ITA Software Blog

Calling all savvy flyers: book smarter with Flight Search

2013-05-09T07:50:00.000-05:00

In honor of National Travel & Tourism Week in the U.S., and just in time for summer travel planning, we thought we'd share some tips on finding the best airfares.

Let’s say you want to plan a long weekend somewhere in the U.S. that involves an easy flight (under two hours, nonstop) and costs less than $350. You can easily search for the best option by going to www.google.com/flights, where you can pick dates, set the sliders to your parameters and leave the destination blank. Live prices will appear on the map, so you can quickly see the destinations that fit your criteria.

Another option for flexible travelers is to check prices for different airports in your origin area. We always wanted to visit The Grand Ole Opry, and it could be especially fun during the Fourth of July weekend. Since we live in Chicago, it is easy to drive to several surrounding airports to save money. As shown below, I used the dropdown check list to search fares for flights departing from Rockford, Milwaukee, O’Hare, and Midway to anywhere. Instantly I was able to see that good flight options are still available for our dates to fly from O’Hare to Nashville for $246. (Sometimes, the closest airport does work best for you. But it’s worth trying the others.)

Whether you’re planning a trip on your desktop, tablet or phone, you can use Flight Search to search for countries, states, islands and even continents from any origin in the U.S., Canada, France, U.K., Italy, Spain or Netherlands.

Set your parameters and go explore the U.S.! It’s easier than you think.

Cara Kretz, Marketing Communications, Travel

Dreaming where to go with your AAdvantage miles?

2013-03-21T08:35:00.001-05:00

Want to go on that dream vacation with your American Airlines’ AAdvantage miles but not sure where you can fly? Redeeming miles for flights just got easier now that American has launched the new Award Map, powered by our QPX™ Reward Shopping feature.

This new tool helps users quickly and easily search for and book award travel using their AAdvantage miles. Users simply search with criteria, such as destination category by region or interest, and the miles they wish to use, in addition to regular search parameters like their departure airport, dates of travel and cabin preferences. Behind the scenes the QPX Reward Shopping engine quickly computes a huge number of possibilities to present the user with all available award flight options within their desired mileage amount. Available destinations are then displayed on American’s intuitive Award Map, making it easy for travelers to evaluate all their options and book using their AAdvantage miles.

“We’ve had a long standing relationship with American Airlines, helping them innovate with pricing and shopping since 2004,” said Gianni Marostica, Commercial Director for Travel at Google. “We were thrilled to help them take this latest innovation from idea to implementation in a few short months. Congratulations to the team at American Airlines on this exciting and successful launch.”

Posted by Nate Nottke, Senior Technical Account Manager

Bon Voyage, Buon Viaggio, Buen Viaje, Bon Viatge, Boa Viaxe!

2013-03-18T11:46:00.000-05:00

If you live in the UK, France, Italy, Spain or the Netherlands -- and are thinking of hiking the Swiss Alps, visiting the Greek Isles, taking a bite out of the Big Apple in NYC or simply planning a business trip -- Flight Search is now available to make planning your trip easier.

Starting today, you can use Flight Search to quickly find, compare and book flights originating from each of these countries to any airport in the world. You'll also be able to search for flights from airports in these countries and see prices in your local currency. Additionally, you can conduct searches in 8 languages: English, French, Italian, Spanish, Basque, Catalan, Galician and Dutch -- and see prices in your local currency.

Smarter travel planning
Let’s say you’ve decided the Greek Isles are your vacation destination of choice, but you’re not sure which airport offers the most affordable fares. By typing ‘Greece’ as your destination, you’ll be able to quickly compare the cost of the different options, viewing live prices on the map.

Likewise, if you’re looking to take the family to New York City but are unsure of the best time to go, you can click on our ‘Lowest fares’ icon to see which dates will get you the lowest fare.

We choose the best flights based on cost and total travel time, while covering a variety of departure times and airlines. But, you can always view longer or more expensive flights by selecting, 'Show all'. Flight Search makes it easy for you to:

Find flights quickly. As you make changes to dates, destinations and filters, results will load fast in a format that’s easy to scan.
Discover places to go on a map. Explore possible destinations and view live ticket prices by surfing the map. You can filter by price, airline or flight duration.
Figure out the best time to travel. Quickly see which travel dates are least expensive by dragging the date selector forward or backward, or click the "Lowest fares" icon to compare lots of dates at once.
See a simple list of the most relevant flights. Use our easy-to-scan list or compare options and find the flight that's most convenient, least expensive, wi-fi enabled or simply the one that best meets your needs.

Sometimes we are not able to show results for every single airline and we will make that clear. We are working to expand our relationship with other airlines, and bring Flight Search to more countries and in more languages.

To access Flight Search in your local country or language, type:

We’ve worked to provide you with fast results as you browse a simple list of the most relevant flights, figure out when to travel, and get ideas about where to go and book your trip online. We hope you’ll enjoy planning your next trip with Flight Search! Bon Voyage!

