https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/26780/is-there-a-flight-search-engine-that-combines-flights-from-different-airlines Skip to main content Stack Exchange Network Stack Exchange network consists of 183 Q&A communities including Stack Overflow, the largest, most trusted online community for developers to learn, share their knowledge, and build their careers. Visit Stack Exchange [ ] Loading... 1. + Tour Start here for a quick overview of the site + Help Center Detailed answers to any questions you might have + Meta Discuss the workings and policies of this site + About Us Learn more about Stack Overflow the company, and our products 2. 3. current community + Travel help chat + Travel Meta your communities Sign up or log in to customize your list. more stack exchange communities company blog 4. 5. Log in 6. Sign up Travel 1. 1. Home 2. Questions 3. Tags 4. 5. Users 6. Unanswered 2. Teams Now available on Stack Overflow for Teams! AI features where you work: search, IDE, and chat. Learn more Explore Teams 3. Teams 4. Ask questions, find answers and collaborate at work with Stack Overflow for Teams. Explore Teams Teams Q&A for work Connect and share knowledge within a single location that is structured and easy to search. Learn more about Teams Is there a flight search engine that combines flights from different airlines? Ask Question Asked 10 years, 4 months ago Modified today Viewed 45k times 30 Is there a search engine that considers "mix&match" flight combinations? My current problem: I need to go from FRA to YLW (Frankfurt/Germany to Kelowna/Canada) on July 29th, and arrive no later than 5pm. The search engines I checked only offer EUR3000+ flights. I found a 2-stop combo through LHR and YVR for half that price. I'll probably have to check my baggage out and back in twice, but if the layover times are long enough, who cares? A real search engine could find that for me (or something that's even better). Or, hell, give me a place to bulk-download the flight schedules from and I'll program it myself (of course I'd also need a way to check seat availability ...). Update: Please read before answering. A search engine which does this should, at minimum, show the flight combination through LHR which I found manually. Note that I need to arrive before 5pm, on the same day. Also note that this is a generic question; I'm not looking for a specific good flight here -- but the details are useful to illustrate whether an answer is actually valid. :-/ NB: Typo, should have been July 29th. * air-travel * online-resources * airlines * bookings * flight-search-engines Share Improve this question Follow edited May 6, 2014 at 8:19 hippietrail's user avatar hippietrail 79.5k5454 gold badges276276 silver badges631631 bronze badges asked May 6, 2014 at 1:31 Matthias Urlichs's user avatar Matthias UrlichsMatthias Urlichs 45111 gold badge44 silver badges88 bronze badges 1 * Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. - RoflcoptrException Commented Oct 24, 2016 at 9:02 Add a comment | 10 Answers 10 Sorted by: Reset to default [Highest score (default) ] 18 Since there seems to be a lot of confusion about what you are looking for, it could be useful to have a summary of what has been suggested (thanks and +1 to everybody who answered!). There are several types of tools you can use to find routes combining flights operated by different airlines: * Airlines' websites typically sell flights from other airlines (not only codeshare or partners from the same alliance but also flights that can be sold through interline agreements). Obviously there are many limitations but they can find at least some multiple airline combinations. * Online Travel Agents (OTA) will combine products from multiple providers and sell them directly to you (typically using a GDS behind the scenes). OTA include Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz and in Germany Opodo, Lastminute, TravelScout24, HolidayCheck (apparently no naked flights) or Thomas Cook. * Search engines or aggregators search various data sources to find potential connections but redirect you to other websites (either airlines or travel agents) to handle the booking itself. Aggregators include Kayak, Momondo, Skyscanner, Hipmunk, Adioso and Google Flights. * Other tools can also be useful. For example, Matrix Airfare Search from ITA lets you look at the details of the fares and use advanced routing codes to refine your search. Unlike all other search engines, it does not provide any link to book the ticket. I don't know much about it but KVS Availability Tool might also be relevant. The various search engines have slightly different functionality (filtering, specifying complex routes, selecting airlines, exploring various destinations, comparing prices when you are flexible on the date, etc.) Some are more focused on naked flights, other push hotels, car hires, or packages but nearly all can find multiple airlines combinations and many can beat your EUR 3000 price on FRA-YLW. Among the search engines listed above, at least ITA's Matrix, Kayak, Momondo, Hipmunk, Adioso, and Google Flights can also filter by time of arrival. One thing that very few sites do is combine separate tickets (i.e. list flights that for some reason can't be booked together as one ticket). Generally speaking doing that is a bad idea since when anything unexpected happens (delay, cancellation, luggage problem), you're on your own. Because of that most search engines