About Google Flights
Google Flights is an MCP server for travelers planning trips, with flight search and analysis of fares, routes, and airports. Its 12 tools include price tracking and cabin comparisons, and require no API key.
Key features
- 01Search one-way, round-trip, and multi-city flights
- 02Track fares and view price history
- 03View calendar prices and price assessments
- 04Compare cabins and analyze layover risk
- 05Look up airports, emissions, and aircraft details
- 06Generate Google Flights booking links
Use cases
- 01Find low fares for dates or date ranges
- 02Compare economy and business on the same route
- 03Monitor route fares and spot price drops
- 04Assess connections and nearby airport options
MCP support
The MCP server provides compatible clients with 12 tools for flight search, fare analysis, and airport lookup. The README lists Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, and other MCP-compatible clients.
Configuration
Local server config is the same for every client. Copy it into your client’s MCP config file.
Tools
12Saved tool list · updated 2w ago
| Parameter | Type | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| origin | string | Yes | Departure airport IATA code (e.g., JFK) |
| destination | string | Yes | Arrival airport IATA code (e.g., NRT) |
| departureDate | string | Yes | Departure date in YYYY-MM-DD format |
| returnDate | string | No | Return date in YYYY-MM-DD format (makes it round-trip) |
| cabinClass | enum | No | Cabin classeconomy | premium_economy | business | first |
| adults | integer | No | Number of adult passengers |
| children | integer | No | Number of child passengers |
| infants | integer | No | Number of infant passengers |
| maxStops | integer | No | Maximum number of stops (0=nonstop, 1, 2). Omit for any. |
| sortBy | enum | No | Sort results bybest | price | duration | departure | arrival |
| maxResults | integer | No | Maximum number of results to return |
Details
From the project READMEgoogle-flights-mcp
The most feature-rich MCP server for Google Flights. No API key required.
12 tools for searching flights, tracking prices, comparing cabins, analyzing layovers, and more, all powered by real-time Google Flights data.
Works with Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, and any MCP-compatible client.
Features no other Google Flights MCP has
- Carbon emissions per flight and per leg (CO2 in kg)
- Price context: Google's own assessment of whether a price is low, typical, or high
- Price tracking: track prices over time with SQLite persistence, detect drops and trends
- Calendar heatmap: 60 days of daily prices in a single API call
- Cabin class comparison: economy vs premium vs business vs first, side by side
- Nearby airport suggestions: find cheaper alternatives (e.g., EWR/LGA near JFK)
- Layover analysis: connection time risk assessment (tight/comfortable/overnight)
- Aircraft & seat details: Boeing 787 vs 777, seat pitch in inches
- Google Flights URLs: direct booking links users can click
What you can ask
- "Find nonstop flights from JFK to London next month"
- "What's the cheapest week to fly SFO to Tokyo?"
- "Compare economy vs business class for LAX to Paris"
- "Are there cheaper airports near JFK I should check?"
- "Track the price of SFO to NRT on June 15 and alert me if it drops"
- "Show me the emissions for flights from SFO to Tokyo"
- "Analyze the layovers for connecting flights from SFO to Bangkok"
Quick start
Option 1: npx (no install)
Works immediately with Claude Code:
claude mcp add google-flights -- npx -y google-flights-mcp
Or with Claude Desktop, add to your claude_desktop_config.json:
{
"mcpServers": {
"google-flights": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "google-flights-mcp"]
}
}
}
Option 2: Install from source
git clone https://github.com/andreacappelletti97/google-flights-mcp.git
cd google-flights-mcp
npm install
npm run build
Then connect to Claude Code:
claude mcp add google-flights node /absolute/path/to/google-flights-mcp/dist/index.js
Or Claude Desktop (claude_desktop_config.json):
{
"mcpServers": {
"google-flights": {
"command": "node",
"args": ["/absolute/path/to/google-flights-mcp/dist/index.js"]
}
}
}
Restart your MCP client. You should see 12 flight tools available.