Posted by Noam Ben Haim, Senior Product Manager, Travel

Virgin Atlantic makes comparison shopping easier

2013-03-15T11:00:00.000-05:00

Virgin Atlantic, one of the world's leading airlines, recently launched new functionality and a completely new website at www.virgin-atlantic.com. Using our QPX™ pricing and shopping technology, the new website improves the overall shopping process and lets flyers search for flights in a much faster manner -- across all global markets where Virgin Atlantic flies. Since re-launching the website five months ago, Virgin Atlantic has seen a sizeable increase in online bookings and nearly 5% in cabin uplift.

Virgin Atlantic first launched these capabilities for their European, United States, South African and Australian markets. They recently completed launches for Hong Kong, Nigeria and China. In April of this year, their global rollout will be complete, launching to the Caribbean, UAE, Japan, Ghana and India.

With the new capabilities, Virgin Atlantic can now present flyers with more information, earlier in the process -- such as offering solutions for all classes of service on the initial flight selection page. This lets flyers quickly choose between Economy, Premium Economy and Upper Class options to find the best time, cost and class of service across a 7-day window.

As part of the launch, Virgin Atlantic also added videos about in-flight amenities and services to their search page, to aid conversion and upsell. These videos let travelers get a first-hand view of what it’s like to fly in the different cabin classes.

Michael Daventry, Manager of eBusiness Channel Delivery & Operations, Virgin Atlantic said, “We’ve been very pleased with the results of this launch! When flyers see the value they can get for the higher fares, they often trade up. The changes we’ve made to our website, in partnership with our IT team and web development agency LBi, plus the ease of integration that ITA offers, will allow us to introduce new features and functionality to our customers in a much faster manner. Later this year we hope to add: interline shopping, the ability to combine award miles and money, and award calendar shopping. We’ll be able to deliver the same great online service for all our customer needs.”

Virgin Atlantic is a great customer and we’re really pleased with the success they’ve had so far. We look forward to helping them achieve their goals throughout 2013.

Posted by Brian Mulvey, Program Manager

One year later -- proven and ready to weather any storm!

2013-02-28T09:00:00.000-06:00

One year ago, Cape Air launched our new airline platform, a 100% completely new, scalable and modern airline passenger service and reservations system. After 130,000 flights and three New England superstorms, we can say the system has been fully tested and is proven, reliable and efficient.

Hosted on two parallel systems, disaster recovery is integrated into the very architecture of the system. When unplanned events strike, or major infrastructure upgrades are required, we have the capability to move between parallel systems without downtime or interrupted service -- and in a matter of minutes. There is no need for experts to fly data tapes to another safe location or spend hours transferring large data files, as with some legacy systems.

Having a redundant architecture allowed us to move Cape Air from their primary reservations environment to their secondary environment and back again, a number of times over the past year. Even during Nemo, Superstorm Sandy and the recent Nor’easter, Cape Air employees were able to offer uninterrupted service to their customers, getting them where they needed to go -- as quickly and painlessly as possible.

Since launching, Cape Air has seen additional benefits and efficiencies, including:

The new system made it easy for Cape Air to roll out a steady stream of new features and releases that lighten the load for customers and employees. In the past 12 months, Cape Air integrated 464 improvements with an average integration time of only 30-45 days.
The integration between the reservations and departure control components allows Cape Air employees to easily shift between the call center and the airport -- using a system that looks and feels the same across these very unique functions.
Agents love how easy it is to check in passengers and baggage, and to add other additional information, to better serve their customers.
Cape Air customers often cite the ease of use, convenience of booking with a profile, how quickly and easily they can change and cancel reservations, and the general intuitiveness of the system.

Dan Wolf, CEO of Cape Air, said “The past year has been full of success moments, in large part thanks to the team and technology provided by ITA. The launch was just about the smoothest I’ve ever seen, and we’ve been able to roll out new features without missing a beat. More importantly, our passengers are finding the way they search, book and travel to be faster, easier and more personal. ITA’s airline platform did not disappoint!”

We’re thrilled with the success Cape Air has had over the past year, and look forward to the exciting updates they’re planning for 2013. To learn more about how Cape Air is making history and delighting its travelers, you can read the full case study.

Posted by Ed Orciuch, Manager, Software Engineering, Travel

MileWise lets you search flights in cash, miles and points on Android devices -- including Nexus 7

2013-02-20T12:37:00.000-06:00

MileWise uses our QPX™ pricing and shopping technology on milewise.com to give users a faster and more comprehensive flight shopping experience.

Now, Android and Nexus 7 users have access to the same great speed and broad range of search options.

In addition to these benefits, QPX also enables other innovative features for MileWise Users:

Combo Fares let users combine two one-way tickets with different carriers and payment types, for big potential savings
Price Alerts let users instantly know if the lower-tier mileage seat or a great cash fare has become available
Search Filters give users a full set of filters, making it easier to find exactly what they're looking for

Users also have access to several innovative MileWise features that allow them to:

Track 500+ programs (including airlines, hotels, credit cards and many others)
Explore places to go, using individual rewards or cash
Get expiration alerts to make sure they never lose hard-earned miles and points again
Receive activity notifications when status level or balance changes

MileWise lets users see real-time flight prices in cash, airline miles, and hotel and credit-card points -- on one screen. They track reward program balances, status and expirations, combining that data with travel and redemption preferences, to recommend the best way to pay.

Congrats to MileWise on their successful launch. MileWise for Android is available for download in the Google Play Store at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.milewise.app.

