Originally Posted by
AviationMoose
That's interesting to know. I've read so many things suggesting that 5-6 months out is the sort of sweet spot for non-sale fares, which I don't know is true or not. But it sort of stacks up if they adjust them when that far out.
I did also once buy a ticket 360 days from a flight which dropped by about a third for the next 8 months, at the other end of the scale.
I think the time for predictable 'sweet-spot' windows for booking is long dead and buried. With dynamic pricing algorithms based on O/D, data on customer searches from Google et. al. and now the induction of AI into pricing logic things will move more quickly than ever before and be in quasi-real time versus anything predictable or reactionary.
Airlines have always had a model that allowed them to extract as much money from each individual passenger for basically the same product (pedantic FT debates on best seats/cabins/equipment and lavs aside - as FT is an absolute outlier in the grand scheme of things) and that is getting more and more true. From an economics perspective it’s both beautiful and fascinating.