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The Best Flight Data APIs

Alex — Mon, 23 Jan 2023 06:47:56 +0000

It’s hard to argue against the benefits of using APIs to create an app or a website. APIs provide us with tools and materials to build a product that can set a good standard and beat its competitors. As opposed to it, creating something from scratch not only postpones the final result, but also requires a lot of resources (both financial and human). That being said, I suppose there are no doubts in the value of API use.

Nowadays there is a huge variety of APIs for every flavor. Some are offered by big companies as a product they developed and use themselves and ready to share, some are developed specifically for commercial purposes. In this article we’re going to focus on flight data APIs and flights affiliate programs which are widely used in travel apps and websites. Most of them can be used as travel agent booking software, performing the whole set of services needed for travel distribution, and some have more specific functions.

Amadeus API

Amadeus flight APIs exist in two versions: Self-Service APIs and Enterprise APIs. Self-Service APIs are comprised of several categories: COVID-19 and travel safety, air, hotel, destination content, and trip. Basically, a fundamental set that will come in handy for a lot of travel apps. Enterprise APIs contain more options: air, booking management, cars and transfers, customer profile, hotel, insurance, payment, queue management, and rail. Apart from a selection that looks a bit wider, they also promise a dedicated support and guidance.

Skyscanner API

The Skyscanner flight search is sharing its own flight search API. And what’s better it’s a free API if you get approved. Skyscanner Travel API offers two types of price search: Live Prices API or Indicative Prices API. The former will allow you to compare prices for specific dates while the latter will let you be more flexible with dates and destinations as the information is retrieved from cached data. Either way you will get access to the cheapest price for flight tickets.

AwardWallet API

AwardWallet shares its Email Parsing API that can be used to extract information from confirmation emails. This API can parse various types of reservations: flight reservations, hotel reservations, car rental reservations, train reservations, cruises and expenses. It supports multiple email formats and retrieves such details as: price, destination, delays, layovers, mileage, cabin class, type of vehicle and more. It is widely used in itinerary planning and expense tracking.

AirLabs Data API

AirLabs Data API provides you with all the necessary flight data: routes and schedules, real-time flights, airlines and airports details, time zones and taxes. The set of APIs also include the Flight Delay API and Flight Alert API which will allow users to stay up-to-date with the most recent changes in their trips. AirLabs offer several payment plans, starting with the free one with a number of queries limited to 1,000 and ending with enterprise with 1,000,000 queries. There are some minor differences in four available plans, but your choice will mainly depend on how many requests are you planning to have monthly.

Travelport API

Travelport offers an extensive set of travel APIs including air APIs. Travelport flight API allows for a full cycle of searching and booking flight tickets. Users will be able to look for the cheapest flight options, receive information about seats availability and other flight details, and finally book the chosen flight. The dates can be flexible with two days before and two days after a chosen date. You will also get access to real-time flight status, schedules, flight specific details (such as meals on board or travel time) and seat map.

Flightradar API

This API allows you to integrate with flight tracking content of Flightradar24. It will enable your app to track aircraft position live (positions update every five seconds), allow users to see the flight path with progress bar, and provide information about type of aircraft, its current speed and altitude. The service of flight tracking is popular among users, because for some people it adds the sense of security to the flying experience.

Duffel Flights API

This API offers flight content from a variety of airlines (more than 300). Users will be able to search for flights, book them, choose the seats and add the extra bags, pay for the flight and cancel if needed. Duffel provides its potential partners with extensive guidelines on how to use the API, so it will possible even for the newcomers to use it and sell airline tickets in the most effective way.

Kiwi API

Kiwi API will allow users first to search for flights, offering a variety of itinerary options, then to book the chosen flight and complete the booking with the payment. The results of the search can be sorted by quality, price, date, or duration. Recently Kiwi came up with a new product called Tequila, which is a platform that connects you with Kiwi API as well as other tools to support your travel business.

Travelpayouts API

With Travelpayouts API you can you can act in two ways. First, you can get flight data API to get travel insights on your website and earn money if people follow the links. The insights include information about cheapest flights for chosen destinations, the calendar of prices for a month, popular directions, special offers and more. The other way to become a Travelpayouts partner is to submit a request to receive access to free flights API by Aviasales. In your request you should explain why you need the API access and give details about your website or app. If you succeed, you will get access to real-time flight search, as opposed to the cached data of the first method.

