Worst flight and hotel booking sites caught keeping best deals from customers

02 February 2024 , 16:22

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The study found different websites show very different prices (Image: Shared Content Unit)

Booking websites consistently fail to show the cheapest flights and hotel prices available, a new study has found.

Holidaymakers are urged to book directly through airlines and accommodation providers following the survey results, which showed some price-checker websites completely failed to highlight the cheapest fares.

Expedia was found to be the site least likely to find consumers the cheapest flights. When Which? checked 10 different flight journeys across nine websites (including four booking sites and five comparison sites), and recorded the price shown for bookings one week, six weeks and six months before the departure date, Expedia failed to return the cheapest option on any occasion.

This may be because Expedia does not offer flights from some budget airlines, such as Ryanair and Wizz Air.

Meanwhile Opodo returned the cheapest flights more often than any other booking site Which? looked at – 11 out of 30 times. That still means customers are not seeing the best deal on almost two-thirds of searches.

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It is definitely worth checking several sites before booking (Getty Images)

Previous Which? research found that while some Online Travel Agents (OTAs) such as Opodo may often offer the cheapest headline fare, once extras like baggage or seat selection are added, the final price will often work out significantly more expensive than booking directly with the airline. Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary has spoken out against this practice, while the UK Government has attempted to legislate against it.

With no flight comparison site vastly outperforming the others on their ability to find the cheapest flight, it is definitely worth checking at least a couple of platforms before committing to a booking decision.

When it came to hotel bookings, there was a clear winner. Which? compared the cost of 30 overnight stays in ten hotels across nine different websites, and found booking direct rather than using a booking site offered the cheapest price half the time.

Comparison sites - which trawl other websites for different deals - again proved partially useful. Kayak and Trivago found the lowest, or joint lowest price on 12 occasions, while Skyscanner was close behind with 11 times.

Hotel booking sites - which let you book a limited number of options directly -were more likely to source the highest prices. Agoda returned the most expensive price on 14 out of 30 occasions, while Expedia and Booking.com each had the dearest prices on 13 out of 30 occasions.

Cheapest flight booking sites

(Name of site, number of times cheapest, number of times most expensive)

1. Opodo: 11, 0
2. Google Flights: 6, 0
3. Cheap Flights: 5, 0
4. Kayak: 5, 0
5. TripAdvisor: 4, 0
6. Skyscanner: 3, 0
7. Lastminute.com 1, 6
8. Booking.com 0, 11
9. Expedia: 0, 16

Cheapest accommodation booking sites

(Name of site, number of times cheapest, number of times most expensive)

1. Kayak: 12, 0
2. Trivago: 12, 2
3. Skyscanner: 11, 0
4. Hotels.com 4, 8
5. Expedia: 3, 13
6. Agoda: 1, 14
7. Lastminute.com: 0, 5
8. Booking direct: 15, 1

The research was carried out on 3 October 2023. Which? recorded prices of 10 stays and 10 flights one week, six weeks and six months before departure, totalling 30 fares across all sites.

A spokesperson for Expedia said: "Consumers in the Which?’s survey have rated Expedia as the best in finding value for money, ease in finding flexible fares, transparency of fees and site functionality, and we believe that the experience of thousands of travellers trumps individual research, as the parameters and methods can differ widely from real-life purchasing experience.

"Prices for flights are dynamic – which means that as airlines sell out of fares or load new fares, price changes can occur, - and while we don’t offer flights from a small number of budget airlines, it doesn’t mean we don’t aim to offer the best price for the airlines we have available on our website.”

A LastMinute spokesperson said: "Which? have used a narrow survey and a narrow range of flight and accommodation options to make far-reaching claims about the performances of different travel companies.

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"Some of the companies named are flight specialists, others accommodation specialists and others, like us are dynamic package holiday experts. It's like comparing apples and oranges and saying which ones are bananas.

As an OTA we act as intermediaries offering a compelling service to travellers. We allow them to compare and mix travel options from different providers - something individual airline companies can't do - and deliver great value holiday packages to millions of customers across Europe.

"Package holidays are booming and our Dynamic Holiday Packages draw from an extensive inventory including 445 airlines and more than 1.2 million accommodations globally. Our Dynamic Holiday Packages offer additional protection and security to customers should anything go wrong, e.g. protecting them from the risk of cancellations.

"In addition, the OTA inventory of travel options also includes alternatives to flights, like trains and buses, thus offering customers more eco-friendly travel choices which would hardly be evaluated otherwise.

"As always the customer is always right, and they will continue to benefit from having as many choices available to them - before they book their holiday."

Milo Boyd