To see and do more, it’s time to liven up the way you book flights. Scheduling multi-city flights, also known as open-jaw flights, is a tremendously clever but rarely used travel hack that can help you save time and money. Is there anything better than a cheap round-trip ticket to London? Consider taking a plane into London, traveling to Paris, and then returning home from there. You can frequently accomplish this without spending a significant amount extra for your travel.
That is the allure of open-jaw and multi-city flights, which are nearly identical with only a small variance. Although arranging a two-for-one (or even three, four, or more) journey requires a little more work than simply purchasing a round-way ticket, it is usually worthwhile.
What is an open-jaw itinerary, or multi-city flight?
While not every multi-city flight is an open-jaw flight, every open-jaw flight is a multi-city flight. Is your mind spinning yet? Now let us dissect it.
This is the appearance of it: A single flight from Chicago’s O’Hare (ORD) to London’s Heathrow (LHR) to Paris’ Charles de Gaulle (CDG) may constitute a multi-city flight, as could the addition of the last leg from Paris back to Chicago. You’re making contact with several cities, right?
One kind of multi-city flight is called an open-jaw itinerary, and that’s important. You leave that blank and travel between the two locations on your own, perhaps by train, rather than having someone connect you from London to Paris. You may even go one step further and take separate planes to and from different airports. or expanding your multi-flight adventure with more segments.
The majority of flight search engines, such as our favorite, Google Flights, view the two items as being identical. Most of the time, you may reserve open-jaw itineraries by using the multi-city search function. The difference is not that significant. Your final itinerary will see you arriving and departing from the airports of your choice.
When Is It Advisable to Make a Reservation for an Open-Jaw or Multi-City Flight Schedule?
Travelers should consider scheduling multi-city or open-jaw itineraries in several situations. Since there is only really one airport on the island and getting to another by boat would be quite difficult, it doesn’t make sense to book open-jaw if you are traveling to and from Aruba (AUA). However, destinations like Europe and Asia are ideal for multi-city travel because there are plenty of inexpensive airline flights available there, as well as convenient access to other modes of transportation.
The most well-liked justifications for scheduling multi-city or open-jaw flights are listed below
Save Money (or Points & Miles)
Using points and miles to fly can be made easier with open-jaw itineraries. Sometimes your preferred travel schedule doesn’t align with points and miles award space, therefore you may need to use numerous airports to make it work. However, you can easily fly out of another nation and avoid reserving round-trip train fees in countries like Europe, where almost every city is connected by convenient train and bus connections.
Imagine that this fantastic Aer Lingus Business Class flight offer has caught your attention. Furthermore, why not? But suppose you are unable to locate an award room to reserve the same return flight. Perhaps it’s a blessing! Instead, you can discover an even better trip home by using some of our other flight offers.
You can also use this incredible United Polaris business class award space to fly home if you decide to spend a few days in London. For only 10,000 extra points beyond the standard roundtrip, that equates to an additional city and another delightful business class journey! Open-jaw flights are beautiful because of this.
Save Time
Imagine that you have two or more cities in mind for your next trip to Europe. You’ve decided to spend a weekend in Belgium in addition to seeing London. Just carry out both.
By making an open-jaw itinerary reservation, you can save a little time. Take a direct flight from London to your home address rather than wasting a half-day traveling from London to Brussels.
Additionally, this method is not limited to use abroad. Domestic multi-city flights are also available for booking. For road journeys, they’re really useful. Would you like to spend a week on the Pacific Coast Highway? Travel with Delta on the same route to arrive in Portland (PDX) and depart Los Angeles (LAX). To help you save time and money, you may do this for a ton of different city pairs.
Save on Single-City Flights
Using open-jaw or multi-city flights can save you money even if you’re just visiting one place. Many cities have several airports; why not take off from the least expensive one?
Suppose you are traveling to Paris. What happens if there is a cheaper flight into Paris-Charles de Gaulle (CDG), but a cheaper flight out of Paris-Orly (ORY) on the way back? To do that, perform an open-jaw flight! For instance, your open-jaw itinerary might be JFK – CDG, ORY – JFK. Although it won’t always save money, this tactic is still worthwhile.
On Google Flights, you may look for low prices in several airports. You can enter up to seven departure AND seven destination cities into Google Flights!
Let’s imagine you’re looking for inexpensive flights to California’s Napa Valley. Instead of focusing just on flights into Santa Rosa (STS), broaden your search to include flights to nearby Bay Area cities such as San Francisco (SFO), Sacramento (SMF), Oakland (OAK), and San Jose (SJC), which are all easily accessible by car from Napa.
Include a Free Stopover
Take advantage of this opportunity to explore two places for the price of one if you haven’t used a stopover before. For up to seven days, a few airlines allow you to include a free or inexpensive stopover. Look into all the airlines that provide programs for stopovers.
You can add a layover in Iceland, for instance, if you’re traveling with Icelandair, either on the way home or to your final destination in Europe. Furthermore, the stopover cost may be less expensive than the standard round-trip fare due to some odd scheduling oddities in Icelandair’s schedule.
Setting Up Flights
I think that booking positioning flights is the reason I utilize multi-city flight searches the most. In case you’re unfamiliar with the phrase, positioning flights are extra flights that you reserve in addition to your primary international tickets to reach the most affordable airport, frequently saving hundreds of dollars.
I just used points to book positioning flights to connect to itineraries on Qatar Airways. The U.S. gateways for Qatar Airways are Miami (MIA) and Dallas (DFW). Therefore, from your home base in, say, Nashville (BNA), you’ll need to arrange transportation to and from both airports if you purchased an award space that departs from Miami and returns to Dallas.
Methods for Booking Multi-City or Open-Jaw Travel
- Organizing a multi-city trip is simple: Utilize Google Flights first. Instead of choosing “Round trip,” select “Multi-city.”
- Two groups of boxes will then appear. If you’re booking an open-jaw itinerary, you can enter your cities here (for flight one, enter city A to B, and for flight two, enter city C to city A).
- Otherwise, to build a multi-city itinerary, select “Add Flight”:
- By choosing “Add Flight,” you can add as many flight legs as desired. Next, begin your search to find your options!
- Use a filter to only view results for the airline you want to fly with if you’re trying to arrange a complimentary layover.
- Choosing the most affordable route could require some trial and error. To find out if rates are lower on particular days, experiment with alternative dates for each leg of your trip.
- Rather, begin your search by looking for affordable round-trip flight dates. Next, do a few different multi-city searches to get the least expensive itinerary.