To learn more about ITA by Google, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by Asif Khan, Sales and Business Development Manager

Explore neighborhoods and easily find hotels with new Google Hotel Finder features

2013-02-05T10:05:00.000-06:00

When visiting a city for the first time, you may want to stay close to the sites you want to see -- or, you may wish to stay in an area of town that you find intriguing. We've made it easier for you to do both, via a new Google Hotel Finder feature that makes it easy to explore neighborhoods in some of the most popular destinations.

Just go to www.google.com/hotels and choose the city you’re planning to visit. After you pick your travel dates, you’ll see a small panel on the top left corner of the results map. You can hover over that panel to see descriptions of different neighborhoods within the city you’ll be visiting. When you’ve done your reading and chosen the neighborhood that best suits your travel needs, you can select that neighborhood to narrow the list of available hotels.

In addition to making it easier to choose the location of your hotel, we’ve also simplified the process for filtering hotel results. To take advantage of this improved experience, simply type your preferences in the search box along with the location (e.g. “3 star hotel in London under $200 with wifi”). The correct filters will be automatically set.

Finally, you will now be able to find your favorite hotel chains with greater ease via a new filter that restricts results by hotel brand.

We look forward to helping you find the best hotel for your next trip.

Posted by: Maciek Nowakowski, Product Manager, Travel

Now you can use Flight Search to plan a trip for the whole family

2013-01-31T08:46:00.000-06:00

Since launching Flight Search, we’ve heard from many travelers eager to use Flight Search to plan trips for their entire family. Starting today, we’re adding support for multiple passengers, as well as children and infants.

It’s easy. Select the number and type of passengers you want to bring along. Your price will be updated, instantly. Then click on the “Book” button to conveniently complete your booking with our partners.

Our goal is to make planning and booking travel as fast and enjoyable as possible -- whether you’re traveling alone, with a friend or with your entire family. Try Flight Search today to see how fast and easy it is.

Posted by Bob Lewis, Software Engineer

Flight Search lets you search for regions, not just airports

2013-01-28T09:29:00.000-06:00

Let’s say you want to take your family to Hawaii for spring break, but you’re not sure which of the islands sounds most appealing. There is now a way to quickly and easily search for a broader set of destination information. In this case, instead of checking prices to Kailua-Kona or Kahului, you could type ‘Hawaii’ into Flight Search. Live prices would then appear on the map, so you can quickly compare the cost of the different options.

Whether you’re planning a trip on your desktop, tablet or phone, you can use Flight Search to search for countries, states, islands and even continents from any U.S. or Canadian origin.

Try searches like ‘Australia’, ‘Europe’ or ‘Florida’, and don’t forget to send us a postcard!

Posted by Peter Balsiger, Software Engineer

Giving back in 2012

2013-01-23T10:33:00.001-06:00

In the spirit of giving, we wanted to take a moment to reflect upon some of the charitable efforts our Boston Googlers have made over this past year.

Provided local grants to MIT’s MITES and MOSTEC programs, Science from Scientists, CodeEd, Breakthrough Cambridge, Digits, Citizen Schools, hack/reduce and many more
Over 220 Boston Googlers joined more than 5,000 Googlers across the globe to give back to our local communities during the week of GoogleServe 2012
Hosted over 1,000 K-12 and university students for tours of the office, and to learn about computer science and online marketing careers
Donated time and talents to train 366 nonprofits on Google tools for nonprofits, 70 teachers on Google EDU tools and 701 small-medium business on Google small business tools. Check back here for future local training events
Trained more than 75 Boston senior citizens on basic internet tools, search and email through our Age Engage program
Donated time and talents to more than 130 students from Boston Public middle schools, through our partnership with Citizen Schools
Raised over $8,600 and collected 240 non-perishable items for the Greater Boston Food Bank
Raised funds to help care for local Boston women and children at Rosie’s Place, a sanctuary for women in need
Hosted Google’s Computer Science Summer Institute, a three-week program that boosts the computer science skills of 30 rising college freshmen from underrepresented backgrounds
Partnered with the Community Charter School of Cambridge and the Kendall Square Association to host a Third Thursday event for the Kendall Square community
Delivered meals to the critically ill and homebound through the annual Thanksgiving Pie in the Sky fundraising event
Donated more than $2,000 to New York Cares to benefit Hurricane Sandy relief efforts, by selling hundreds of shirts across multiple Google offices
Donated over 80 gifts to families in need through our annual ABCD Headstart gift drive
Assembled Thanksgiving baskets for the East End House, which delivered over 850 baskets to needy families in the Massachusetts area

While this represents only a small portion of the charitable efforts made by Googlers around the world, we wanted to acknowledge the kind hearts and minds of our Boston-based team!

You can find out more about the global grants and Global Impact Awards we host on the Google Giving page and the Official Google Blog.

Posted by Liz Schwab, Cambridge Community Affairs Lead

ITA by Google and MileWise let you search flights in cash, miles and points on your mobile phone

2012-12-20T10:17:00.001-06:00

Recently, we introduced MileWise as one of our newest QPX™ customers. MileWise presents users with real-time flight prices shown in cash, airline miles, and hotel and credit-card points -- on one screen. MileWise also tracks traveler reward program balances, status and expirations, combining that data with travel and redemption preferences, to recommend the best way to pay.

