Google adds AI to Flights to help you book a trip when you don't know where to go
Let artificial intelligence select your next destination
🤖 Google has added a new AI-powered flight deals feature to its popular Flights service
🤔 You can use it to search for travel inspiration and be as specific or general as you wish
🏝️ It'll then return results based on the prompt you provide, with varying levels of success
✈️ The feature is rolling out to those in the USA, Canada and India at the moment
Google has added AI to its popular Google Flights service that can help you plan a trip when you don't know where to go.
According to a recent news post, Google has begun testing an AI-powered Flight Deals search tool. You can describe the kind of place you want to visit, how long you want to fly for and what you want to do when you arrive.
Once you put that information in, Google can then use AI to provide cheap flights that match the descriptions you provided. You could try something like "a week-long trip this winter to a city with great food, non-stop flights only", as Google lists, or "a weekend away in June in a city rich with culture and history, no more than 10 hours away", for instance, and see what it provides.
As has become common with AI, some results are better than others. Unfortunately, I couldn't test the new feature myself, as it’s only available to those in the USA, Canada and India. Using a VPN also didn't work. However, the folks at The Verge found out that it's good for some things and not so for others.
For instance, they found that a search for "a trip to Europe with hiking" mentioned unexpected places, such as Cluj-Napoca, Romania and Ljubljana, Slovenia.
They also fooled the system with "trips to Japan during cherry blossom season" returning no results.
If you don't specify when you want to visit somewhere, Google will default to showing the next six months, and you can also specify a direct flight or one with stops, or any airline you'd particularly want to use.
It can be found on the dedicated Flight Deals page, or in the top left corner of Google Flights if you want to try it out.
Reece Bithrey is a journalist with bylines for Trusted Reviews, Digital Foundry, PC Gamer, TechRadar and more. He also has his own blog, UNTITLED, and graduated from the University of Leeds with a degree in International History and Politics in 2023.