Thailand Domestic Low Fare Airlines

Thailand has a number of cheap domestic airline options. Travelling by plan is normally the quickest way around a country and some of these domestic airlines can provide you with a flight at a very reasonable cost.

It can also be argued that it is probably safer to travel through the skies of Thailand than the roads!

Thai Air Asia
I have flown Thailand Air Asia many times and I struggle to recall a flight that has taken off on time. At this stage I am willing to invest in other options. See Air Asia - Quality Cheap Flights Throughout Asia for further information about Air Asia.

One thing that annoyed me, was I could never find on the Air Asia website was a flight map visually showing their routes.

There was also an issue with their website when I tried to book my friend a ticket. The computer system gave me some vague error message and we had no idea whether it had actually made the booking or not. It appeared not and we did not get an email message until well after we tried to make the booking. Turned out the booking did go through, but we had already made another booking. It turned out okay in the end though as they had cancelled the first booking by the time we enquired at the airport.

I also believe all my flights with Air Asia ran late, but then I think all the flights on that holiday were running late.

NokAir
NokAir is pretty distinctive with their bright yellow colour. I have not flown the NokAir airline myself, but hear they offer a good service. Many people suggest this is the best cheap domestic option for Thailand. I may have to try them on my next Thai trip. Update: I have tried on at least two seperate occasions to book flights with NokAir, but due to different reasons their website failed to take my booking. I wonder how much business they have lost due to the poor quality of the NokAir website.

I believe they offer prearranged seating when you are booking online, this can stop the mad rush for seats that you might encounter flying with an open seating airline like Air Asia.

NokAir also offer their Nok Plus, which is a higher fee seat with some perks such as

- you can change travel dates without a change fee
- Nok Plus passengers receive a free snack on board and access to newspapers
- Allowed a total of 30kg baggage allowance as opposed to 15kg in economy class.

The website notes that Nok Plus seats are available at only 535 Baht extra (VAT included) on top of economy class fare.

Below are some airlines that are not low far airlines, but may be worth checking out.

One-Two-Go
One-Two-Go is owned by Orient Thai Airlines. They claim to be the first low fare airline in Thailand.

Their pricing structure sounds different to most low cost airlines as it sounds like everyone is offered the same price, no matter how many seats have been sold.

They are also trying to entice you with free drinks and snacks ;)

Frequent Thailand domestic travellers may want to check out One-Two-Go's Access Cards. These provide up to 12% discounts on flights as well as other privileges.

One-Two-Go prices look pretty cheap to me, so well worth checking out, especially if you are booking close to the travel date.

Bangkok Air
Bangkok Air called themselves a boutique airline. I think this is somehow meant to explain their high prices ;) I haven't heard to much about these airlines, except that a friend used to fly with them until one day he turned up to the airport and was told that the flight was no longer running. He said he was less than happy with their boutique services when this occurred and refuses to book with them ever again.

Phuket Air
Phuket Air website didn't do much to impress me. They seem to have limited flights options and after a few attempts, I gave up trying to get it to give me a price. I'm not sure how their fares measure up to the others here.

Phuket Air seem to only run routes along Bangkok, Ranong and Yangong. Their flight route map has a number of other options listed for the future. I'll leave it to you to decide about Phuket Air. Funnily enough, they don't seem to do a route to Phuket!

SilkAir is a Singapore Airlines company and might be worth looking at as it does some Thailand routes.