Flight price alerts by API: get Google Flights fare drops in Slack, email or JSON

Google Flights can email you price alerts, but only in its app, one route at a time, with no API or webhook. To get fare drops as data, run Google Flights Scraper on Apify on a schedule with Only fare drops turned on. Each run checks your route and dates and saves flights only when the cheapest fare is lower than on the previous run, with that previous price on every row; add Max price for a threshold alert such as "New York to London under $900". It costs $0.20 per 1,000 flights saved, and a run with no drop saves nothing, so a daily check costs well under a cent.

Open Google Flights Scraper on Apify $0.20 per 1,000 flights ($0.16 on Gold and above)

Step by step

  1. Create a free Apify account. Sign up at apify.com. The free plan's $5 monthly credit is more than a year of daily fare checks.
  2. Set the route and dates. Open Google Flights Scraper and enter the origin and destination airport or city, the departure date and, for a round trip, the return date. Pick the cabin, stops and currency.
  3. Turn on Only fare drops. Under Fare alerts, switch on Only fare drops. Optionally set Max price to keep only flights at or under your budget.
  4. Save it as a task and schedule it. Click Save as a new task, then Schedule it daily. The first run saves every flight and records the cheapest fare; later runs save flights only when that fare falls.
  5. Send the drops somewhere. On the task's Integrations tab, send each run's rows to Slack, email, Google Sheets or a webhook, or pick them up in n8n, Make or Zapier. Each row has the price, previousCheapestPrice, airlines, times and a Google Flights link.

Do it from code

One check (cURL)

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automationnation~google-flights-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"origin": "JFK", "destination": "LHR", "departureDate": "2026-12-18", "returnDate": "2027-01-03", "currency": "USD", "maxPrice": 900, "onlyPriceDrops": true}'

# First run: every flight, change "first_check". Later runs: only flights cheaper than the last cheapest fare, change "price_drop", previousCheapestPrice set.

A daily fare alert, set up through the API (cURL)

# 1. Save the search as a task
curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/actor-tasks?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"actId": "3DCcOweLP0KkHu5Ux", "name": "fare-alert-jfk-lhr", "input": {"origin": "JFK", "destination": "LHR", "departureDate": "2026-12-18", "returnDate": "2027-01-03", "currency": "USD", "maxPrice": 900, "onlyPriceDrops": true}}'

# 2. Run it every morning (TASK_ID is the id returned by step 1)
curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/schedules?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"name": "fare-alert-jfk-lhr-daily", "cronExpression": "0 8 * * *", "timezone": "Europe/London", "isEnabled": true, "isExclusive": true, "actions": [{"type": "RUN_ACTOR_TASK", "actorTaskId": "TASK_ID"}]}'

From an AI assistant (MCP)

Add this MCP server URL to Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor and ask in plain English:

https://mcp.apify.com?tools=automationnation/google-flights-scraper

Alternatives

Google Flights' own Track prices sends emails for routes you track while signed in, with no API. Kayak, Skyscanner and Hopper have app alerts, also without data access. Amadeus switched off its free Self-Service flight APIs in July 2026, and Skyscanner's API is for approved partners. See the side-by-side comparison.

FAQ

How often should it check?

Daily is plenty for most trips; fares rarely move more than a few times a day. Hourly schedules work too and cost the same per flight saved.

Does it track each flight or the route?

The route: it compares the cheapest fare for your search with the cheapest fare on the previous run, so you hear about any flight that beats it.

Can I watch several routes?

Yes. Add them to Routes, one per line; each route keeps its own fare history. Use Monitor name to keep separate histories for the same route.

What does the first run do?

It saves every flight and records the cheapest fare, marked first_check. Alerts start from the second run.

Written by AutomationNation, the developer of Google Flights Scraper. Prices checked October 2026.