Sabre API

Sabre, being one of the GDS, offers a huge variety of flight data APIs (around 200). You can pick and combine several APIs to suit the needs of your app or website. The list includes, but not limited to: flight fare search, air tax calculation, passenger check-in, booking cancellation, and many more. Sabre also provides its partners with guidelines easing them into a successful integration.

Carbon Footprint API for Apps.

Alex — Thu, 29 Dec 2022 09:34:05 +0000

As society is turning more and more to sustainable development, any business that’s going green is bound to achieve more success than its competitors stuck in the fossil fuels era. While some business owners turn to recycling, others try to use renewable energy or refrain from using plastic packaging; some contribute to reducing the damage we’ve already done and cleaning up the mess. The point is if you you’re willing to, there are multiple ways how you can help the environment. And technology seems to be an obvious example of how we can do some climate action quickly and easily.

There are many ways we can use technology to benefit climate change, but today we are going to talk about carbon footprint offsetting. We all probably know what a carbon footprint is and that it’s inevitable for a human being to have one.

But since it’s proved to be harming the environment, people are learning to negate their carbon emissions somehow. A lot of apps and websites provide their customers with the ability to calculate their carbon footprint and some even provide options on how to offset carbon emissions. Typically you can purchase carbon offsets by participating in different projects on climate change around the world.

So, how does it work? First, the app calculates the number of carbon emissions you produced. It depends on the type of data you put in. It might be a flight ticket or a parcel delivery or a gas refill. Then the app offers you ways to ensure carbon removal. As a rule, you can choose from a variety of carbon offset projects to fund and help save the environment. It’s easy for people and it’s good for nature. Win-win on both sides.

But it might get tricky on the part of the app. To get access to carbon emission data, an app needs to either build its API, which is a great deal of work or integrate with the already existing offset APIs.

So, what is carbon footprint offsetting API? This type of API collects information about personal carbon emissions and processes it to make calculations. To make it more specific, let’s have a look at some examples.

Lune API

This API estimates various carbon emissions from goods shipping to the whole company's CO2 level. Lune is widely used by retailers and delivery services, who want to provide their customers with sustainable products and deliver goods without the pain of guilt.

AwardWallet Email Parsing API

This API takes the customer experience to another level by eliminating clients’ efforts to zero. It parses incoming emails for necessary information and transforms it into usable data. The process is automated which allows people to become more carbon-neutral without lifting a finger.

GreenStory API

This API is focused on the product’s carbon emissions at each stage of its production: from the factory, through shipping to consumer use. It’s often used by online shops that strive to become carbon-neutral and want to encourage their customers to do the same.

As you can see the use of carbon-offsetting APIs not only ease customers and developers into the process of becoming net zero but also creates an important social impact.

API to Use in Carbon Footprint Offset

Alex — Wed, 10 Aug 2022 13:08:14 +0000

Environmental problems are becoming more and more urgent nowadays and the humanity is seeking a solution. A lot of companies focus their efforts on finding new ways to fight climate change. One of them is carbon footprint offset. It’s not a secret that humans produce a huge amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and that it affects the environment and increases the global warming. So the smart way to deal with it is to compensate the damage that you brought upon.

The main sources of carbon emissions are burning of oil, coal and gas. So when people drive their cars or travel they emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Not to give up travel and driving altogether, some companies came up with the idea how to reduce the harm. They calculate the amount of CO2 emitted after each trip and find the methods it can be reimbursed with.

Typically it will require a lot of work, but modern technologies allow us to save time and energy. In this case we can use an API to collect the necessary data we need for calculation.

AwardWallet Email Parsing API is able to retrieve data from travel emails and structure it to fit the needs of calculating formula. The process is done automatically. The emails are either sent to the company’s inbox, or a customer might allow parsing emails directly from the inbox, which will of course make the process even more effortless.

So if you are thinking about starting a company that will calculate the carbon footprint or you want to add it as a feature to your existing app, email parsing API has already done half of the work for you.

