Flying with Kids: How to Make Air Travel Fun

I once paid £690 for three seats to Málaga because I booked in the first week of August, and the same flights, same airline, were £278 when I checked them back in late May. That was the mistake. Not the airline, not the airport, not the fact that my daughter had a meltdown somewhere over the Bay of Biscay. The mistake was the calendar.

So the rule I now build every family trip around is simple: the date you fly matters far more than the airline you fly, and it matters more than any trick you’ll read about clearing your cookies. Which is why everything below is organised by when you’re going, not where.

If your dates are fixed by term times, you’re competing with every other parent in the country for the same twelve days, and the airlines know it. Easter and the last week of July are the two worst windows in the UK calendar, and the February half-term isn’t far behind. I’ve watched a Bristol to Faro return for two adults and one child sit at £540 in October, then climb past £900 by the following March for the identical August dates.

Book those trips as early as the seats are on sale, which for most European short-haul is roughly eleven months ahead. Yes, that feels absurd. No, nothing better arrives later. Set a price alert on the search page and let it email you when the number moves, rather than checking every Sunday night and driving yourself mad.

What you’re buying with that early booking isn’t just the fare. It’s seat selection next to each other, a decent departure time, and the row where your four-year-old can see the screen.

Here’s the part parents don’t hear often enough: if you can move your trip by even a few days, you’re playing a completely different game. Take the family out of the school holiday window and prices fall hard, because you’re no longer bidding against half of Manchester.

I flew London to Copenhagen in the second week of September, three of us, hand luggage only, for £186 return in total. The same seats in the third week of July would have been closer to £500. Nothing about the flight changed except the month.

The one I keep coming back to is www.kupi.com, which I use to compare one-way prices across several carriers at once, mostly because family trips are rarely simple returns and I get tired of opening six tabs to check a Tuesday.

A few things worth comparing before you pay, because the headline fare is never the whole story:

• Whether baggage is included or added at £30-£45 per bag, each way
• Seat selection, which some carriers now charge for even when you’re allocated together anyway
• The airport transfer at the far end, since a “cheap” arrival at 23:40 often means a £60 taxi
• Whether the return date can be moved, and what that costs if a child gets ill

Last-minute family travel is rarely cheap, and I’d stop pretending otherwise. What you can still do is fly at antisocial hours, because a 6:15 departure on a Saturday is often £80-£120 cheaper per person than the 10:30, and small children are frequently better on early flights than anyone expects.

The honest alternative here, for a lot of readers, is the train. On Paris or Brussels from London, Eurostar wins outright once you’ve added bags, transfers and the airport faff, and the kids can walk around. Flying only beats it when the destination is genuinely far, or when the ferry and the drive together cost more than the seats.

What decides it, in the end, is whether your dates are movable. Move them and you’re a normal traveller again; fix them to the school calendar and you’re paying a premium for the privilege, so book early and stop checking.