Tools (12)
Search
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
search_flights | One-way & round-trip search. Returns prices, airlines, durations, stops, aircraft, seat pitch, CO2 emissions, and price context. |
search_multi_city | Multi-leg itinerary search (2-5 segments). |
Price intelligence
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
get_calendar_heatmap | Full calendar of daily prices (~60 days) from a single API call. Cheapest dates at a glance. |
get_price_insights | Scan a date range to find cheapest departure dates (multiple API calls for precision). |
compare_cabin_classes | Compare economy, premium economy, business, and first class prices for the same route. |
track_price | Record current price and report trend (dropping/rising/stable). Persists in SQLite. |
get_price_history | View all recorded price observations for a tracked route. |
list_tracked_routes | List all routes being price-tracked with last known price. |
Airport tools
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
lookup_airport | Search 8,800+ airports by city, name, IATA code, or country. |
find_nearby_airports | Find alternative airports within a radius (default: 200km). Uses Haversine distance. |
Utility
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
get_flight_url | Generate a direct Google Flights booking URL. |
analyze_layovers | Analyze connection quality for multi-stop flights. Reports risk level, connection type, aircraft. |
Example output
search_flights (with emissions and price context)
Flights from SFO to NRT on 2026-06-15:
Price assessment: HIGH ($294 above typical). Range: $500 - $700, typical: $577
Flight 1: $874 | 11h 15m | 0 stop(s) | CO2: 428kg
ZG 25: SFO -> NRT (11h 15m) [aircraft: Boeing 787, seat pitch: 31 inches, CO2: 428kg]
Flight 2: $1310 | 11h 5m | 0 stop(s) | CO2: 545kg
NH 7: SFO -> NRT (11h 5m) [aircraft: Boeing 777, seat pitch: 34 inches, CO2: 545kg]
get_calendar_heatmap
Price calendar: SFO -> NRT
61 days of data
Cheapest: $384 (2026-02-12)
Most expensive: $870 (2026-04-13)
Average: $632
2026-02:
12: $384 ***
13: $384 ***
...
20: $540 ***
2026-03:
06: $609 *
...
20: $689
find_nearby_airports
Airports near JFK within 150km:
LGA - LaGuardia Airport (New York, US), 17km away
EWR - Newark Liberty International Airport (Newark, US), 33km away
HPN - Westchester County Airport (White Plains, US), 48km away
How it works
There is no official Google Flights API. This server reverse-engineers Google's internal FlightsFrontendService endpoint. It extracts not just flights, but hidden metadata: emissions, price assessments, daily price calendars, aircraft types, and seat details.
Reliability
- Caching: 5-minute TTL cache, identical searches don't hit Google twice
- Retry with backoff: exponential backoff + jitter on 429/5xx errors, honors
Retry-Afterheaders - Circuit breaker: stops requests after 5 consecutive failures, auto-recovers after 30s
- Structural validation: clear errors when Google changes their response format
- TLS mitigation:
undiciwith browser-like headers + rotating User-Agents,fetchfallback
Price tracking
Price history is stored in SQLite at ~/.google-flights-mcp/prices.db. Each call to track_price records the current cheapest price and reports the trend compared to previous observations.
Development
npm install # Install dependencies
npm run build # Build with tsup
npm test # Run tests (85 tests)
npm run lint # ESLint with FP rules (no-let, immutable-data, no-loop-statements)
npm run typecheck # TypeScript strict type checking
npm run check # typecheck + lint + test (the full CI pipeline)
npm run dev # Build in watch mode
Design
Fully functional TypeScript codebase:
- No mutation: all types
readonly, nolet/var/.push()/forloops - Result monad: errors are values (
Result<T, E>), not exceptions - Pure/IO separation: pure transforms are separate from network and disk IO
- Composition:
pipe()+flatMap()for chaining fallible operations
See CLAUDE.md for architecture details and the Google Flights response format reference.
Limitations
- No official API: uses an undocumented Google endpoint that could change at any time. Structural validation makes breakages obvious.
- Rate limiting: Google may throttle heavy use. Built-in retry and circuit breaker handle transient issues.
- Prices are estimates: prices reflect query time; they can change before booking.
- Currency: determined by Google based on IP/locale.
Contributing
- Fork the repo
- Create a feature branch
- Make your changes
- Run
npm run checkto verify - Open a PR
License
ISC
Comments
New to MCP?
From what the protocol is to installing your first server, these answers cover most first questions.
An open protocol that defines how AI applications connect to external tools and data in a uniform way. Clients talk to the model; MCP servers provide tools, resources and prompt templates. They exchange standard messages, so one server can be reused by many clients.