Skyscanner API alternative: the timing question, answered without an application
Access to Skyscanner’s travel APIs goes through a partner application, which is where most side projects stop. Piratefly answers a narrower question — is this fare good for this route, and when should I buy — over our own observed price history, with a free tier you can call right now and no approval wait. If you needed live itineraries to display or a booking deeplink, this is not that.
What Piratefly does not do
No live availability, no bookable itineraries, no deeplinks, no inventory of any airline or OTA. We do not resell Skyscanner data and we are not affiliated with them. What we have is a long observation history of real fares on real routes, and a verdict built on it.
What maps across, use case by use case
| What you wanted Skyscanner for | Piratefly |
|---|---|
| Cheapest fare on a route — is this price any good? | GET /v1/analisi returns a percentile against that route’s own observed history, plus a verdict (buy / wait / your call). |
| Cheapest month or calendar view for a route | The same response ranks months by median fare, with the sample size behind each one. |
| How far ahead should this be booked? | anticipoConsigliato is the booking window that has historically come out cheapest on that route. |
| Live prices and itineraries to show a user | Not covered. We return timing intelligence, never a bookable fare. |
| Booking deeplinks and affiliate redirects | Not covered, and not planned. |
| Access: partner application, then approval | 30 requests/day per IP with no key at all; $9.99/month removes the cap, card or USDC, key issued immediately. |
One call, no key
Cities by name, not IATA codes. This is a real response from the live API:
curl "https://next.piratefly.com/v1/analisi?origine=Stockholm&destinazione=Rome"{
"origine": "Stockholm",
"destinazione": "Rome",
"valuta": "EUR",
"verdetto": {
"livello": "ottimo",
"percentile": 9,
"medianaCent": 5600,
"minimoCent": 2500,
"campione": 23
},
"mesiPerConvenienza": [
{ "mese": 8, "medianaCent": 5900, "campione": 33 },
{ "mese": 10, "medianaCent": 8900, "campione": 74 }
],
"anticipoConsigliato": { "daGiorni": 56, "aGiorni": 83, "medianaCent": 5800 },
"osservazioni": 169
}Reading the response
percentile is where today’s cheapest fare sits in that route’s own history (9 = cheaper than 91% of everything we have seen), campione is how many observations that verdict rests on, mesiPerConvenienza ranks months by median fare, and anticipoConsigliato is the booking window that has historically come out cheapest. Prices are cents, EUR.
Try it, then decide
The free tier needs no account: paste the URL above in a browser. When 30 calls a day stops being enough, the Pro plan is on the API page.
Is Piratefly a drop-in replacement for the Skyscanner API?
No, and it would be dishonest to say so. Skyscanner returns live, bookable prices across suppliers; Piratefly returns judgement over historical prices for a route. If your product shows flight results to book, you still need a search or booking API — Piratefly is what you add on top to tell the user whether to buy now or wait.
Do I need an account or an approval to start?
No. The free tier is 30 requests per day per IP with no key and no signup. Pro is $9.99/month for no daily cap, paid by card on Stripe or in USDC on Solana, with the key handed back immediately.
Where does the price history come from?
From our own continuous observation of real fares on the routes we cover, stored over time. We never show a verdict on fewer than 8 observations: saying something false costs more than saying nothing.