Now, MileWise users can search with our QPX pricing and shopping technology on milewise.com and their iPhones (Android will be available in Q1 2013). This means MileWise users have improved speed and range of search options whether they’re using their desktop, laptop, tablet or mobile device.

Here’s a snapshot of some of the features MileWise users have access to with MileWise for iPhone:

Innovative search features enabled by QPX

Combo Fares: combine two one-way tickets for big potential savings
Recent Searches: quickly re-try searches to see if that mileage seat has opened up
Search Filters: full set of filters so users can find exactly what they’re looking for

More innovative features for MileWise users

Track 500+ programs (including airlines, hotels, credit cards and many others)
Explore great places to go using individual points and rewards
Expiration Alerts: never lose hard-earned miles and points again
Receive Price Alerts
Activity notifications when status level or balance changes

Sanjay Kothari, Co-founder, MileWise, said “To become the best one-stop travel search engine, we needed an amazing mobile offering. With ITA's help, we believe we were able to deliver that. And, our Android mobile and tablet versions will be released in the first quarter 2013.”

Congrats to MileWise for their successful launch. MileWise for iPhone is available for download at https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/milewise/id548797388?mt=8.

To learn more about ITA by Google, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by Asif Khan, Sales and Business Development Manager

A better, faster travel planning experience: 2012 updates

2012-12-19T08:00:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

Google aims to help people turn their intents into actions, lightning fast. For travelers, this means we’re helping to take the complexity out of planning a trip by making it fast and easy for users to find the information they need to plan their next journey. Whether you’re looking for information about flights, hotels, activities or destinations, we have tools to help you -- and they are easily accessible for people on the go. Some of our favorite new functionality is outlined below.

More information, better presentation
This year, we’ve made some changes to the user interface of Flight Search, and added features that offer more information about amenities and fees; we did this to help users feel well-informed, and to help them quickly choose the best itinerary.

For instance, you can now quickly compare multiple destinations and multiple days simultaneously, using live prices, with our recently introduced experimental feature called Flight Explorer. Try it at www.google.com/flights/explorer.

Flight Explorer experiment search results page

You can also use a number of new features to tailor your flight shopping:

More easily calculate the total cost of your trip by taking a look at the baggage fees displayed next to each flight option
Choose a flight offering in-air connectivity by viewing a new indicator noting flights that offer Wi-Fi
Consider a little more luxury in the sky by comparing the cost of flying business or first class instead of coach
Easily plan complex itineraries -- such as those including multiple stops, or trips that involve a flight into one city and a return trip from another -- without confusion, using our new, user-friendly interface

Multi-city trip, Wi-Fi availability indicator, upgrade cost and checked baggage fees

Going global
In March, we made it possible for users to find flights to more than 500 destinations outside the US. Soon after, we enabled this capability for any international destination airport, for flights originating from the US or Canada. Globetrotters can try these features at www.google.com/flights, or just type your departure city and destination in the search box.

Results for international destination flight

And late this year, we rolled out localized versions of Hotel Finder in France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, Austria, Portugal, UK and Ireland. Now, people in those areas can search for and view hotel options in their own language and currency.

Helping people make informed hotel choices
In 2012, we made it even easier to find and book the right hotel for you using Hotel Finder. We also added more content including Zagat reviews and amenities. Hotel Finder now shows the price and availability for a choice of room types.

Pricing information, reviews, hotel details on Hotel Finder

Varying room types on Hotel Finder

You can try these features, and others, at www.google.com/hotels.

Empowering road warriors, delivering better destination data
In September, we made it easier for you to find the information needed to plan a trip, whether you’re searching via desktop, smartphone or tablet.

Soon after, updates to Google Now offered a number of ways for you to stay informed while on the go:

Automatic flight status notifications
Updates on weather at your destination
Showcase of events happening nearby
Website suggestions to help you explore as you research things to do
Electronic boarding pass cards for ease of travel

Google now travel cards

Finally, you can easily tap into the collective intelligence of the web to uncover a list of information relevant to your destination, using the Knowledge Graph carousel -- and hopefully, find inspiration.

Knowledge Graph carousel list of activities in Rome

Stay tuned for more. We think you’ll love what we have coming your way in 2013.

Posted by Jeremy Wertheimer, Vice President, Travel

New Google Now: the perfect travel companion for the holidays

2012-12-06T08:32:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on the Android Official blog)

Now Dasher! Now Dancer! Now, Prancer and Vixen! On, Comet! On, Cupid! On, Donner and Blitzen! For Santa’s holiday travel this season, Google Now is just the prescription.

As you head off this holiday season, the latest update to Google Now makes it even more useful for traveling. Before you even leave your house, Google Now will tell you what the weather will be like at your destination (just in time to make sure you remember to pack those mittens). At the airport, your boarding pass is automatically pulled up, helping you breeze through to the gate (launching shortly for United Airlines, with more to come). And once you've arrived at your destination, Google Now can help you uncover some great activities, by showing you events happening around you, suggesting websites for you to explore as you research things to do, or allowing you to learn more about specific pieces while you’re at a museum (using Google Goggles).

All of this builds on top of some of the other cards designed for travel, like the currency conversion, translation, and flight status cards -- hopefully taking a little bit of the stress out of holiday travel so you can focus on family and fun.

