Saudi foundation day travel searches up by 83% compared to 2022

It was revealed by Skyscanner that travel searches for the week of Saudi’s Foundation Day 2023 increased up by 83% compared to 2022. In terms of booking windows for flights in February also see increase compared to 2022, suggesting a return to pre-pandemic booking windows as consumer confidence continues to grow and travellers book flights earlier.

Travel searches within the GCC – top 3:

1. Saudi Arabia (+98% compared to previous year)
2. UAE (+99 compared to previous year)
3. Qatar (+2094% increase compared to previous year)

International travel searches – top 5

1. Egypt (+19% increase compared to previous year)
2. Morocco (+41% increase compared to previous year)
3. India (+83% increase compared to previous year)
4. “Everywhere” Search (+497% increase compared to previous year) – this indicates KSA travellers are considering prices and being flexible about their destinations to visit.
5. Pakistan (+57% increase compared to previous year)

Flight bookings made more than 30 days before departure in February 2023 are up 7% compared to 2022, whilst flight bookings made less than 30 days before departure are down 6% from the previous year.

Discover the best time to book using Skyscanner’s new Savings Generator

Travellers looking for guidance on how to make their money go further can visit Skyscanner’s 2023 Savings Generator, which shows the best time to book for the top 15 most popular departure airports and destinations pairings.

Currently, the overall best time to book flights from Saudi Arabia is on average 21 weeks before departure and the cheapest day of the week to travel from Saudi Arabia is a Sunday. However, the global travel site has data crunched millions of flight bookings over the last year across its most popular destinations and the results reveal this does not in fact tell the whole story. Not only do these hacks change depending on the destination but also, travelers will find differing results for the same destination but a different month i.e.:

• From Jeddah, the cheapest day of the week to travel to London in August is a Tuesday vs from Riyadh, which is a Thursday.
• The best time to book, a flight from Riyadh to Dubai in December is 12 weeks ahead vs from Abu Dhabi to London, which is 23 weeks.
• The cheapest day of the week to travel to Bangkok from Riyadh in March is a Monday but in June, it is a Wednesday.