest First Class Flights

Find Great Deals on Hotels and Car Rentals

After you’ve finalized your round-trip flight particulars, you can too use Skyscanner to seek out the very best deal on lodges and automobile leases throughout your keep. The whole course of is fairly much like discovering flights however much less open-ended, so that you’ll have to enter the place you’re going and when.

You’ll then be introduced with a listing of lodges that you may filter utilizing choices resembling value, star score, evaluations, cancellation coverage, and extra. Once you’ve narrowed it down, use the menu on the high to rearrange your resort outcomes by value, assessment, star score, or proximity to close by airports or landmarks.

You’ll additionally discover an interactive map on the right-hand facet that provides you an concept of the place every resort is situated, together with its value. Simply click on on any choices that curiosity you to leap to them within the search outcomes.

Much like when trying to find flights, while you click on on the choice of your alternative, you’ll be redirected to the web site with the bottom price. If you look intently at every itemizing, you’ll see you can too select from varied reserving platforms on the backside by clicking the one you like.

Using Skyscanner to Find a Cheap Car Rental

Skyscanner has every thing it’s essential discover flights, lodges, and automobile rent choices multi function place. Just choose the automobile leases tab, sort in when and the place you need to choose up your rental, and the date and time you need to return it.

On the subsequent web page, you’ll have the ability to use the map or filters to slender down your choices based mostly on close by airports, the variety of seats, and extra. Yet once more, you’ll be directed to a third-party website to make the precise reserving, so keep on the alert for scammy web sites.

The cool factor about Skyscanner is that you may even use it to seek out the very best offers on rental automobiles in your hometown, even when you don’t plan on taking a flight anytime quickly. On the automobile rental homepage, you possibly can select your hometown from a number of cities to get a take a look at the very best offers on automobile leases close to you.

See Related: Best 5 Dollar a Day Car Rentals

Is Skyscanner Reliable?

The fact is, it’s attainable to get two utterly completely different opinions on Skyscanner, relying on who you ask. And provided that the location is now utilized by 100 million folks every month and obtainable in 30 languages, you’ll discover loads of differing responses relating to who you ask.

In order to know the distinction in opinions, you first want to know precisely what Skyscanner is and isn’t. As we’ve tried to put out, Skyscanner is a meta-search engine that continuously combs the web seeking the very best offers on journey.

Have you ever planned a trip on Kayak or in contrast flights on Momondo? Skyscanner relies on the identical idea.

Skyscanner isn’t an airline web site in itself, however a journey fare aggregator that pulls collectively the very best offers from different online travel agencies and presents them on your perusal. In different phrases, they don’t truly provide you with the costs; they simply enable you discover the suitable ones.

You may discover flights from bigger on-line journey companies like Expedia or Kiwi, but in addition from smaller, more questionable companies like MyJourney.com or GotoGate.com. Many of the least flattering Skyscanner evaluations come from vacationers who’ve ended up making an attempt to reap the benefits of the “offers” supplied by less-reputable on-line journey brokers, solely to find the horrible fact about them firsthand.

The backside line is that whereas Skyscanner itself is a very legit firm, its search engine doesn’t at all times filter out less-than-stellar third-party brokers. While it may be a great way to find cheap flights and extra, it’s important to do your personal due diligence and take a look at the businesses behind its search outcomes earlier than reserving.

See Related: Best Apps & Sites Like Expedia For Travel

Pros and Cons

Much like different platforms, Skyscanner has its personal set of strengths and weaknesses. Based on our experiences and evaluations, right here’s a fast breakdown of the professionals and cons you possibly can anticipate while you use Skyscanner.

Pros

• Skyscanner combs by means of hundreds of flights worldwide to current you with the very best choices at the very best costs.
• You can use the multi-city flight search choices to seek out the very best reserving choice for varied locations in the identical time-frame.
• The “Everywhere” search choice is a cool method to take a look at costs on websites everywhere in the world throughout a particular time-frame.
• You may also use Skyscanner to guide lodges and rental automobiles on your journey, full with search choices that embrace proximity to completely different airports or landmarks.
• When you are taking the time to discover ways to finest use the web site, Skyscanner can genuinely prevent a substantial amount of cash on journey.

Cons

• Much like Google Flights, Skyscanner is a flight search engine that redirects you to a third-party website to finish your precise reserving.
• Some of the third-party reserving websites it suggests are rather more respected than others, so you’ll want to do your personal due diligence.
• Given that you may’t make a reserving instantly by means of Skyscanner, it has only a few customer support choices. That mentioned, it does provide helpful information that may enable you contact the airline or reserving agent you used.

Ratings

Now that you simply’ve acquired a really feel for the way Skyscanner works, let’s see the way it stacks up in a variety of classes. While we in the end encourage you to determine for your self whether or not or not Skyscanner is best for you, listed here are our opinions based mostly on person evaluations and private expertise.

Ease-of-Use: 5

Overall, Skyscanner makes it extremely straightforward to seek out an affordable ticket at over 500 airports around the world. The easy, user-friendly interface may even level you within the route of the very best lodges and rental automobiles on your journey.

