I travel by airplane twice a year (plus or minus one) and it seems every time I fly, there are new online tools. First, years ago, Expedia allowed me to find low prices across multiple carriers. Then Priceline debuted, allowing travelers to “name their own price.” Although I’ve experimented with the tool, I never used it for booking flights.

One of my favorite tools is SeatGuru, which has seating configurations for many different aircraft on a variety of carriers. Before you choose your seat when booking a flight, you must check SeatGuru to determine which seat locations provide more legroom (good) or are next to restrooms (bad).

Last time I traveled, I found success with SideStep, which searches more airlines for rock bottom price and is highly configurable. A site which provides is Kayak.com.

I’ve never been on a cruise, but if that’s how you roll, Kayak is now offering metasearch for cruises, so you don’t have to go back and forth to individual travel sites to find the best deals. At first glance, it’s as easy to use as the flight search, but the travel dates are less flexible.

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