AwardWallet API supports thousands of email formats, so you can rest assured that all the emails will be parsed correctly and the information is complete.

API for Expense Tracker Apps

Alex — Mon, 08 Aug 2022 10:15:28 +0000

Expense tracking is extensively popular in managing both personal and business finances. But while personal financing does not seem like a huge burden, when it comes to managing expenses for the whole company, the automation of this process is inevitable.

A lot of money is usually spent on business travel and entertainment and the employer need to keep an eye on the company’s money. Employees, on the other hand, need to claim their expenses to get reimbursement. Apart from the process of reporting expenses itself, the necessary procedures and policies need to be followed. Sometimes the expenses are analyzed in order to avoid overspending or to rationalize the existing habits. These actions are very time-consuming, mistake-prone, and to be honest rather boring for both parties. That’s when technology comes to the rescue.

A good expense tracker will need to integrate with different types of software such as travel management, time tracking, payroll and others. Even text recognition might be of great help.
Most of these functions (as well as some extra) can be acquired with the use of various APIs. For example, for foreign travel your app will have to be able to convert currencies (you can use Currency Converter API or Currency Exchange API). There is also Receipt Extraction API that retrieves the information from receipts. It will considerably decrease the amount of work done and save the time. Another method of automation is email parsing. Again, the data is not entered manually, but rather collected from incoming emails and structured to a known format.

AwardWallet offers Email Parsing API to extract information from emails and use it to track travel expenses. Instead of sending tickets and confirmations to human resources, the user forwards them to the provided email and then everything is done automatically. The required information about the cost of the trip is divided into categories and converted into JSON format. The process takes mere seconds, but the result saves many working hours and allows for a seamless workflow.
AwardWallet supports most known email formats and continues to add more if necessary.

API to Use for Flight Compensation Claims

Alex — Wed, 03 Aug 2022 07:07:20 +0000

Flight delays happen too often and bring too much hustle not to notice them. And the sad truth is that in many cases people don’t bother to apply for compensation, because this will involve more hustling and bustling. The answer to this problem lies in the companies that provide services to guide people through the process, relieving the customer of its burdens and grabbing a piece of pie for themselves. This will benefit both parties if the process is smooth and automated.

And that’s where API comes on the scene. Its technology allows flight compensation companies to retrieve all the necessary details about the trip fast and without any effort on customer’s part. AwardWallet Email Parsing API deals with incoming emails that contain information about the trip. It extracts the data that you need to fill in when you apply for compensation. Everything is done automatically. The users’ emails are scanned for the specific details which are then processed and turned into a structured format for further use.

AwardWallet’s parsing solutions are unique for several reasons. First, the technology is built in-house and that means it’s reliable, up-to-date and easy to operate. Second, Email Parsing API supports thousands of email formats and that means that the chance of not being able to extract the necessary information is extremely low. And third, the ability to scan the inbox for the related emails makes the process absolutely hassle free for the customer. The API can also trace the emails as back in the past as possible in search for potential compensation the customer may not have even been aware of.

AwardWallet constantly works on improvements and adds new features. Moreover, if the data retrieved from the email is insufficient for some reason, AwardWallet can add additional information from third party services, so that in the end you will receive the whole package.

Itinerary Management API for Building Apps

Alex — Tue, 26 Jul 2022 07:24:00 +0000

Why do we need itinerary management?

If you are reading this article you either already know that you need an itinerary planner for your app (then you might as well skip this part) or you’re curious whether this feature can be implemented to your app. For the latter, the answer is probably ‘yes, it can’ and that’s why.
It’s very convenient to have all your reservations stored in one place. It works perfectly well with organized groups or individual travelers, business trips or holidays. When you have an itinerary planner, less work is done manually by the travel agents. And as a result the risk of losing important data or making a mistake is very low. End-users are happy to have all the information at hand whenever they need it, whether it’s a gate number or a hotel address.

How does it work?

If you want to add an itinerary planner to your app you can either build up your own technology from scratch or use the existing ones. In any case you will need an email parsing API to pull the data directly from emails thus relieving the users of doing this job themselves and making the process automatic.

