Google Flights API: Current Status and Best Alternatives

Google is notorious for discontinuing products. Otherwise useful, some projects didn’t meet the expected financial, competitive, or innovative goals of the company. One such project, unfortunately, is Google Flights API (Application Programming Interface).

It allowed businesses to integrate aggregated airline data into their applications or websites. Real-time information on flight prices, availability, destinations, and timing made Google Flights API one of the best tools for various travel business uses. The flight API is no longer available, but there are quite a few alternatives.

Evolution of the Google Flights API

It all started on July 1, 2010, when Google acquired ITA Software that created the airfare search and pricing API QPX. With it, developers were able to integrate real-time flight data into their websites and applications.

Various travel business models, such as hotels and travel agencies, use such APIs to find flight information and book the best flights. Google’s purchase worried US authorities about possible antitrust violations, resulting in Google being required to provide access to their flight data for at least five years.

After the antitrust worries were addressed, Google released QPX Express, an improved version of QPX, better known as Google Flights API. It included many advanced filters for flight information — date, duration, departure, arrival, airline, carbon emissions, and other details.

Most importantly, this flight API provided accurate and up-to-date information. If a flight was delayed, discounted, or changed in any other way, the flight API immediately reflected it. Smaller travel industry businesses didn’t need to partner with multiple airlines to find different flight options.

Unfortunately, Google Flights API was shut down in 2018. The officially cited reason was a low interest among travel partners and users. It sparked speculation about Google’s future plans since the travel industry, at least at the time, was booming, and in different forms, the flight API features are still available.

Current Status of Google Flights API

After shutting down the flights API, Google shifted focus to its own flight information aggregator, Google Flights. While it is convenient for users when tracking prices, delays and other updates, it’s not a flight API replacement for developers.

It cannot be integrated into your apps or website, which essentially means traffic and sales you could acquire with aggregated flight information is now redirected to Google. The only publicly available flight API from Google now is the Travel Impact Model API. It calculates emission estimates — a metric also available on Google Flights.

Allegedly, enterprise QPX API is still available for large corporations with huge budgets and direct contacts to Google. It’s unlikely Google will reintroduce the publicly open Google Flights API anytime soon. Doing so would go against their own interest in developing an online flight search service.

Alternatives to Google Flights API

Google Flights API may be shut down, but the demand for flight data hasn’t disappeared. Many other flight APIs offer access to flight times, prices, and other data. Although less popular than Google Flights API was, many options are extremely useful for the travel industry.

Skyscanner Flights API

Skyscanner is best known as a flight search aggregator and travel agency for individual customers, but it also offers its own flight API. It offers well over a thousand partner airline data with flight times, availability, prices, carbon footprint, and more. Along with flight data, Skyscanner includes car rentals and hotel reservations.

The Skyscanner Flight API comes with no direct costs, but you might need to make an affiliate agreement with them. You might even earn money by redirecting customers to Skyscanner, but it might not be in line with all business models.

There is enough Skyscanner API documentation for a decent developer to get started. The partner support team is also known to be responsive. The API endpoints can be run and tested in Postman before being fully implemented, which helps to set it up.

Kiwi.com Flights API

Kiwi is a web-based online reservation system and travel management tool for online travel agencies. Their plugin is optimized for integration into various website designs to fit your branding. With over 150 airlines and real-time pricing data, Kiwi’s API is a comprehensive flight search API for travel-related businesses.

Kiwi.com API is praised for expense management and reports, but the tool itself may be a significant expense. You can purchase Kiwi API requests through the RapidAPI marketplace. The free plan charges for every request over 300, while other plans cost from $10 to $49 per month with overage charges.

Kiwi.com’s developer portal has all the information needed to start the integration, including API keys. Although the documentation isn’t freely accessible upfront, the API works with known integration methods Restful API and Graph QL.

Duffel’s Flights API

Duffel Flight API supports over 350 airlines, including the major ones like United Airlines, Emirates, and Turkish Airlines. Smaller air travel providers are also available through various partnerships. Duffel provides not only basic information on flight prices, times, and emissions but also advanced search with the possibility of providing accommodation options.

Duffel API is free to sign up and features a pay-as-you-go model, which makes it convenient to start using. For example, each order will be charged a $3 fixed fee along with a 1% of the total order value only when confirmed. Other features cost additionally, but it all grows similarly when your operation scales.

