How to get Cheap Flights to Italy

If you're hoping to find cheap flights to Italy - be it Florence, Rome, Venice, Pisa or Milan, you'll find that there are many more options available to you today, compared to a few years ago. It used to be that you had to book your flights through a travel agent, but now with so many online booking websites its easier to find a cheap flight to Italy.

The important thing to remember when booking flights online is that it pays to shop around. If you want to make sure that you get the best deal, you should aim to visit at least 5 different websites to check out the prices. For example, I checked the price for a return flight from Chicago to Florence leaving on 1st October 2005 and returning on 8th October 2005 and found flights ranging from $960 up to $1470. For flights on the same dates from London to Florence I found flights ranging from £162.10 up to £880.50. The prices were different on each of the websites that I checked.

It's also worth considering flying to or from nearby airports. The more flexible you can be, the better chance you have of getting cheap flights to Italy. For example, if you are travelling to Florence, you may want to consider flying to Pisa airport. Pisa is a 1 hour train journey from Florence and has a much bigger airport. A quick check on the travel sites for the dates I mentioned, showed that I could save £42 on the cheapest airfare by travelling from London to Pisa instead of London to Florence.

Here's a list of the best sites to use for booking cheap flights to Italy. Bookmark this page and you'll have a handy reference guide to check all the websites to book flights from.

Flights from the USA to Italy

The following sites allow you to book flights from the USA to Italy online:

• Expedia Flights - Expedia lets you search for flights on multiple airlines at the same time, including American Airlines, Lufthansa, British Airways and Alitalia. I always visit this site first as its fast and the prices are pretty competitive.
• TripAdvisor - has a selection of different airlines and is also a great place to read unbiased reviews of all the popular hotels in Italy.
• Travelocity - this is another good site for booking flights online and also searches many different airlines simultaneously
• Ebay Tickets & Travel - it's now possible to book your vacation on Ebay. Take care to look at the feedback rating for the seller before you buy, to ensure that they are an established Ebay seller with prior positive feedback.

Flights from the UK to Italy

The following sites allow you to book flights from the UK to Italy online:

• Expedia.co.uk Flights - Expedia lets you search for flights on multiple airlines at the same time including British Airways, KLM, Lufthansa an Alitalia
• Lastminute.com flights - Despite its name, you can book flights up to a year in advance on this site
• Thomson Flights - Flights to Pisa and Venice can be booked through this site.
• Travelocity - this is another good site for booking flights online and also searches many different airlines simultaneously
• TripAdvisor - has a selection of different airlines and is also a great place to read unbiased reviews of all the popular hotels in Italy while you're there.
• Ebay.co.uk Tickets & Travel - it's now possible to book your vacation on Ebay. Take care to look at the feedback rating for the seller before you buy, to ensure that they are an established Ebay seller with prior positive feedback.

It is often worthwhile visiting the airline's own website as sometimes they may have special offers on.

Each time you book a flight visit at least 3 of the websites listed above (more if possible) and find the cheapest most convenient flight for you, then visit the airlines' own website for the two cheapest fares to see if you can get a better price. Finally, if you have some spare time on your hands and really want to make sure that you have the best price you could also phone a couple of travel agents to see if they can beat the prices that you have found.

Finally, don't forget to sign up for the airline's frequent flyer program. All airlines, apart from the budget airlines have their own frequent flyer program and will reward you with miles for every flight that you take with them. Frequent Flyer programs cost you nothing to join and can save you huge amounts of money. This year I'm flying from Edinburgh to Pisa (via Germany) on Lufthansa. I only have to pay airport tax, as I'm using the miles that I earned from my previous trips to the USA with United Airlines.

Find out more tips for booking the best flight in the Ultimate Guide to Florence and receive a free bonus ebook explaining how you can get cheap flights as an air courier.

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