Email parsing API will scan customers’ inboxes for travel emails, extract the necessary details and turn it into useable data. The API will need to recognize various email formats, support as many providers as possible and stay up to date with all the changes.

Where can I get it?

You can get email parsing API from AwardWallet. It extracts all the relevant data from the emails that were forwarded to the account, or it can scan users’ inbox for new and existing reservations. Thus, the customer gets alert notifications in case there are some changes in the itinerary. AwardWallet’s API supports thousands of email providers and can handle most email formats. Moreover, when the data in the email is insufficient, the API uses external sources (such as other APIs) to make the information as complete as possible so that the users’ travel experience is kept seamless.

Itinerary Planning APIs and Why We Need Them

Alex — Wed, 15 Jun 2022 08:56:00 +0000

Anybody who has ever used an API won’t question the benefits you get when using it and will probably notice the load of work it takes upon itself. The variety of APIs will fit any developer’s needs, so if you want your app to quote Marvel movies, there’s an API for that. But that’s a separate topic for discussion, because today we’re going to have a look at itinerary planners.

Itinerary planning APIs are hardworking little elves that take the load of information retrieved from various sources (such as confirmation emails or other APIs) and carefully process it turning into a viable product that makes end-users happy. As a result, the users get a comprehensive plan of where they are going, when they are going to be there and what to expect on the way. The route details vary in different APIs.

AwardWallet API (Email Parsing API)

AwardWallet Email Parsing API parses incoming emails for travel information (including the emails already received by the user if they choose to allow it). Then it arranges the received information in an orderly manner. Usually it includes: Flight Reservations, Hotel Reservations, Car Rental Reservations, Train Reservations, Expenses. If some information is missing in the email (such as airport codes or possible delays), it is added by addressing the third-party sources. In the end, the data is returned structured and ready to use.

Concur APIs

Concur APIs are available for both to B2B (Enterprise) and B2C (eReceipt apps) integration. Initially Concur is an expense tracking company, so their APIs rely heavily on this type of experience. But as business expenses often come along with travel, their Itinerary API is also there. The segments of travel it covers varies from the type of client you are, but they definitely include Air, Car, Hotel, and Ride (with Dining, Rail, Parking, and Travel being extra).

Traxo

Traxo API is similar to AwardWallet API. It parses email for travel information and returns it in JSON format. The segments of trip covered by the API usually include: Air, Hotel, Car, Activity, Rail, and Cruise. The parsing process is automated, but sometimes requires human intervention.

Travefy

Travefy API allows users to include into their itinerary such categories as: Activity, Lodging, Flight, Ground Transport, Cruise, Tour, and Booking. Its main target audience is the travel agents and the itinerary planning requires a bit of manual work on their part. The details about the trip need to be inserted first. The API uses a lot of external sources to provide the travelers with as much information as possible (including historical and cultural data), but it won’t tell you if the flight number is changed (which is a confirmation email info).

Tripit

Tripit API gives access to Tripit platform and the ability to manage (create, delete and retrieve) a comprehensive set of objects: Air, Activity, Car, Parking, Cruise, Directions, Lodging, Map, Rail, Restaurant, Trip, and others. The API receives the information from confirmation emails and turns it into one master itinerary, thus collecting all the scattered info from across the web (or inbox) in one place.

AwardWallet’s itinerary planner has become part of Uber Travel experience

Alex — Thu, 26 May 2022 06:17:37 +0000

In May Uber announced the introduction of a new feature to their app called Uber Travel (along with other new items, such as Voice Ordering, Uber Charter, Uber Eats at Stadiums, etc.)

Uber Travel allows users to create a route by linking their upcoming trips and reservations with Uber rides. This happens automatically without any effort on users’ part thanks to AwardWallet itinerary planner and Uber car rides. The only thing you have to do is to sign in with Gmail account so that the app could receive information about the bookings. It is safe, because the app will only track travel related emails.

As a result, users get a smooth travel experience, because their journey is planned from start till finish. Moreover, they get notifications about any delays on the way and can alter their plans accordingly. Users can reserve the rides 30 days in advance and that helps with planning a budget. A bonus of 10% Uber Cash is given on each ride booked through Uber Travel.

