Methodology

How the Deal Score works.

Every real cached fare we show can carry a Deal Score out of 100. Here is exactly how it's calculated — including when we refuse to show one at all.

Price against our own history — up to 80 points

We record the cheapest cached partner fare we observe for each route, at most one observation per departure date per day, and compare today's fare against the median of our observations from the last 90 days. At 35% under that median a fare earns the full 80 points; at 35% over it earns none; between the two it scales linearly — those two thresholds are refitted periodically from the actual fares we've seen, so they track roughly the cheapest and priciest tenth of each route's own history. This is a comparison against our own observations of that route — not a market-wide benchmark, and we don't claim otherwise.

Booking window — up to 20 points

Fares departing 3 weeks to 4 months out score the full 20 — historically the sensible booking window for most routes. Just outside it scores 10; last-minute (a week or less) and very far out score nothing. This is a stated heuristic, not a prediction.

When we refuse to score

Below 5 observations for a route we show no score at all — just an honest note saying the history is too thin. Sample results (clearly labelled) are never scored. A number computed off thin data is a guess wearing a badge, and we'd rather show you nothing.

The bands

80+ Excellent · 60–79 Good · 40–59 Fair · under 40 Below par. Cached partner rates move — the final price is always the one confirmed on the partner site.