We're also making Voice Search even more powerful: you can find out the name of the song that’s playing (“What’s this song?”), quickly find product info (“Scan this barcode”) and post updates to Google+ simply by using just your voice.

These goodies are waiting for you in the updated Google Search app, available on Google Play for devices running Android 4.1, Jelly Bean, or higher.

Posted by Baris Gultekin, Product Management Director

ANA renews QPX™ agreement with ITA Software

2012-12-05T10:12:00.000-06:00

We’re happy to announce that All Nippon Airways (ANA), Japan’s largest airline and one of our first QPX™ customers in Asia, has signed a new multi-year agreement for continued use of ITA’s pricing and shopping engine.

ANA launched QPX in 2008, utilizing our advanced airfare shopping tools to provide international airfare search on www.ana.co.jp. ANA has since expanded their international search capabilities to incorporate calendar, flexible date shopping and multi-city. Most recently, ANA added slice-by-slice search capabilities which allows travelers to customize their itinerary by selecting departure and return options separately.

Headquartered in the Shiodome area in Minato, Tokyo, ANA operates service to 49 destinations in Japan and 31 international routes. They’ve been a great partner and we’re excited to continue supporting their growth and expansion into other international markets over the next several years.

To learn more about ITA Software, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by Lewis Chang, Sr. Technical Account Manager

ITA by Google and MileWise let you search flights in cash, miles and points

2012-10-08T12:30:00.000-05:00

As one of our newest customers, MileWise recently launched our QPX™ pricing and shopping technology on milewise.com. MileWise presents users with real-time flight prices shown in cash, airline miles, and hotel and credit-card points -- on one screen. MileWise also tracks traveler reward program balances, status and expirations, combining that data with travel and redemption preferences, to recommend the best way to pay.

Using QPX improves the speed and range of options for their users -- and limits results to only those that are available. QPX also enables MileWise to better deliver innovative features for their customers such as Price Alerts, Combo Prices and Explore.

Price Alerts notify travelers when a “Saver” award or cheap cash fare becomes available for a desired trip.
Combo Prices let travelers easily mix and match different ways to pay for a flight. These prices can be cheaper and let travelers with less rewards still use them for travel.
Explore inspires travelers by showcasing awesome award prices and fantastic fares for dream destinations and popular places.

Another feature popular with MileWise users is the WisePrice index that ranks flights based on total price, miles earned (including bonuses) and personalized reward values.

Sanjay Kothari, Co-founder, MileWise, said “The choice for us became clear. To be a one-stop travel search engine, we need the best cash fare inventory, fast response times and powerful search capabilities. That meant partnering with ITA. We’re now able to provide more personalized and flexible searching capabilities and return the lowest prices for vastly more routes.”

We’re looking forward to working with MileWise as they continue to expand their offerings.

To learn more about ITA by Google, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by Asif Khan, Sales and Business Development Manager

Travelers can now access Flight Search from their tablets

2012-09-28T11:37:00.000-05:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

More and more travelers are using tablets to search for and book travel. In fact, 46% of all US tablet owners who search for travel, actually purchase via their tablet. We also know that people use their tablets differently than they use their desktop. That’s why we’ve optimized our Flight Search experience for those who prefer to search with a tablet, such as a Nexus 7 or an iPad.

Starting today, travelers can search for and book flights on any tablet device by going to http://www.google.com/flights/. With the touch of your finger, you can easily explore places to visit on the map and see prices updated in real-time for each destination.

If you’re flexible with your dates you can also use our lowest fares tool and scroll across days, weeks and months to find the cheapest dates to take your trip. Your results will be updated super-fast, even when you switch dates or destinations.

We hope this makes planning your next trip easier and more enjoyable -- whether you’re using your desktop, laptop, mobile device or tablet. We look forward to your continued feedback on Flight Search.

Posted by Rani Manoharan, User Interface Designer, Travel

Oktoberfest anyone?

2012-09-21T12:14:00.000-05:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)

If you’re thinking about attending the 179th Oktoberfest, there’s still time. It runs September 22 -October 7 in Munich, Germany. Just in case you’re planning a trip, we’ve assembled some tips for how you can use Google tools like Flight Search, Hotel Finder, Maps and Transit to help you plan an amazing trip -- whether you’re using your desktop, laptop or on your Android device.

If you want to figure out the best beer tents to visit, this Google Map will be a great place to turn during the event (will be live 09/22/12). When the pin over the tent is green, the tent still has seating and is open. When the pin is red, the tent is closed because of overfilling.

My favorite tent is the Hippodrom, a smaller tent frequented by a younger crowd -- and recently discovered by celebrities. It offers beer -- of course -- but also has a sekt (sparkling wine) bar that is pretty stylish. You should plan on arriving early if you want to visit.

You can also see live pics from Oktoberfest by clicking on various webcams on the map. This capability is very useful in providing information to help you choose the tents you’re most interested in visiting.

You might also want to plan ahead and consider the crowds and traffic. With Google Maps for Android, you can take a look at live traffic to see if you want to drive -- or choose to just walk, bike or take transit.

