serpapi
[Google Flights API] Pricing and flight options don't match those in Google Flights
A customer reached out mentioning that they are getting different results with our API than those shown on Google Flights.
I was able to replicate this and see that the results returned have very different pricing, and there are more fights in Google flights than what we are returning with our API. It seems like our API is returning one flight option per airline, which seems to be what Google loads initially before showing all options.
Search: https://serpapi.com/playground?engine=google_flights&gl=us&hl=en¤cy=USD&type=3&travel_class=3&multi_city_json=%5B%7B%22departure_id%22%3A+%22GRU%22%2C+%22arrival_id%22%3A+%22%2Fm%2F02_286%22%2C+%22date%22%3A+%222025-03-02%22%7D%2C+%7B%22departure_id%22%3A+%22%2Fm%2F02_286%22%2C+%22arrival_id%22%3A+%22LAX%2CSFO%2CATL%2CDFW%2CBOS%22%2C+%22date%22%3A+%222025-03-03%22%7D%5D&deep_search=true
Results on Google Flights: https://www.google.com/travel/flights?hl=en&gl=us&curr=USD&tfs=CBwQAhokEgoyMDI1LTAzLTAyagcIARIDR1JVcg0IAxIJL20vMDJfMjg2GkgSCjIwMjUtMDMtMDNqDQgDEgkvbS8wMl8yODZyBwgBEgNMQVhyBwgBEgNTRk9yBwgBEgNBVExyBwgBEgNERldyBwgBEgNCT1NCAQFIA3ABmAED&tfu=EgIIAQ
Public links: Playground 1
Internal links: Intercom | Search Inspect 1
For more information. I initially thought the issue was isolated, but I’ve now noticed that almost every search I run returns incomplete results, as described above. This wasn’t happening a few weeks ago.
From what I can tell, the issue isn’t specific to multicity searches but affects other types too. This makes the tool almost useless, as the results being returned - although valid selections - have huge price discrepancies of what Google Flights actually displays.
And it looks like Serp can return more than one option per airline:
^returns two AA results priced at 503
@Stedelmanto Thank you for providing your input. Your feedback and points are very helpful. Our team will take this into account when finding and implementing a fix for this.
Can you please share an example (like a playground link or search ID) where you are seeing incorrect results for non multi city trips? This might help in investigating this issue further.
@sonika-serpapi I've been testing but haven't been able to replicate the incorrect results for non-multi-city searches. The rest still holds, but I'll update here if I come across the issue again for non-multi-city.
I came across an interesting result I wanted to share.
I know that Google's search algorithm sometimes ignores certain routes when optimizing searches. Here’s what I found:
When I search for a multi-city itinerary: GRU → DFW → LAX The following flight appears (Search ID: 67c393bb599d681389f6c943) at a price of $303.
However, when I expand the same search by adding more airports: GRU → DFW → LAX/ORD/IAD/IAH (Search ID: 67c396163d251083fa8dcd60), SERP does not return the same $303 flight found in the "simpler" original search.
At first, I thought this was due to Google's optimization algorithm overlooking that route when having multiple arrival airports. But after manually checking the Google Flights link that SERP returns for the second search, I found that it does display the same $303 flight - meaning that serp is the one not retrieving that flight. Not sure if having multiple arrival/departure airports somehow causing this.
google flights link associated with 1st search:
google flights link associated with 2nd search:
HI, @Stedelmanto. Thank you for sharing your findings. We'll take it intro consideration. cc @zyc9012 for visibility.
A potential customer reported this.
However, I'm able to see, even though only one time, that Google Flights itself returned a similar result as we did. So it could just be the behavior of Google Flights itself.
First try, got similar result
2nd try, got more results
The customer above also reported another similar issue:
Our API response:
Google Flights page has a lot more airline options:
Received another report of this. The customer noted an airline that appeared in results on actual Google Flights, but not through our API. Their original request didn't include deep_search, however I tried adding deep_search=true and got the same results.
The customer was also searching manually from Colombia with COP as the currency, but with US localization through our API. I tried both US and Colombian localization params in our API, and results were the same aside from the change in currency.
Actual Google Flights:
Our results:
Received another potential report of this. In this case, searching in Google Flights in the browser returns two results, but our API returns empty:
Playground | Inspector | Intercom
This morning a potential customer reached out after creating this issue.
After some further investigation, it seems that there is some strange behaviour on Google Flights' end, where the prices for Air India are not being displayed on initial load. However, after interacting with the UI and toggling between flight dates, the previously-searched flight will now have the price displayed (while the flight for the next day shows: "Price unavailable" until reload).
I have captured this behaviour in the following gif:
Our API does not return the price information for Air India flights, as a result.
Playground | Inspector | Intercom
Are there any updates or estimates on when this will be fixed? Noticed #2680 was opened and might be tangentially related.
Unfortunately I will need to pause my SERP subscription because of this issue - for my specific use case the scraping becomes useless with the bug described in this ticket.
Hi @Stedelmanto , unfortunately, we don't have any ETA to share. We can totally understand if you want to pause your subscription first, just let us know via [email protected].
We'll also reach out once we've deployed a fix for this issue.
We've released a fix for this. deep_search parameter works now.
SerpApi search:
Google Flights search:
@Stedelmanto tagging you for visibility. I hope the fix works on your end as well. Thank you very much for your patience.