Is Priceline Legit for Flights? What To Know Before You Book

Yes, Priceline is a legitimate, secure online travel agency, and booking a flight through it is safe. It’s accredited by the Better Business Bureau, uses encrypted payments, issues real tickets, and is backed by its publicly traded parent, Booking Holdings.

The real question isn’t whether Priceline is a scam (it isn’t), but when booking through it actually serves you, and when you’re better off going straight to the airline. Here’s how it works, what the fees and cancellation rules are, and how to book without getting burned.

Key takeaways

• Priceline is a legitimate OTA. It partners directly with airlines and travel providers, though customer service issues can crop up if you need to change or cancel.
• It’s owned by Booking Holdings, the same publicly traded parent behind Booking.com, Kayak, and Agoda, and has operated since 1997.
• Its cheapest fares come through Express Deals, meaning the exact airline and flight times aren’t revealed until after you book.
• Express Deal bookings are prepaid, nonrefundable, nonchangeable, and nontransferable.
• Traveler reviews skew negative, but the complaints are about support during changes and cancellations, not fraud.
• Rule of thumb: If you’re saving a minimal amount of money, like $20–$50 per ticket, consider booking directly with the airline. If you’re saving $100 or more and your dates are firm, Priceline can be worth it.

Is it safe to book flights through Priceline?

Yes. Booking a flight through Priceline is safe. Your payment is encrypted, you receive a valid ticket with an airline record locator, and the company is a long-established, publicly traded business. The risk of booking with Priceline isn’t typically safety, but rather flexibility and support if your plans change.

What to know before you book

A few things separate a smooth Priceline booking from a frustrating one.

• Remember that you’re booking through a third party, not with the airline. Changes and cancellations have to go through Priceline rather than the carrier, which can be slower.
• Express Deals hide the airline and exact times until after purchase, so you might land a red-eye or an awkward connection.
• Discounted and Express Deal fares are strict. They’re typically prepaid and nonrefundable.
• Booking through an OTA can affect elite miles and status credit, and it removes the airline as your direct point of contact.

What travelers say

There’s a common thread throughout traveler experiences with Priceline. On Reddit threads and frequent-flyer forums, the travelers who book Priceline and walk away happy almost always have one thing in common: Their plans didn't change after booking.

Frustration shows up when something goes wrong and you need to change or cancel. Because you booked through Priceline instead of the airline, you’ll need to go straight through Priceline if something changes. 

People have noted long holds and slow refunds when a flight gets canceled or a schedule shifts. Another gripe that pops up again and again: a roundtrip ticket that was quietly booked as two separate one-ways, which can double what it costs to back out.

Keep it in perspective, though. People are far more likely to post about a booking that went sideways than one that went fine, and almost none of the horror stories are about fraud. 

How to book safely on Priceline

You can avoid most of the headaches with a few habits.

• Read the fare rules before paying, especially the change and cancellation terms.
• Skip Express Deals if there’s any chance your plans will shift. Book a standard, transparent fare instead.
• After booking, log in to the airline’s site with your confirmation number to confirm the itinerary and add bags directly, rather than assuming the OTA passed everything along.
• Screenshot the price, terms, and what’s included at checkout.
• Use the 24-hour window: Cancel and rebook if you spot an error right after booking.

What is Priceline, and who owns it?

Priceline is an online travel agency that has sold discounted flights, hotels, and rental cars since 1997. It’s owned by Booking Holdings, a publicly traded company (also the parent of Booking.com, Kayak, and Agoda) with annual revenue north of $20 billion.

It built its name on the old “Name Your Own Price” bidding tool, but that feature has been discontinued and replaced by Express Deals. For how Priceline fits among the big booking sites, see our complete guide to online travel agencies.

Priceline vs. booking direct (and other OTAs)

Priceline can be cheaper, but booking direct is easier to manage. Here’s a simple rundown.

Remember that if Priceline saves you only a small amount, it’s usually best to book directly with the airline for the easier support and full mileage credit. If it saves you $100 or more and you’re not anticipating that your plans will change, the savings can outweigh the friction.

Either way, compare the price on Google Flights first, and let Going alert you to deals so you know what a good fare looks like before you book anywhere.

How to use Priceline: the complete Priceline tutorial

Using Priceline is straightforward. The goal here is to book in a way that keeps you safe and flexible. Here’s a simple tutorial for finding cheap flights using Priceline. 

Let’s say you're looking for a cheap flight from Chicago to Paris in September.

How to search for flights on Priceline

Priceline works much like other OTAs and flight search sites, such as Kayak and Orbitz. 

