The Cheapest Day of the Week to Fly from the UK

If your dates are flexible, the day you leave can change the price. We looked at the cheapest one-way fare for every departure day on 56 routes departing the UK, from London, Manchester, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Belfast and Bristol, and compared each day of the week.

What we found

Across 2,406 daily fares for departures from November 11, 2026 to January 31, 2027:

• Thursday: 4.3% below average, the cheapest day to depart
• Monday: 3.0% below average
• Tuesday: 0.7% below average
• Friday: 0.9% above average
• Wednesday: 1.4% above average
• Saturday: 2.6% above average
• Sunday: 3.2% above average, the most expensive day to depart

The weekday mattered less this winter than in our autumn data, when Monday and Tuesday ran 9% below average and Friday 16% above. The gap between the cheapest and most expensive day is now about 7.5% of a typical fare: on a £60 ticket, roughly £4 or £5. Weekends were still the dearest days to leave.

Short-haul routes, to the UK, Ireland and Europe, showed the strongest pattern, with Thursday 11% below average. On longer routes, to Turkey, the Caucasus, Central Asia and beyond, the days were closer together.

A real example

On London to Barcelona, the lowest fare we found for Thursday, November 19 was £30. The same route on Sunday, November 22 was £57. Edinburgh to London showed the same pattern a week earlier: £16 on Thursday, November 12 and £28 on Sunday, November 15.

How the UK compares with the US

In our US fare data, Tuesday was the cheapest day and Sunday by far the most expensive. From the UK, Sunday is also the priciest day to leave, but the differences are much smaller, and the cheapest days are Thursday and Monday rather than midweek.

How we measured it

For each route we took the cheapest cached one-way fare for each departure day, compared it with that route's average daily fare, averaged those differences by weekday, and centred the results so the seven days balance out. Comparing each route with itself keeps a £300 long-haul fare from drowning out a £15 domestic hop.

We left out departures in the first week after collection, because last-minute fares are high whatever the day, and routes with fewer than 14 days of fares (56 of our 75 UK routes qualified). The fares come from recent searches on our travel partner Aviasales, collected on November 4, 2026, and include Christmas and New Year. Prices change constantly, so treat these numbers as a guide to patterns rather than a promise.

How to use this

• Avoid leaving on a weekend. Moving a Saturday or Sunday departure to the Thursday or Monday before is the simplest saving.
• Check the calendar for your route. The weekday effect is small next to the difference between a cheap and an expensive date. Every route page, like those for flights from London and from Manchester, shows the cheapest days over the next three months.
• Search every London airport. The cheapest fare is rarely from Heathrow. Here is why searching "LON" helps.