There’s extensive Duffel API documentation separate for flights and stays. A test environment, as well as SDKs (Software Development Kits) in Javascript, Python, and Ruby, are available to help you ease the process. All are open source and can be accessed even before you purchase the flight API.

Implementing Flight Data APIs

Each flight API is built with different programming languages and might require specific infrastructure on your end to work. In general, they all still are sets of protocols for retrieving real-time flight information. So we can outline some general steps to give you an idea of how to implement them.

1. Choosing a flight API

It’s essential to find an API that fits your needs and current infrastructure. API implementation can take significant effort, which might be wasted if you realize that the API is unfit for you somewhere down the road.

2. Acquiring the API key

An API key is crucial for authenticating requests and accessing data. No integration is possible without it. Most API providers will require you to register a free account or purchase at least the basic plan for acquiring the API key.

3. Understanding the API documentation

Read the documentation and consult the API provider if something is unclear or missing. Typically, documentation includes details on endpoints, sample codes, authentication formats, error-handling parameters, and other crucial information.

4. Selecting an integration method

API documentation should outline the available integration methods. Many flight APIs provide multiple options, such as RESTful or GraphQL. Choose the one that fits your website or app infrastructure the best.

5. Developing API integration

Some steps need to be taken before you start writing the actual code. They involve choosing the programming language and libraries, implementing authentication, error handling, and other crucial parts. Python is frequently used for API integration.

6. Testing the API functioning

It’s useful to run the individual components of the API code in a testing environment before integrating. After the code is live, the code should also be tested in real-world scenarios, preferably by real users.

7. Customizing the API

Customization might include design choices for how the data fields are visually displayed to match your product. Often customization also involves specific functions that might need to be developed additionally.

8. Data security

Most API providers recommend that securing the data would be between you and the flight API with means such as SSL certificates. It’s also important to double-check whether API data is encrypted and follows data protection regulations.

Tips and Best Practices

Implementing a functioning flight API doesn’t mean it no longer requires attention. The API will require constant monitoring and updates to avoid potential issues or security flaws. The data sets you or your customers collect might also need some attention.

• Regularly check for updates with your API provider.
• Prepare fallback routes in case the API or your product infrastructure changes.
• Maintain logs of API requests and responses for future troubleshooting.
• Respect the rate limits set by your API provider or your plan.
• Provide comprehensive documentation and comments for the API code.
• Perform scheduled reviews of the API integration.
• Rotate API keys periodically to minimize potential security risks.
• Regularly back up the data collected via the API.
• Audit the data collected with the flight API to ensure
• Parse data in case it’s stored in a larger database.

Use Cases of Flight Data APIs

Aggregated airline data is widely used among different sectors within the travel industry. Airlines use it for dynamic pricing and trend analysis. Online travel agencies, hotels, and other travel service providers implement it to upsell their own offers. No matter what travel business you run, chances are real-time flight data will be useful.

• Flight and booking search

Customer retention often rests on how convenient it is to find flights and other services related to your business. Integrating a flight API to your website or app is a way to help customers find related services. A good integration will show your business as a trustworthy source of travel information.

• Dynamic pricing

Many travel businesses, especially airlines, have already moved beyond static pricing. Real-time flight data is invaluable for building a platform based on dynamic pricing. It not only enables travel-related businesses to react quickly to demand changes and competitor strategies but also maximizes profits.

• Consumer behavior analysis

With flight APIs, developers can create custom analytics tools to understand the latest travel demand, customer preferences, and other trends within a specific sector or location. It’s useful for market research purposes when tracking and predicting consumer behavior.

• Revenue management

Airlines and other related businesses frequently use historical flight data to manage expected revenue. It’s a crucial data point to forecast possible peak downward periods as well as price trends. Accurate forecasting is crucial for maximizing revenue or simply keeping the business afloat.

• Travel packages

Integrating flight data will allow your travel business to provide comprehensive travel packages. You can pair your services with flights, car rentals, hotel reservations, or other offerings for better prices. Alternatively, you can help clients find the needed travel services themselves more easily.

Conclusion

Although Google replaced its API with customer-oriented Google Flights, there are still many great flight API solutions for travel businesses. Follow the best practices of implementing API responses and use travel fare aggregation proxies for the best results.