One way fares are sometimes a useful strategy when it comes to finding a lower fare option for your travels. Unlike domestic US fares where one way fares outbound and inbound are added together to create a round trip fare price, ticket prices for international travel are based on the departure airport.
The price to fly Los Angeles to Frankfurt might be $1,200 round trip when the price to fly Frankfurt to Los Angeles round trip might be $700. My tickets purchased earlier this month were under $400 round trip to fly Bergen, Norway to San Francisco on American Airlines. Ticket price originating in San Francisco to fly to Bergen, Norway were over $1,000 round trip.
These large discrepancies in ticket price based on the departure airport where the itinerary begins is where one-way fares from the USA to Europe can be a useful strategy for airfare discounts. You can fly to Europe one-way and purchase airline tickets to many destinations at far lower prices than from the USA.
Aeroflot and Norwegian one way out of Los Angeles LAX
The problem is most airlines charge nearly as much for a one-way international ticket from USA to Europe as the round trip price. Aeroflot and Norwegian are two of the primary carriers out of Los Angeles with lower priced one-way flights. Norwegian Airlines offers true one-way prices with outbound and inbound priced separately and added together for round trip fare.
Skyteam member airline Aeroflot often discounts one-way tickets to Europe at about 60% of round trip price.
Aeroflot has some relatively low one-way fares priced today at $390 to $460 from Los Angeles LAX to a variety of cities in Europe. Of course, you have to route through Moscow, but that may be a small inconvenience for potentially big savings on airfare. Los Angeles is the only western USA airport serviced by Aeroflot.
There are a number of reasons why a one-way fare to Europe may be a good buy. You can fly Norwegian or WOW back to the USA. You can continue onward to another destination from Europe, besides back to the USA. You can buy a lower priced round trip fare from Europe to the USA and have your next trip date to Europe set.
Aeroflot One-Way Fares to Europe from Los Angeles LAX
$390 to $460 one-way ticket price to these airports
- London LHR $390 Sunday Nov 8Â (Norwegian Air $349 nonstop)
- Barcelona BCN $390
- Madrid MAD $390
- Geneva GVA $390
- Zurich ZRH $390
- Budapest BUD $390
- Athens ATH $430
- Brussels BRU $430
- Bucharest OTP $430
- Warsaw WAW $430
- Amsterdam AMS $460
- Helsinki HEL $460
- Paris CDG $460
- Hamburg HAM $460
- Berlin SXF $460
- Frankfurt FRA $460
- Munich MUC $460
- Rome FCO $460
- Milan MXP $460
- Venice VCE $460
- Sofia SOF $460
These fares are available most days of the week from September into April 2016.
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Norwegian Airlines has lower fares to many of these same cities on some dates. Of course, Norwegian is the one-way airline to Europe from the San Francisco Bay Area with flights from Oakland OAK airport. Aeroflot does not offer low fares from SFO. In many cases, you can find a lower ticket price flying into LAX on a separate ticket and picking up a lower fare to Europe from LAX.
One way fares from the USA to Europe have limited usefulness for most travelers. Remembering that one-way fares are an option with Aeroflot, Norwegian, Icelandair and WOW offers another strategy to consider when faced with airline ticket price shock for your European destination.