If you want to see more of Germany, you can use Google Transit to reach other cities such as Hamburg or Frankfurt. This navigation tool includes information about Deutsche Bahn (DB) trains and recommends the best transit options, taking into account various factors such as duration and number of Umstiege (transfers/stops). The options are then shown on the map, along with time, train type and duration of the trip. This is especially handy because it’s possible to click through from the transit options page, to purchase your tickets on bahn.de without needing to reenter the dates!

And if you’re a non-Bavarian who doesn’t speak German, don’t worry. You can use Google Translate or the official Oktoberfest dictionary to communicate with the locals.

So now that your interest is piqued, you’ll probably want to plan a trip right away. You can do so by going to www.google.com and searching for [flights to Munich]. Your departure city will be automatically recognized; mine was New York City. As you change your dates, prices will instantly update.

I prefer nonstop flights, so I clicked on “Nonstop” to get a list of flight times available at the $1,073 USD price and then evaluated various attributes of the flights -- including the cost of checked bags for this ticket. Once I picked the flights that worked for me, I clicked the red “Book” button to make my booking via the airline’s website.

Finally, you can use Hotel Finder to find hotels near Oktoberfest in Munich. You can do this by going to www.google.com/hotelfinder and entering [Oktoberfest Munich, Germany], along with the dates you plan to be in town. You can use the reviews, images, ratings and pricing information to create a shortlist. Once I selected the hotel I was interested in, I used the red booking button which took me to www.booking.com to complete my reservation.

We hope you found these tips helpful. Whether you end up hitting the Wiesn tents this October, or visiting Germany at some point in the future, we hope to help you plan your trip and connect with travel suppliers with ease.

Posted by Noam Ben Haim, Senior Product Manager, Travel

Club Premier achieves rapid results in only six months

2012-08-10T13:03:00.000-05:00

Six short months ago, Club Premier announced it would be using QPX™ to power online award shopping on www.clubpremier.com. They’ve accomplished quite a bit since then, and we wanted to share a quick glimpse:

Grew online flight award redemption nearly 30% by making it easier for members to shop for and redeem Aeroméxico flight awards on their new website.
Introduced calendar shopping for Aeroméxico flights, allowing members to view all available flights within the week or the month they’re interested in traveling.
Improved look to book ratios by more than 2x, a statistic that is well above the industry average.
Dramatically reduced call times for their members and customer service agents, by deploying the same advanced functionality in their call centers.

Jeremy Rabe, CEO at Club Premier, Aeroméxico said, “We’ve been very happy with the initial launch and how quickly we’ve been able to add new functionality to our site since. Our Club Premier members now have even more flexibility and value for their loyalty.”

Check out the full case study to learn more about the early results Club Premier has achieved with QPX™.

Posted by Brian Mulvey, Program Manager

Work hard. Serve hard.

2012-07-03T08:32:00.000-05:00

Each year Googlers across the globe participate in GoogleServe, in an effort to give back to the communities that help us grow and thrive. This year GoogleServe took place between June 8-15, with more than 5000 Googlers across the globe participating in 350+ projects. We also expanded the program to include skill based projects like analytics support, resume workshops and scientific training that will give our employees a chance help individuals and corporations year round.

Cambridge based Googlers came out in full force. More than 200+ Googlers participated in 24 projects, covering a wide range of needs in the greater Boston area. Projects took place from Concord to Cambridge, Belmont to Boston and further afield, at great organizations like Mass Audubon, EMARC, Gaining Ground Organic Farm, Greater Boston Food Bank and more.

Feedback from recipients and the Cambridge Googlers who participated was enthusiastic. Adam, who attended our ‘Help a Hero Get Hired’ resume workshop, said “I appreciate the time you took to help me on Friday. In 90 minutes working with you, my resume improved more than it had in a week long class... It's nice to know that there are people like you and companies like Google.”

Elizabeth Mills, one of the Google volunteer site leads, said "I loved leading our GoogleServe project at the Women’s Lunch Place because we provided extra hands for an organization that helps women in Boston, no questions asked, day in and day out. We couldn't believe the scope of the services this organization offered and were thankful both to be able to give back and learn more about such a great non-profit."

GoogleServe really gives us a chance to revitalize and deepen our connections with the local communities where we work -- and it also helps us build a stronger sense of community with our fellow Googlers. Check out some of the pics from our projects across the globe on the GoogleServe Google+ page.

Posted by Jonah Berman, Account Executive, Online Sales | GoogleServe Boston Site Lead

Introducing Flight Search for Canada

2012-06-06T10:37:00.001-05:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Inside Search blog)
Read this post in French

As a child, I remember my father driving us to an open field adjacent to the runway at Montreal’s P.E. Trudeau airport. We sat on the hood of our car and watched the incoming aircraft as they landed before us. There was something special about people embarking on their new journey or returning from a great trip. With the introduction of Google’s Flight Search, people can quickly and easily find flights to embark on their own travel adventures, and starting today, you can use Flight Search to find and book flights from Canadian airports.

If you live in Canada and are thinking of hitting the Florida beaches to celebrate the end of another school year, heading to the Rockies for a getaway, or simply planning a business trip, Flight Search can help you quickly and easily find and book your flight.

