Open-Jaw Ticket
A multi-city flight booked as one ticket where you fly into one city and out of another, usually cheaper than two one-ways.
- Mumbai → Rome (outbound)
- Paris → Mumbai (inbound)
You travel overland between Rome and Paris during the trip, no need to backtrack to your arrival city.
Why this is cheaper than two one-ways: Airlines price round-trips lower than the sum of two one-ways (artificially, to capture "vacation" traffic). An open-jaw is treated as a round-trip by the algorithm, so you get the round-trip discount even though you're not returning to the same city.
- Europe trips: 25–35% cheaper than booking two separate one-ways
- Asia trips: 15–25% cheaper
- Africa / S. America: 30–45% cheaper
- **Google Flights**, click "multi-city" tab, add both segments
- **Skyscanner**, same feature, "multi-city" mode
- **ITA Matrix** (matrix.itasoftware.com), best for power users; finds open-jaws Google misses
- **Direct on Emirates, Qatar, Lufthansa, Singapore**, sometimes 5–10% cheaper than aggregators
The gotcha: on a single open-jaw PNR, if you miss any segment, the entire rest of the ticket cancels automatically. Don't skip the inbound because you "decided to stay an extra week", you'll lose the segment.
Indian-specific tip: Doha (Qatar Airways) and Dubai (Emirates) both add 24-72h free stopovers to open-jaw tickets. Booking Mumbai-Rome-Doha-Mumbai with a 48h Doha stop adds a country at zero extra ticket cost.