Uber’s CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, believes that ‘people have been sitting around at home for too long’ and that with Uber Travel ‘you can rest assured that you’re going to make it to the flight on time’.

About Uber Travel

About AwardWallet API

My best travel APIs

Alex — Thu, 28 Apr 2022 12:25:17 +0000

If you are reading this article you probably already know what an API is. But just in case you were wondering, here is a quick explanation. API (Application Programming Interface) is a software medium that allows two programs to interact. So Travel APIs can do various sorts of things such as retrieving information about hotel and flight bookings and presenting it in different forms according to your needs. The same goes if we talk about restaurant reservations, public transport timetable, travel itineraries and other things. Basically it collects vast amount of travel data from one place, structures it and pass it on to other applications to use. In this article we are going to look at some of the best travel APIs to date.

Amadeus

Amadeus APIs are available in two options: Self-Services APIs and Enterprise APIs. Each of them is comprised of several categories:

Self-Service APIs

Air (flight search, flight booking, flight prices, prediction and analysis, schedule and seat maps, airport information and more)
Hotel (hotel booking, hotel search, hotel prices, hotel ratings)
Destination content ( safety rated locations, COVID restrictions, tours and activities)
Trip (trip parser, predictions and recommendations)
Enterprise APIs
Air (customizable search, calculating, shopping and ticketing services)
Booking Management (booking interactions)
Car & Transfers (complex car search, car booking)
Cruise (searching and booking)
Customer Profile (personal preferences, payment details and more)
Hotel (hotel search, hotel booking)
Insurance (travel insurance booking and shopping)
Payment (virtual cards)
Queue Management
Rail (searching and ticketing)

So you can see that the set of travel APIs is different and the choice depends on your needs. While Self-Service travel API seems to be more traditional, Enterprise travel API allows for a customized experience.

Sabre

The variety of travel APIs offered by Sabre is divided into three categories:

The Sabre Platform (Travel Solutions APIs)
The Sabre GDS (Airline Solutions APIs)
SynXis Central Reservations (hospitality APIs)

But for a more suitable fit, you can filter the 465 existing travel APIs by target audience, category, function, and product type.

Travelport

Typically Travelport would offer its classic Travelport Universal API (SOAP based), covering such services as:

Air (flight search, flight booking),
Car (car search, car booking),
Rail (ticket search, ticket booking),
Hotel (hotel search, hotel booking),
Customers’ profiles and reservations management.

But recently they’ve appeared to launch a pilot program Travelport Trip Services, which is REST based and optimized specifically to be used for mobile apps. The APIs are divided into “kits” for convenience (Air APIs, Trip Change Kit, Hotel Kit, Car APIs Kit, Payment Card Services API Kit). Even though it’s a pilot program not available for everybody, it seems very promising.

AwardWallet

AwardWallet offers several APIs to choose:

Email Parsing API
Web Parsing API
Account Access API

Email Parsing API allows you to retrieve the information from booking confirmation emails and use it (for example travel data for itinerary planning). It can also scan your email for any future (or previous) bookings to adjust the data. Web Parsing API extracts information from users’ online loyalty accounts and structures it in a needed format. Account Access API gives access to users’ AwardWallet account (if authorized) and shares the necessary information.

Skyscanner

Skyscanner flight search API will allow you to search flights, compare prices, and find the cheapest ticket and the best route. It started as a flight search engine, but now its travel services include car rental and hotel search. You can get Skyscanner APIs for free, but to achieve full functionality you will have to go through a vetting process.

Flightstats

Flightstats APIs provide us with all the necessary information concerning flights, airports and aircrafts. This includes, but not limited to: weather forecast, flight ratings (time accuracy), flight tracking, flight status, flight amenities, delay index, connections, schedules and changes alerts. Essentially, Flighstats APIs are divided into two categories – Flex APIs and Trip Data Services. The first category delivers comprehensive data on commercial flights and airlines, whereas the second one focuses more on itinerary management.

Tripit

Tripit travel API collects information about users’ hotel and flight bookings to build an itinerary. Tripit is a free platform and it can be integrated into any travel websites or apps. It promises the process to be easy for travelers as one of the features available is the button “Add to Tripit”. By clicking the button on your site users automatically add their booking confirmations to their Tripit account.