We’re introducing google.ca/flights in both French and English, with prices for flights in Canadian dollars. Now you can find and book flights from Canadian airports, complete with all the benefits of our Flight Search product:

Find flights quickly with results that load instantly in a format that’s easy to scan.
Discover places to go on a map - see ticket prices for various destinations by surfing the map. You can filter by price, airline, or flight duration.
Find the best time to go - Click the calendar icon to see what dates will get you low prices.
Compare your options by viewing the combination of price and flight duration in a graphical format

Flight Search is also available in French

You can use Flight Search to book travel to over 500 international destinations. If your ideal destination or airline isn't yet available, don’t worry -- we're working hard on expanding our global coverage and adding more routes and airline partners in the future. Our goal is to make booking travel as fast and enjoyable as possible.

Posted by Gianni Marostica, Commercial Director, Travel

Flight Search feeds your sense of adventure

2012-05-08T08:33:00.000-05:00

In honor of U.S. National Travel & Tourism Week, we want to give you a few tips on how Flight Search can help you plan an amazing summer vacation.

My favorite vacation is one where I can have a bit of adventure -- be outdoors, get some exercise and feel the rush. After combing the lists of best places to visit, I set my sights on Moab, Utah. Moab has everything I like in a vacation -- rafting, hiking, rock climbing, mountain biking and four-wheeling. It’s also set within Monument Valley, which is the famous backdrop for many Hollywood western movies. And Frommer’s named it the Top Adventure Destination in the world this year.

So let’s take a look at how you can use Flight Search to plan your Moab adventure. Begin by going to www.google.com and searching for [flights to Salt Lake City], the closest airport to Moab. Your departure city will be automatically recognized; mine was Chicago. As you change your dates, prices will instantly update.

I prefer nonstop flights, so I clicked on “Nonstop” to get a list of flight times available at the $466USD price. Once I picked the flights that worked for me, I clicked the red “Book” button to make my booking.

Whether you end up visiting Moab, Utah or some other destination this summer, we hope you have the best travel experience with Google.

Posted by Noam Ben Haim, Senior Product Manager, Travel

Frequent fliers vote American AAdvantage the best overall loyalty program

2012-05-04T08:56:00.001-05:00

This year we sponsored the annual Freddie Awards, an awards program started by "frequent flyer guru" Randy Petersen, founder of FlyerTalk.com and editor of Insider Flyer Magazine.

Our customer American Airlines and their AAdvantage loyalty program won the Overall Airline Program of the Year (Americas). American uses our Reward Redemption product to allow AAdvantage members to shop online for flights using miles. Suzanne Rubin, President, American AAdvantage Loyalty Programs, accepted the award.

According to the Freddie Awards blog, “AAdvantage treats elite members well. Many members would say that the program offers the best domestic award availability of any U.S. airline and AAdvantage miles offer some of the most lucrative international award redemptions in the industry. Members are clearly happy after all these years.”

The Freddie Awards were inspired by Sir Freddie Laker, who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for his contribution to commercial aviation. Winners are determined by members of frequent traveler programs who vote for their favorite program in a variety of categories. This year over 1.3 million global program members voted for their favorite programs.

The awards ceremony was held on April 26 at the Renaissance Hotel, Newark Airport. Over 400 travel industry executives, journalists and bloggers attended the gala event. The son of Sir Freddie Laker, Freddie Laker Jr., made a special guest appearance and helped emcee the event along with Randy Petersen and actor Robert Wuhl.

Congratulations to American Airlines and all the winners!

Posted by Cara Kretz, Sr. Manager Marketing, Communications and Public Affairs, Travel

ITA removes “agony” for Hipmunk engineers

2012-04-10T12:30:00.000-05:00

Hipmunk, the winner of Travel + Leisure’s Best Travel Websites 2011, is known for their lovable logo and their commitment to removing “agony” from travel planning. “We wanted to find a way to give people the best high level understanding of results and make it easier to mentally narrow down what the best options are,” said Adam Goldstein, co-founder and CEO, Hipmunk.

Hipmunk integrated ITA’s QPX™ pricing and shopping technology in January 2011, to give travelers more comprehensive results and more flexibility in how those results are displayed. According to Adam, “The way we standardized how the results are displayed was a huge differentiator, and a big reason why people love Hipmunk. We built a site to help users find a way to easily compare schedules, prices, lengths of flights and duration for example. As it turned out our users became passionate about Hipmunk and we see them sharing their Hipmunk experiences with friends, family and colleagues. What we’re doing does take the agony out of the experience, and it worked out far better than we hoped!”

Hipmunk recently implemented ITA’s Boombox, a comprehensive integration platform that provides a simple API and hosted service layer for QPX. Adam said, “QPX and Boombox certainly remove agony from our engineers’ lives, allowing them to work a lot more quickly and efficiently to roll out new features that help users.”

I sat down with Adam to ask him about his thoughts on travel technology, the success Hipmunk’s had with QPX over the past year and a few other personal thoughts.

What have you done with QPX that has helped differentiate Hipmunk or been really popular with your users?
There are several things we’ve been able to do with QPX that help remove agony from travel planning, such as:

Calendar shopping,
Multi-city shopping,
Search filters for multiple airlines and flexible dates,
ITA routing language that lets users fine tune search parameters before they click search, and
Integrated airfare shopping results with Google Calendars.