From the landing page, select the Priceline Flights tab to bring up the correct search box. Then, set your dates and locations. Click into the “Departing - Returning” field on the right-hand side and look for your desired dates on the calendar.

If your city has more than one major airport, like Chicago, you can either choose Chicago, IL (CHI) to see results flying out of all area airports or you can restrict your search to one airport. The same rules apply to the destination. 

You can choose to search for roundtrip tickets, one-way tickets, or multi-destination tickets that include multiple departure and arrival cities. If you pick multi-destination, the “+ Add another flight” button will surface below the location fields.

Finally, pick your desired number of travelers and fare class from the corresponding drop-down boxes. Then hit the green “Find your flight” button to kick off your search.

If your destination is flexible and you want to compare the cheapest roundtrip tickets from Chicago to Paris against the cheapest roundtrip tickets from Chicago to London on the same dates, you’ll have to run two separate searches.

How to view results on Priceline flights

The first thing you’ll see on the results page is a box that alerts you if other days around your chosen dates might be cheaper. You’ll see date options, the lowest price, and how much you can save. Below that, you’ll see any Express Deals offered for your dates (more on that in a bit).

Underneath that, you’ll see your flight options for your selected dates, with the lowest priced option first. Priceline identifies which flights you can cancel for free within 24 hours, and there are icons that denote whether advance seat assignment or carry-on luggage is included.

How to filter flight results on Priceline

Priceline offers several filters to help you narrow down your results to determine which itinerary works best for you. The sidebar to the left of the flight results allows you to filter by number of stops (and it shows you the lowest price associated with each number of stops), departure and arrival times for each leg of your journey, the duration of travel, and the airlines. 

If one of your locations spans multiple airports, you can also include or exclude specific airports by checking or unchecking the boxes listed under Airports.

You can adjust for desired fare class and flexible dates by clicking the More Options hyperlink in your main search box. The drop-down box is defaulted to economy, but clicking into it reveals premium economy, business, and first options.

Priceline Express Deals

Express Deals can help you save a good amount of money when purchasing flights, as long as you’re willing to book without knowing a few details. These are opaque bookings with pre-negotiated prices, and they only let you in on sparse details before you complete the transaction, like departure and arrival airports, general timeframes (morning, afternoon, or evening), a handful of potential “trusted airlines” illustrated by their logos, and whether or not carry-on luggage and advanced seat assignments are included.

Sometimes Priceline will show you exactly how much you’re saving (e.g., 5% off list price, or $85 savings), while other times they’ll give you a vague idea (e.g., up to 40%). Until you book, you won’t know your exact flight times, carrier(s), or layover information.

Discounts range from 5%–40%, but there’s no way to search specifically for these deals. They surface more frequently during last-minute flight searches, especially on long-haul trips where ticket prices are usually more expensive.

By sifting through the non-Express Deal flight results below the deal box (comparing flight times, carriers, and costs), you’re able to get a sense of the value of the discount the deal offers. 

Priceline makes an effort to keep these deals hidden, so you most likely won’t find flights from any of the Express Deal’s “trusted airlines” listed in the general search results. If you really want to figure out the Express Deal before you book, try another search on a site like Google Flights or Kayak and reference those results against the Express Deal.

Express Deals are nonrefundable, so booking locks you into the deal even if it turns out to be less than desirable (though the Best Price Guarantee does refund you 200% of the difference if you find the same flight listed at a lower cost anytime until 24 hours before check-in).

If you want to use them to your advantage, see our guide on saving money with Priceline Express Deals.

Hotels, cars, and the Priceline app

Priceline is a full travel agency, so you can bundle hotels, rental cars, and cruises. Bundling a flight with a hotel or car can unlock extra savings. Its Express Deals and Pricebreakers extend to hotels, where the property name is hidden until you confirm.

The Priceline app mirrors the site and adds app-only deals plus its free VIP rewards program. For a flights-and-safety decision, the main thing to know is that the same third-party support caveats apply across all of it.

Priceline customer service

This is Priceline’s weak spot, and it’s the reason to think twice when your plans are not firm. You can reach support through the “My Trips” section online or by phone. Be sure to keep your confirmation number and screenshots handy.

Priceline's customer service number is 1(877)477-5807. You can also text or chat with a customer service rep, or look up FAQs on their help page.

The bottom line: Is Priceline worth it for flights?

Priceline is legit and secure, and it can save you money, especially through Express Deals and bundles on trips where your dates are firm. The cost is flexibility and support: Changes run through a third party, opaque fares hide the details, and help can be slow when something goes wrong.

If the savings are small, book directly. If they’re large and your plans won’t change, Priceline is a reasonable bet, as long as you book a fare you understand.