If you care about flight information, EF will show the exact same thing that the airline can see. With delay reasons, etc.

KVS will only show "scraped" information, formatted in their format.


Also, I find KVS's mobile site to be buggy on flight availibility searches, where I have had results "change" airports, such as entering SGF (Springfield,MO) will return information which is sometimes accurate for SGF, but will be coded as SPI (Springfield, IL).

Also, I have seen results for ORD returned as CHI, and other weirdness

I find ExpertFlyer's mobile site much more expansive than KVS.


Figured I would share these tidbits.

KVS Tool vs Expert Flyer
 

Hi,

This question was most probably ask quite a few times but still couldn't find a good answer. Which is better KVS Tool or Expert Flyer? KVS is catching my eyes as it has more airlines, but I would like to know if it's accurate and if it shows how many reward seats there are open (I travel with family).

And is award seats availability shown on GDS like WorldSpan?

Thanks for your advise.

i'm trying to plan a somewhat complicated family vacation for early next year using award seats, and i'd love a quick answer to this question also. i'd prefer to not have to pay for both.

Learn to use the Search function. There aren't that many threads in this forum and about half of them answer your question:

Main threads:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...es-thread.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...tool-here.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...ard-nexus.html
(it's not just KVS vs EF, there is AwardNexus as well which largely duplicates KVSs award searching).

"vs" threads:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...pertflyer.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...lyer-tool.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...18-ef-kvs.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...ard-seats.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...-software.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...ilability.html

Rather than add yet another thread on this issue, we ask you continue the discussion in one of the threads offered above by pete4212. Thanks! /Moderator

I bought both KVS and EF but it has been quite some time since I have really been using them save cursory searches.

A couple of questions:

1. Regarding Expertflyer, I just noticed that there is a discrepancy regarding cx411 on 1-May, ICN-HKG. For flight availability it says plane type is 774 with F9 and A9 but the seat map shows a 773 without F class. Could it be that CX has changed equipment? Even so, how come this is reflected on Expertflyer's Seat Map but not on Flight Availability?

2. Regarding KVS, I have a stupid question - how does one search cx availability? I can search award but not general availability or seatmaps on cx!

Thanks.

It could be an equipment change, the Seat Map equipment code comes from the airline with the seat map but the Flight Availability equipment code is from the original schedule that would have to be updated by the airline.

You can have F & A class codes on a flight without a First class cabin, they would just book into Business. Airlines do this because the first class fare codes could be needed for a F ticket connecting to other flight segments that do have a First cabin.

Regular Availability for all airlines (incl. CX) is accessible via the main [Availability] Tab in the KVS Tool.

To access Seat Maps, just double-click the desired flight.

I am giving Expert Flyer a whirl and will give you a full review after a few months. I can say right off the bat I'm not impressed with the user friendliness of the website nor with customer support, though their rep hereon did reply quickly, albeit briefly, to my private messages.

RNE, first impression: It seems Expert Flyer expects its users to be experts, whereas those users expect the website to be the expert. Go figure.

As EFV has noted in the various EF specific threads, you should get support by emailing their customercare@ address, not by PM. That's what I do, there is even a link to email them after you login.

There are new-user guides to help you understand what's going on, did you read them? Both tools show raw travel data, KVS more so, if you don't understand the data then maybe they aren't for you or spend time to learn before evaluating the services.

Yes I e-mailed and yes I read. As I said, I'm still evaluating Expert Flyer. My initial impressions are simply impressions, not statements subject to retort. :)

No problem. Just wanted to make sure since you said "...to my private messages".

Please follow the discussion as the thread moves to the relatively new Travel Tools forum. Ocn Vw 1K, Moderator, TravelBuzz.

Month after month goes by and the only e-mail I ever get from EF is...

RNE, yeah, ExpertFlyer is saving me a lot of money! :rolleyes:

ExpertFlyer vs KVS
 

Which one do people prefer to find fare class availability?