QPX lets us enable people to specify what they want and what they don’t want at the time of search. They can use special routing notation to search for certain airlines, cities, flights -- or even specify cities they don’t want to connect through, maybe because those airports are known for having terribly long layovers, frequent delays or weather issues -- all to return the most relevant search results right away. This has been pretty popular with frequent fliers.

Another thing that’s really popped is the ability to interact with people’s calendars. When users log in, they can integrate their Google Calendar with Hipmunk to easily see which flights fit within their schedules. QPX powers that flight search and is super flexible in supporting this integration.

How has Hipmunk benefited the most since working with us?
The quality and speed is great! This applies to the results we return to users as well as the speed in which we’re able to roll out changes to our site. We talked about the Boombox integration earlier -- but it’s nice that our users benefit from new features more often when we don’t have to worry about implementation.

What change in technology has had the biggest impact on the travel industry over the last decade?
The biggest impact? Probably smart phones. We recently saw our first day in which our mobile usage exceeded web usage. Even absent any macro trends, people are finding mobile experiences to be much more seamless and important. And, having the same power on your phone as you do on a desktop is incredible -- especially if you’re stuck in an airport and need to find a flight out. I think more and more of the technical power and experience we have on our mobile devices will migrate to desktops as well.

What have you learned about the travel industry that surprised you?
There are a lot of big companies in this industry that are slow to adapt to change. The systems and websites of some airlines and suppliers make engineering changes extremely slow. We’re really fortunate to be able to iterate as quickly as we do.

What's the funniest thing that's happened to you while traveling?
That depends on your sense of humor. I’ve been stranded and have bumped into people I know half way across the world, in Buenos Aires and Hong Kong. But, one especially funny incident; we were in Turkey, driving through the countryside between two cities about eight hours apart -- basically, in the middle of nowhere. We saw a restaurant called Mantar Evi - which means Mushroom House. It sprung up pretty randomly, and the entire menu was all mushrooms. I was pleasantly surprised. Honestly, it was the most delicious and best meal we had on our entire trip. Check it out if you’re ever in Korkuteli Turkey.

Hipmunk has been a great team to work with over the past year plus! I’m looking forward to helping them come up with new ways to remove “agony” from the travel planning experience. You can learn more about Hipmunk on their Google+ page.

Posted by Scott Myles, Senior Technical Account Manager

What do Air France-KLM travelers get with Affinity Search?

2012-03-21T12:30:00.000-05:00

The best airfare deals across their combined global network, instantly!

Affinity Search uses ITA Software’s pricing and shopping technology to let travelers search the AFKL global network for the best deals. Results immediately display the lowest price for each destination with an intuitive Google Maps solution. It also includes filters that make it easy for travelers to select flights based on price, dates, duration and more.

When travelers select a point of departure, the new feature instantly returns prices to AFKL destinations worldwide for travel during a period of up to 180 days from the departure date. The traveler can then explore the results returned and complete a booking in a few simple steps.

Martijn van der Zee, SVP of eCommerce, AFKL said they selected ITA to develop Affinity Search because, “We knew they were the best partner for the job. We’ll be able to give our travelers useful features with ITA’s technology and we like their commitment to solving difficult airfare search problems.”

A global leader in air travel and Europe’s largest airline, AFKL has long been focused on driving value for their customers. They soft launched Affinity Search on airfrance.com for the Austrian, Finnish, Greek, Italian, Spanish and UK markets, and on klm.com for Finland, Greece and Austria. Now, they are progressively extending the functionality to their other country websites.

We can’t wait to see what AFKL does next.

To learn more about ITA, visit www.itasoftware.com.

Posted by Nicola Simionato, Head of Account Management, EMEA

Club Premier uses QPX to launch new frequent flyer programs

2012-03-19T12:00:00.000-05:00

Mexico’s leading coalition loyalty program and the operator of Aeroméxico’s frequent flyer program, Club Premier, recently launched a completely new website, www.clubpremier.com that allows Club Premier members to redeem awards online. Powered by our QPX™ pricing and shopping engine, the new website makes it much easier for members to shop and redeem kilometers for Aeroméxico flights.

As part of the launch, Club Premier introduced two ways for members to use their awards -- using Classic Awards or Always Awards. The Classic Award program offers members the best value for their kilometers. This program uses traditional, fixed mileage awards based on limited availability. As you can see in the example below, Classic Awards are only available for the top two flights traveling from Mexico City to Cancun:

However, the Always Awards program is more flexible. Always Awards point requirements are based on the current availability and price of tickets, but are always available for redemption. This means if a Classic Award is sold out, Club Premier members can still book an Aeroméxico award seat with their Always Awards. This is great for popular routes that sell out quickly.

Using the same example where a traveler wants to go from Mexico City to Cancun, you can see they now have access to all Aeroméxico flights, even those that were previously unavailable using their Classic Award kilometers.

“We’ve been very happy with the product and the people who helped us implement QPX. It was a pleasure working with them” said Jeremy Rabe, CEO, Director General, Club Premier, Aeroméxico. “And, because of the new functionality, our Club Premier members will get even more flexibility and value for their loyalty.”

We’re really pleased to have Club Premier as part of the ITA Software by Google family. We look forward to seeing what comes next.

Posted by Mike Mo, Sales and Business Development Manager