Omar Martin

We would risk heading down a dead end if we didn't take this into account, given how quickly prices change so fast with events. It is absolutely necessary to check the dates of local events for our stay before even looking at flights, otherwise it's money down the drain. We can't just rush headlong; we need to take the time to ensure we won't pay double for a hotel room because of a football match.

Flight search engines give you dates and prices, but to know if the Cannes Film Festival will make the streets impassable or the hotel inaccessible, that's not where you'll find the information.
You can't seriously say that these tools concretize the atmosphere or crowd levels related to a local event when their primary function is to compare airfares.
If we were to reinvest in the idea of these platforms, would we expect them to inform us about the local impact of Heritage Days?
It’s important to understand that what these platforms measure is the supply and demand of transportation, not the soul of a place.

Flight search engines focus on the ticket price, and it’s an oversimplification to believe they reflect the real impact of local events on a destination. If we were to reassess the investment in these tools, we would realize they say nothing about the atmosphere or logistical constraints of a festival. A site like Skyscanner can show an increase in airfares during the Olympic Games, but it will never indicate whether the city will be crowded or public transport saturated. To anticipate this, specific event information is needed, not just a fare, but feedback or local forums.

Flight search engines are not the direct and main realization of the impact of local events on a stay; it is a distortion to rely solely on them.
Honestly, if we hadn't already invested so much attention in these platforms, would we see them as the primary solution to understand the real impact of an event?
These tools are made to find flight prices, not to explain the atmosphere of a city or logistical hassles that a festival can create, like massive traffic jams in Cannes during its Festival.
To truly anticipate and understand an event, more than just a list of fares is needed; specific information about the event itself is required.
We focus on the ticket price, but forget everything else: saturation of public transport or lack of seats in local restaurants.

Yes, it is true that relying solely on flight search engines is like watching a black-and-white movie while life is in color. The problem is that we are guided by the ease of these platforms without looking further. A glaring example is the impact of an event like the Pride parade in Paris: hotel prices soar well before flights are affected, and no flight comparator will really show you that.