On a flight from L.A. to San Francisco, you could pay six times more than your seatmate
On a flight between Los Angeles and San Francisco — one of the nation’s most popular air routes — a passenger can pay up to six times more for an economy seat than another passenger on the same flight.
That is one of the conclusions of a study by the travel planning app Hopper. The researchers compared the prices of six major carriers and found that United Airlines has the greatest variability in prices on that route. Delta Air Lines has the least.
That means if you fly United on that route, you have the greatest chance of getting a real bargain — and a high likelihood of overpaying for an economy seat. On Delta, the prices vary less, meaning what you pay will be closer to what your fellow passengers pay.
Economy seats on United ranged in price from about $100 roundtrip to $550, depending on how far in advance you booked the flight, according to Hopper, which analyzed millions of fares for the study. On Delta, the seats ranged from $150 to $400 roundtrip on the same route.
Alaska Airlines sells seats with a bigger price range — from $100 to $600 — than United, but Alaska offers fewer seats that vary in price.
Alex Chang, a data scientist for Hopper, said several factors influence the price of an airline ticket, including how far in advance the seat is booked, how much inventory is available and what rival carriers are charging for the same route.
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