Concur

Concur API is similar to TripIt, but it is mostly used with business travelers. It helps with planning the itinerary, tracking the expenses, thus providing easier reimbursement.

Booking

Booking travel API is one of the biggest hotel booking APIs. It shares the information about hotel inventory, real-time pricing and hotel rooms availability, as well as property descriptions, names of cities and hotels, facilities, photos. As far as the booking process is concerned, it can be done in two ways: you can either confirm the booking by redirecting the user to Booking.com or you can become partner and process the booking on your site.

Tripadvisor

Tripadvisor Content API provides access to Tripadvisor content which is one of the richest in travel industry in terms of hotels and restaurants reviews and photos. Each item contains a set of details, such as:

name and location
detailed reviews
rating
pricing
attraction type
cuisine

The travel API is free, but for API integration you have to register and go through minor evaluation process.

Google

The APIs offered by Google Maps are grouped into three products: Maps, Routes and Places, each containing a set of APIs.

Maps (Maps SDK for Android, Maps SDK for iOS, Maps JavaScript API, Maps Static API, Street View API, Maps Embed API)
Routes (Maps JavaScript API, Directions API, Distance Matrix API, Roads API)
Places (Places API, Places Library, Maps JavaScript API, Geocoding API, Geolocation API, Time Zone API, Elevation API)

If you are not sure which Google Maps API is better to use in your case, you can have a peek at API Picker. It is made to help you choose by showing the functions each Google Maps API will bring to you.

Travelopro

Travelopro is a car rental API that deals with car search and car booking. Once the API integration into your site is complete, you get access to a full inventory of car rental offers. You can search the available cars by price, number of passengers and level of comfort. Travelopro supports several languages and has a car fleet from more than 190 countries. They also offer Travel APIs, Flight APIs, Hotel APIs, and Cruise APIs.

Windy

Windy API gives access to a vast collection of webcams around the world. It is available in two plans – Free and Professional. Free plan allows you to either link your site to windy.com or embed a player. Professional plan allows you to get unlimited API access without any in-player ads or size restrictions. The webcams can be filtered by country, category, nearby location and other features.

Expedia

Expedia travel API is a hotel booking API with a huge number of functions. It has got standard features, such as hotel booking and hotel search, as well as some extras:

Hold & Resume – this feature lets you pause the hotel booking and get back to it with price staying unchanged
Property Collect Deposits – lets the client leave a deposit and pay the rest of the sum at the hotel
Cross-Sell Recommendations – interaction between different types of APIs for more desirable experience
Notifications – let you know if any changes occur
User-Generated Content – gives you access to reviews and ratings

To proceed with Expedia API integration you will have to become a partner and get approval.

Tiqets

Tiqets API is dealing with tickets to museums, galleries, concerts and other places of interest. It provides full booking experience divided into three stages:

Content Discovery – allowing you to find the place you want to visit
Product Availability – checking if there are tickets available for the chosen date
Booking Order – finalizing the booking by purchasing the tickets

The ticket itself contains the information about the venue, cancellation policy, disability access, “Skip the Line” option and many other details.

Numbeo

Numbeo API provides you with all kinds of information about cost of living, property prices and quality of life around the world. Numbeo gathers information about local prices (housing, utilities, food, transportation, education, etc.), salaries, healthcare availability, crime rates, pollution and many more. The API boasts vast collection of cities with cost of living and life quality indexes. The API is available by purchasing a subscription, but you might get it free you want to use it for academic and not commercial purposes. And a bonus discount of 40% if your company is not very big.

RoadGoat

RoadGoat Cities API shares travel related data about various destinations around the globe. It covers 232 countries and more than 4 million cities. Each destination features such details as:

Photo
“Known for” tags
RoadGoat community info
Budget, safety and COVID ratings
Geodata
Booking links

The API is available for free or by purchasing the subscription.

OpenWeather

Weather API does what it is supposed to do – it gives you weather forecast. On top of that you get information about solar radiation, road risk information, historical weather, weather maps and national weather alerts. The API is available in different variations with flexible payment plans.

https://hackernoon.com/my-best-travel-apis