won't show a "connection" that involve a low-cost airline as these often don't handle connections or sell tickets through third parties at all. Still, at least rome2rio and Kayak seem to do that in some cases (but, because of the drawbacks noted above, they will only display it if nothing reasonably similar as far as price and duration is concerned is available). azair and Kiwi.com, which specialise in low-cost flights will also do that for you. For travel agents or aggregators, expanding resources on flights that can't be sold, expose travelers to a lot of problems and might not even be that much cheaper does not make sense. Given that your unspecified connection over LHR was apparently significantly more expensive and cumbersome than the ones found by most websites (including the Condor/Westjet solution mentioned by jpatokal or djhurio), there is no reason why it should figure prominently in anyone's results. Yet, if you drill down their results, rome2rio, Google Flights or Momondo all have FRA-LHR-SEA-YLW or FRA-LHR-YYC-YLW connections around EUR 1800 (at the time of writing) that sound very much like the one you described. Now, if you are looking for an exhaustive search engine that could find any arbitrary connection then that does not exist as far as I know. Everybody who knows something about the industry seem to agree that it would be much more difficult than you suspect (see this earlier answer and this presentation for a glimpse into the issue). Note that the problem is not so much finding a route (that's a well-known problem) but also getting all the data in the first place and coming up with a price that can be booked. All the tools listed here are designed to find actual bookable tickets, not idly explore flight routes. If there is a specific reason why you want another connection than the ones found until now, then you need to explain what that reason is. Otherwise, it's difficult to meaningfully search for it. In any case, the problem is not merely that your solution involves multiple airlines because all search engines are fully able to find such connections. Share Improve this answer Follow edited Aug 6, 2017 at 20:38 answered May 7, 2014 at 17:00 Relaxed's user avatar RelaxedRelaxed 110k1010 gold badges240240 silver badges401401 bronze badges 0 Add a comment | 14 Kayak.com does this in two ways. First, for connecting flights, it'll search from A to B and you can select 'multiple airlines' in the search results. This combines tickets and airlines to find cheaper combinations. Secondly, It has a flight type called a 'Hacker Fare' where if it finds one, will display it as such. It consists of combining two one-way flights from different airlines to create a cheaper overall flight. For example, Melbourne to Christchurch return, it may find a Jetstar flight going there, and a deal on an Air New Zealand flight coming back. Edit: Beat That Flight is able to produce these searches too. (disclaimer: my site) Share Improve this answer Follow edited 21 hours ago answered May 6, 2014 at 1:52 Mark Mayo's user avatar Mark MayoMark Mayo 160k104104 gold badges680680 silver badges1.5k1.5k bronze badges 4 * Doesn't work for connecting flights, so not helpful, sorry. - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:03 * @MatthiasUrlichs oh, it does that too, I'll update. - Mark Mayo Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:12 * The search results I get do show "multiple airlines" hen I turn on the airline selector, but I can't click it and the connection I found is not displayed. :-( - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:49 * 1 Anecdotically, for LON--PGA, kayak.com finds connections for no less than $5689, whereas matrix.itasoftware.com finds connections for PS671. - gerrit Commented Oct 10, 2015 at 19:59 Add a comment | 5 Try the Skyscanner. It seems there is a 1-stop flight through YVR for EUR 918 (at time on writing). And another one through SEA. Please check the dates! Share Improve this answer Follow answered May 6, 2014 at 7:20 djhurio's user avatar djhuriodjhurio 32111 silver badge55 bronze badges Add a comment | 4 I'm a fan of Rome2Rio, which is very good at this sort of thing since it covers most budget airlines. They suggest the following combo: July 27 Condor DE7070 FRA 2:35 PM YVR 2:10 PM 10hrs 35min Layover next day in Vancouver (YVR) 18hrs 10min July 28 Westjet WS218 YVR 8:20 AM YLW 9:11 AM 51min Price US$1,114 one-way at time of writing. Share Improve this answer Follow answered May 6, 2014 at 1:47 lambshaanxy's user avatar lambshaanxylambshaanxy 99.6k4444 gold badges583583 silver badges832832 bronze badges 2 * rome2rio at least does display multi-airline flights. Unfortunately it still doesn't show the combination that I found. :-( - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:55 * 12 Why would it show a two-stop flight for EUR 1500, when it found a one-stop flight for US$1114? Or if you're quoting a return fare, when is the return? - lambshaanxy Commented May 6, 2014 at 5:01 Add a comment | 4 A long time ago, when I was interested professionally in airline data sources, I remember reading somewhere that at some point Travelocity was the best search engine to find multi-airline tickets (I don't mean the usual partner airline / codeshare arrangements, but actually multiple unrelated airlines). Supposedly they had developed some proprietary technology in-house that allowed them to find, price and issue such tickets. I don't remember