Features: 4

Skyscanner truly has a variety of actually nice options when you take the time to study to make use of them. The downsides are that you may’t guide your personal flights instantly on the Skyscanner web site and might want to do your analysis relating to verifying the creditability of a few of the third-party reserving websites it might advocate.

Customer Service: 4

This is the place it’s so necessary to know that, very similar to Google Flights, Skyscanner is a search engine relatively than an precise reserving platform. While it’s technically attainable to contact Skyscanner directly with a query, the web site is fairly upfront about the truth that you’ll have to deal directly with the third-party accomplice you used to make your buy.

Value for Money: 5

Who can argue with the value of a free service? Not solely will you discover nice offers on Skyscanner flights, lodges, and rental automobiles, however the truth that the location provides free value alerts is fairly spectacular.

Skyscanner’s price alerts let you preserve an eye fixed out for the very best offers on flights to a number of locations on the dates of your alternative. While flight alert golf equipment like Going.com (previously Scott’s Cheap Flights) will preserve you updated on extra flight offers year-round, Skyscanner’s alerts are nice when you’re on the lookout for value alerts to particular locations.

See Related: How to Use Going (Formerly Scott’s Cheap Flights)

Skyscanner vs Other Travel Booking Websites

These days there are many nice websites that may enable you discover an excellent price on a flight, resort, or rental automobile. So, how does Skyscanner stack up towards competing websites like Kayak, Expedia, or Momondo?

Skyscanner vs Kayak

Overall, Kayak is essentially the most much like Skyscanner and has stayed on high of updates to make sure it provides almost similar options and repair choices. It even has a couple of extra options, resembling bus and prepare info, packages, and a “hacker fare” device that mixes two one-way flights from completely different airways to create a less expensive choice than a single round-trip fare.

Much like Skyscanner, you possibly can’t make direct bookings on Kayak, however shall be redirected to a third-party website. Given that each Kayak and Skyscanner are free to make use of, it’s price testing each because the distinction between the 2 could largely come down to non-public choice.

Skyscanner vs Expedia

While Skyscanner and Kayak are flight search instruments, Expedia is an precise reserving platform, which means that you may guide instantly from its web site. Though Expedia does its finest to current the very best offers from varied airways, its search options don’t are usually fairly as strong or thorough as Skyscanner’s.

Unlike Skyscanner’s “Everywhere” search choice, Expedia requires you to enter your journey dates earlier than it might probably hunt down the very best offers on your journey. Expedia is a really dependable reserving website, nevertheless it by no means hurts to take a look at all of your choices on Skyscanner earlier than you guide.

Skyscanner vs Momondo

Momondo is one other nice journey search website that may enable you discover the very best offers on flights from varied airways, rental automobiles, lodges, trains, and packages. As a part of the Kayak household, Momondo options some offers that you may guide instantly by means of the location, although it’s extremely upfront about letting you realize if one other website provides the identical deal cheaper.

One of the issues that basically makes Momondo stand out is its enjoyable interface and extremely thorough search options. The Explore feature allows you to try flights to locations by way of an interactive map and even search based mostly on the kind of journey (romantic, outdoorsy) that you simply’re trying to take.

Skyscanner vs Going

Going.com (formerly Scott’s Cheap Flights) is a good useful resource for locating superb offers on airfare nevertheless it works in a different way than Skyscanner and different flight serps. Going.com isn’t a journey company or reserving website, however a flight alert platform designed to provide you a heads-up any time airways launch an incredible deal.

The platform provides each free memberships and subscription tiers designed to save lots of you lots of of {dollars} on mistake fares and value drops. The solely catch is that there’s no approach to know when a take care of seem for a flight to a particular vacation spot.

If you’re tremendous versatile and need to keep looking out for the very best offers out of your chosen airport, then Going.com is a good alternative. But when you’re on the lookout for flights to a particular vacation spot or on sure dates, then you definately’re higher off going with Skyscanner or an analogous flight search engine.

See Related: Best Skyscanner Alternatives to Book Travel

The Final Verdict: Is Skyscanner Legit?

Yes, very a lot so – there’s a motive so many people at ThroughTravelers usually use Skyscanner. Overall, we gave Skyscanner a 4.5 out of 5 based mostly on varied elements. Not solely is the web site utterly free to make use of, nevertheless it additionally makes it extremely straightforward to seek out great prices on flights from airways everywhere in the world.

As talked about, your expertise with Skyscanner will possible come all the way down to how properly you perceive what it’s and what it’s meant to do. Think of it much less as a reserving website and extra because the Amazon of journey – whereas you need to use it to seek out nice offers, it’s necessary to remember that you could be additionally come throughout a couple of much less scrupulous sellers alongside the way in which.

With that in thoughts, Skyscanner is a good place to begin your search when you’re trying to save money on travel. Just you’ll want to try the legitimacy and insurance policies of any third-party website you’re not already aware of earlier than finalizing your reserving.

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