(The website Rome2rio is the easiest way to explore public transportation schedules and prices anywhere in the world, including trains, buses, and ferries.)

KEY TAKEAWAYS Air travel accounts for 2.4 percent of global carbon emissions. Underlying that number is the fact that airplane emissions are particularly difficult to eliminate, and they’re growing quickly, though efforts are underway to limit net carbon output. Culpability for a plane’s emissions varies widely among passengers. Responsibility

Airlines have figured out a business model in recent years that depends not on fickle, price-sensitive vacationers but, instead, on more reliable sources of income like premium travelers, banks, corporate contracts, and fees. In a sense, all these items are subsidizing economy fares, making $300 roundtrip flights to Europe possible.

Rather than asking yourself if you’ll regret taking a trip you’re considering, ask yourself this: How many trips have you taken in your life that you wish you hadn’t? For most of us, the answer is none, even for trips that didn’t go particularly well.

Airlines’ pricing model is largely based on a single principle: achieving maximum willingness to pay from each passenger. If a passenger needs to take a certain flight and would pay whatever cost, an airline has left money on the table if they charge that passenger $200 rather than $2,000. To that end, one of the most important objectives for

By far the most difficult three months of the year to get cheap flights are (in ascending order of difficulty): June, August, and July. Summer is the most popular time of year to travel, for two primary reasons: great weather and school’s on break. Humans are fond of sunshine and warmth; many of us are inclined to get out when it’s nice out. For

Nowadays the practice of slashing last-minute fares has become virtually extinct. Not only that, it has been replaced by its polar opposite: jacking up last-minute fares. What happened? Airlines took a close look at who was buying fares in the last week or two before a flight. Turns out it wasn’t the typical leisure travelers. Sure, a handful of

it boils down to three primary factors: Where to fly? When to go? When to book? If it feels intimidating to optimize for cheap flights by having no prerequisites at all, try choosing one of these three considerations and centering your trip on that.

KEY TAKEAWAYS Keeping an eye on nearby airports—including ones within driving distance and even a short-hop flight—can vastly increase your odds of getting a cheap flight. In many instances, using a nearby airport can also mean less overall travel time. Though there’s no specific cheapest time to book flights, fares are most likely to become cheap