24 Charts Showing the Top Flight Searches for Summer Travel in 11 U.S. Cities

Understanding where flight search volumes are highest for any given destination helps destination market organizations, hotels and airlines understand interest levels in their long-time, stronghold markets as well as monitor budding interest from new markets too.

Google Trends Data show mobile search volumes for flights are still much lower than that for hotels and that Delta Air Lines and Southwest Airlines have some of the highest search volumes for U.S. airlines among U.S. travelers.

Google looked at its trends data for last summer and furnished the following charts, which illustrate that some U.S. cities saw year-over-year increases in search volumes of more than 100% for some destinations. New York City also had the highest search volumes for more than half of the cities we looked at but it usually didn’t have the largest year-over-year increases in search volumes for different destinations, instead leaving those to cities where travel in general is growing. Last summer’s flight searches also peaked the week of July 13, 2014, according to Google.

Here are 24 charts offering a glimpse at search volumes for U.S. summer air travel last year which will help with comparisons when this summer’s search volumes are finalized.

Chart 1: Flights for the Los Angeles to Las Vegas route had the highest search volumes but the New York to Chicago route saw the largest percentage increase in search volumes year-over-year.

Chart 2: More searches were for Delta than any other U.S. airline but search volumes for Allegiant Air saw the most growth year-over-year.

Source: Google Trends Data

Chart 3: While mobile search for flights grew 33% year-over-year that’s smaller than the 49% increase for hotels, and hotels still dominate for mobile search volumes.

Chart 4/5: Searches from travelers from Atlanta, Georgia and San Francisco, California represented the largest year-over-year search volume increases for flights to New York City. However, New York City residents’ search volumes for Chicago, Illinois increased the most year-over-year, and there was an 11% decrease for flight searches to San Francisco.

Charts 6/7: Lots of increased interest from travelers from Atlanta and San Francisco wanting to go to Washington, D.C., and D.C. residents showed a lot of interest in flights to Chicago.

Charts 8/9: Half of the top 10 metro areas with highest search volumes for Los Angeles, California are located within that state, with San Francisco seeing some of the most growth in search volumes for flights to Los Angeles year-over-year. There’s also been a lot of increased interest for flights from San Diego to Los Angeles.

Charts 10/11: The feeling is mutual: there was also an 11% year-over-year decrease for flight search volumes from New York City to San Francisco. There’s also a surge in interest for flights to San Francisco from Chicago, Seattle, Denver and San Diego.

Chart 12: Atlanta had the highest increase in search volumes for travel to Orlando.

Chart 13/14: San Francisco, Boston, Atlanta and Denver had the highest increases in search volumes for travel to Chicago and Chicago residents also yielded large search volumes for Atlanta and Denver.

Chart 15/16: New York City area travelers exhibited a lot of interest in Miami, Florida and Miami residents searched for Santa Barbara, California second to New York City.

Chart 17/18: The increased interest in flights from Chicago to Atlanta is mirrored by that for flights from Atlanta to Chicago. Travelers from Atlanta also showed a ton of interest in Orlando, Miami and Charlotte, North Carolina.

Chart 19/20: Search volumes for travel to Boston showed upswings in San Francisco, Chicago and Washington, D.C. and flight search volumes for travel from Boston to Chicago spiked last year.

Chart 21/22: Seven of the top 10 metro areas for large search volume indexes for Dallas, Texas were in that state and Las Vegas has the largest search volumes for travel from Dallas.

Chart 23/24: Los Angeles has the highest search volumes for flights to Seattle and Seattle residents are very interested in travel to Las Vegas, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Source: Google Trends Data