how reliable this information was, and the situation has probably changed many times over since I looked at it, but I still check Travelocity for tricky flights. As for "bulk-download the flight schedules ... and I'll program it myself" - this is an incredibly hard problem, especially once you add fare calculation (thousands of pages of tariff rules) and availability data. If you can really do this, I am sure there are some recruiters at ITA Software (now Google) who'd like to talk to you : ) Also, keep in mind that if you buy two unrelated tickets and the first flight is delayed for any reason causing you to miss the 2nd flight, you're pretty much on your own, whereas if it's a single combined ticket the airline will generally do whatever it takes to get you to your final destination. UPDATE: Since I mentioned ITA Software above, I've tried their search and it seems to be giving good results for your itinerary. Try it here: http://matrix.itasoftware.com/ Share Improve this answer Follow edited May 6, 2014 at 2:12 answered May 6, 2014 at 1:53 Eugene O's user avatar Eugene OEugene O 9,15433 gold badges4444 silver badges6060 bronze badges 5 * 1 Travelocity is the same as Expedia these days, quite obviously. They don't seem to do that any more. - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:39 * Doesn't seem to do what I want; please read the update to my question. - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:48 * 9 Obligatory link for "why flight search is hard", courtesy ITA Software: demarcken.org/carl/papers/ ITA-software-travel-complexity/... - lambshaanxy Commented May 6, 2014 at 5:02 * @jpatokal That doesn't look very difficult. Since most trips only have 1-3 legs, a probabilistic algorithm could solve it in a few milliseconds (99% of the time). Hell, you could probably bruteforce part of it. - Navin Commented May 7, 2014 at 3:30 * 4 Did you even read the slides? Routing is trivial, it's the fares that are the hard part, especially since they're non-Euclidean (A-C-B is often cheaper than A-B, even though it's a longer distance). This round trip on a fixed itinerary has over 25 million possible fares: demarcken.org/carl/papers/ ITA-software-travel-complexity/... - lambshaanxy Commented May 7, 2014 at 3:36 Add a comment | 2 http://www.momondo.com/ is pretty good. I attempted to input your search, modify if I screwed up :) link to Momondo search (click "Time of day (Outbound) Arrive" and set the right slider to 17:00) PS: remember to clear your cache before ordering your tickets since many airline companies jack up the price based on your interest and OS choice (Mac users are often met with higher prices). Edit: additional search options are enabled once you make your initial search, like, show only flight times before 5pm. Share Improve this answer Follow edited May 6, 2014 at 11:28 bain's user avatar bain 13333 bronze badges answered May 6, 2014 at 8:01 Eirinn's user avatar EirinnEirinn 12122 bronze badges 4 * 2 I fixed your link. Current best result for FRA>YLW is 806 Euros (Sembo) for flight on 20140729 arriving before 1700. Momondo is a good site. I usually use it in combination with Google Flight Search and Skyscanner to compare prices. - bain Commented May 6, 2014 at 11:30 * Thank you, I really need to read up on the exchange formatting. - Eirinn Commented May 7, 2014 at 10:45 * Momondo served me well many times over many months. BUT, I have ran dozens of searches in the past month and every time, Kayak showed a lower price than Momondo. Clearly one or both of them has changed something. - WGroleau Commented Jan 1, 2016 at 17:51 * "Mac users are often met with higher prices" [citation needed] (that's illegal, at least in Europe) - bfontaine Commented 7 hours ago Add a comment | 2 I personally like Hipmunk. http://www.hipmunk.com/ Shows the results in a Gantt chart so you can easily see flights available from a certain time period or arriving by a certain time period. You can also easily see how many layovers there are, and are sortable by price, agony, and other factors. Share Improve this answer Follow answered May 6, 2014 at 18:20 C Nick's user avatar C NickC Nick 12111 bronze badge 1 * Last time I tried Hipmunk, it suggested a flight with an airline that was FIVE YEARS out of business. - WGroleau Commented Dec 3, 2017 at 1:10 Add a comment | 2 Matrix by ITA Software is excellent for this: http:// matrix.itasoftware.com/ It's capable of giving you very complicated fares, and can find some good deals. You can't book directly from Matrix, it just shows you a fare and a price, but you have to go back through the particular airlines website, or over the phone. This isn't a problem, usually flight search tools just add a surcharge, and you are better off booking direct with the airline. Share Improve this answer Follow answered May 7, 2014 at 4:36 user13517's user avatar user13517user13517 2111 bronze badge Add a comment | 1 Expedia.com definitely provides this functionality. Using your example, the three cheapest flights are multiple airlines: * Condor + Alaska * Icelandair + WestJet * Airberlin + Iberia + Air Canada (though both the first two are actually British under the covers). Share Improve this answer Follow answered May 6, 2014 at 1:36 dlanod's user avatar dlanoddlanod 14.5k77 gold badges4545 silver badges102102 bronze badges 4 * You obviously missed the "arrive before 5pm" part of my question. In any case, Expedia does not show that multi-airline connection through