Italy is a dream vacation destination with gorgeous views, world-class dining, and fascinating places to explore. There are many unique places to visit in Italy, making it a romantic, soul-satisfying escape for adventure lovers everywhere.
To make the most of your Italian vacation, you’ll want to avoid expensive plane tickets draining half your travel budget or stressful flights with bad connections starting your trip off on a sour note. That’s why we’ve put together our top 5 essential tips to make booking your flight to Italy a piece of cake!
Book early
Don’t procrastinate! It’s best to book your flight as early as possible, especially during high season times. If you wait too long to book your flight to Italy and you book close to the time you want to go, there might be a spike in prices due to high demand!
Sure, sometimes it’s possible to get a good deal at the last minute, but it’s best not to count on it. Book early – at least six months out is best. But before you go ahead and book your flight for Italy, be sure to reserve any exclusive tours or curated experiences beforehand.
Most experiences simply aren’t available year-round due to the seasonality of many activities. To ensure you don’t miss out, you’ll want to know the availability and dates to put in your time-off request pronto and grab your seat before your preferred travel dates are SOLD OUT!
Schedule smart
When possible, try to schedule flights for weekdays. Flying out on a Friday can be more expensive than on a weekday simply because you’ll be competing with many Europeans taking weekend getaways in Europe in addition to international travelers. And if you’re booking a flight with a stopover, be sure to leave enough space in between flights especially if you’re flying with different carriers.
In the case of booking with two different carriers, your connection won’t be guaranteed. So if you happen to miss your connection with RyanAir when, for example, you booked the first leg of your trip with United, RyanAir won’t guarantee your connection and vice versa.
The truth is when you’re looking to save using a cheaper carrier, you might not save at all if you happen to be unlucky and miss your flight. It will be up to you to weigh your options and decide if the savings will be worth the risk and possible hiccup in your Italy trip.
Booking stopover flights and flights with different carriers isn’t the only way to get the best price for your flight to Italy. Google Flights can help you with the flight searching process. It’s one of the best tools to check flights and incredibly useful to have a total picture when trying to find the lowest rate combination for your international flight.
Another way to find flights is by browsing incognito. This can sometimes help you find a cheaper fare. Brave is a privacy browser that keeps you incognito, and DuckDuckGo is an incognito search engine. You can also choose to keep using your current browser and just open an incognito window, using that to search for and find flights.
That being said, it’s best to book directly with the airline if possible, because sometimes search engines don’t show all available flights.
Be aware of seating
Do you know how much legroom you will get on your flight to Italy? It’s important to think about this, because if you’re going to Italy from the US, you’ll generally be spending around 8 to 10 hours in the air. The first thing you’ll want to check is the pitch, or distance between rows of seats. This will give you some insight about how much legroom you’ll have on your transatlantic flight. Most airlines tend to have a similar pitch for their seats, which is usually between 29 to 32 inches. This chart can help you compare pitches across the different airlines.
To ensure that you’re comfortable throughout your flight, be aware of any seating limitations or space limitations you may have and plan accordingly. One way to secure more legroom for your flight at no additional cost or a low added cost is to reserve a seat in an emergency exit row, as these seats always have more room. Premium economy seats may offer more room and be worth the splurge in some cases, however sometimes it is not. That’s why it’s important to inform yourself on the specifics of the airline you’re booking to book your flight to Italy with and to do some research prior to booking to understand what features and amenities are included with each ticket class.
Get the best price
How much will getting a flight to Italy set me back? That’s probably what you’re wondering, especially when it comes to how to find the best price for your flight to Italy. Is there some way to predict flight prices in the future? Unfortunately, there isn’t a way to predict airline prices. Any website that claims to be able to do so is probably taking an educated guess… which is often wrong!
Some people opt to work with travel agents to try to find the best-priced flight, but that may not be the best idea. Travel agents do not have access to any special systems that let them find better flight prices than the average traveler. In the end, working with a travel agent may add to your cost and the benefit is most likely not worth it.
So what can you do? We recommend setting up price alerts on your phone using Google Flights or another flight search website. This way, you’ll know right away when the price drops for your perfect flight to Italy.
Have a comfortable flight
Depending on where you’re flying from, your plane trip to Italy can stretch for a long time. If you’re not prepared, you may be in for an uncomfortable flight! Remember to bring these things to make your long flight more pleasant:
- Noise-canceling headphones or earplugs
- A neck or back pillow
- Layered clothing so you can adjust for the plane’s temperature
- Facial mist and other skin moisturizers
- A downloaded series you can binge-watch, or downloaded ebooks and magazines
- Eye mask – this is essential especially if your seatmate has their light on and you need to get some shut eye
Need more help planning your trip?
We know, booking a flight isn’t the dreamiest part of your trip to Italy, but knowing the best ways to book a flight to Italy will make your vacation a lot smoother. Often, people taking a trip to Italy will focus so much on their bucket-list that they overlook some of the practical details of things like flight planning, on-the-ground logistics, and what it actually takes to have an authentic Italian experience – which ends up in disappointment, a whole lot of stress and missing out on the real Italy that you’ve been dreaming out experiencing your for your entire life.
That’s why we offer loads of comprehensive guides on everything from flight planning to figuring out what to pack for Italy to knowing the top mistakes to avoid when traveling to Italy as a starting point to planning the perfect trip to Italy. You can explore more Italy insider travel tips on our blog!
Enjoying the ultimate Italian dream vacation where you can explore Italy without the crowds and live like a local requires someone on the inside to translate the Italian experience and that’s exactly where we step in! Click here to learn about our Small Group Italy tours and find out why our clients say you’ll get to experience the real Italy, the Italy that so many people who visit Italy multiple times, never get to experience in their lifetime.
Ready to experience the real Italy? Click here to discover your next Italian vacation today!
PLANNING A FUTURE TRIP TO ITALY? PIN THIS POST FOR LATER!
