When we are out looking for the best options to make our dreams true with some perfect holidays, there is one thing we will always have trouble with. And this is the decision if a strategy that involves multiple stops will be more efficient or not.

To start with, I would like to mention the two differences that we can encounter, and to make you understand it properly I will place two examples. Let's imagine we are planning to fly to Singapore from Paris, Europe, and we take a look at the flights market trying to discover what can be best.

The idea is to find an airline or combination of airlines that can bring us there for the less price possible. If we find a flight operated by one single airline, we receive one price A. We then look for combinations with different airlines and we have another price B. Which of them will be higher?

If the stop that we make in the route to change to a different airline operator is placed pretty near to our place of departure or arrival, the option will have chances to be cheaper. An example could be flying from our supposed home town Paris to London, and then from London take a flight to Singapore.

Instead, if we plan to fly from Paris to any destination in the middle East, and from there a flight to Singapore, unless it exist a very special offer in place, this will be always a problem, and the total fare will increase.

Nowadays, with the option to fly to East Asia with Oasis Hong Kong will even more kill the possibility to travel to Middle East, as flying to London will allow you to use this airline to travel there.

Another example will happen if we plan to go to Barcelona, Spain, from the US, from Miami for example. Of course we can find direct flights that will have a good price. But did you know that if you fly first to Italy with Alitalia and then you take Ryanair to Barcelona the fares are a lot cheaper? Did you also know that with Zoom Airlines you could fly with a low cost carrier to New York from Miami, fly from NY to London for 343 euros, and then take Ryanair to Rome in Italy for 20 euros?

In the end, what I mean with this article is: normally a direct flight will be cheaper, but if the stop you are planning to make is relatively near to your airport of departure or to the airport of arrival, the possibility of making a 1 stop or even 2 stops flight should be considered as you can be happily surprised. source: buzzle.com