LHR. - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 2:38 * 5 I didn't miss the "arrive before 5pm" part, I just chose not to run your query for you - that's easy enough for you to do. You asked for a flight search engine that combines multiple airlines - Expedia does. You didn't ask for one that provides the specific combination that you found that was cheaper. - dlanod Commented May 6, 2014 at 3:30 * 1 A search engine that only offers me connections at twice the price isn't exactly useful, now is it? - Matthias Urlichs Commented May 6, 2014 at 4:46 * 4 We don't know that it "only offers me connections at twice the price". We know that one time it offered one person a connection at twice the alleged price. - hippietrail Commented May 6, 2014 at 13:32 Add a comment | -2 You might try: http://www.comparavel.com which compares flights across different airlines. Disclaimer: The owner of this website belongs to my family. Share Improve this answer Follow edited Aug 1, 2017 at 15:37 answered May 6, 2014 at 15:13 Mikael Mayer's user avatar Mikael MayerMikael Mayer 9722 bronze badges 2 * 1 You might want to mention that that site is in French. Also, if you're associated with the site at all you should make that clear. Also, it's not at all clear that the site does anything remotely like what's asked for in the question. - SpaceDog Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 10:59 * 1 And I just realized this answer was posted over a year ago ... - SpaceDog Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 11:02 Add a comment | You must log in to answer this question. Highly active question. Earn 10 reputation (not counting the association bonus) in order to answer this question. The reputation requirement helps protect this question from spam and non-answer activity. Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged * air-travel * online-resources * airlines * bookings * flight-search-engines . * Featured on Meta * User activation: Learnings and opportunities * Preventing unauthorized automated access to the network * September 2024 photo competition, Text Linked -3 How can I use flight alliance websites to book multipart flights? 69 Why are one-way plane tickets more expensive than return tickets? 8 How can I book flights online with separate airlines? 11 Search engine for stop over possibilites 4 Is there a tool for planning "nested" round trips? 2 Where can I get help planning my plane trip? 2 Airline pricing website with multiple destinations -1 What company to use for a flight Paris-Dublin? -1 Can I book two tickets to reach my destination with a stop over to my destination? Related 20 Is there a flight search engine that has an option to show full flights? 12 Low cost airlines search engine? 13 Finding flights to Cuba with a flight search engine 3 Mixed flight / bus search engine? 4 Is there a flight search engine that allows me to pick the departure and return flight separately? 3 Flexible-date flight search engine with specified weekdays 12 What are 'hacker fares' at a flight search-engine? 3 Flight search engine for weekend flights Hot Network Questions * Relational-join Excel tables * How to prevent leaves from going into the water drains of a flat roof? * CC BY-SA 2.5 License marked as denied license in the FOSSA tool after upgrading to React Native 0.74 version * Creating new field from another field in QGIS Field Calculator * When is due diligence enough when attempting to contact a copyright holder? * Why does lottery write "in trust" on winner's cheque? * "...[it] became a ______ for me." Why is "gift" the right answer? * the usage of phrase 'Leave ... behind' * Crime and poverty: Correlation or causation? * How does salt water compare against chlorinated water in terms of long-term damage on diving masks? * How do I know what version of Ubuntu I have if I can't log in or get to tty? * Why Doesn't the cooling system on a rocket engine burn the fuel? * Why is the #16 always left open? * How can "chemical-free" surface cleaners work? * Enter a personal identification number * If directly exposed to the vacuum of space, what would be the effects on a womans reproductive system? * How uncommon/problematic is a passport whose validity period (period between issue and expiry) is a non-whole number of years? * SF story set in an isolated (extragalactic) star system * How much would you trust a pre-sales inspection from a "captured" mechanic? * Is it possible to monitor the current drawn by a computer from an outlet on the computer? * Individual pangram lists for words of lengths 12-letter, 13-letter, 14-letter, and 15-letter * Using of physical FPGA for PCB prototyping * Is it possible to make sand from bones ? Would it have the same properties as regular sand? * Why is thermal conductivity of thermal interface materials so low? more hot questions Question feed Subscribe to RSS Question feed To subscribe to this RSS feed, copy and paste this URL into your RSS reader. [https://travel.stack] * Travel * Tour * Help * Chat * Contact * Feedback Company * Stack Overflow * Teams * Advertising * Talent * About * Press * Legal * Privacy Policy * Terms of Service * Cookie Settings * Cookie Policy Stack Exchange Network * Technology * Culture & recreation * Life & arts * Science * Professional * Business * API * Data * Blog * Facebook * Twitter * LinkedIn * Instagram Site design / logo (c) 2024 Stack Exchange Inc; user contributions licensed under CC BY-SA . rev 2024.9.20.15615