Duffel Flights and Stays API vs Skyscanner Travel APIs

Duffel Flights and Stays API

Self-serve sign-up and test mode with no card or contract. No OpenAPI document, llms.txt or official MCP server.

Skyscanner Travel APIs

Thirteen documented search APIs cover flights, hotels and car hire behind one x-api-key header, with default rate limits published per endpoint and no usage fee. Access needs an approved application, an audience above 100,000 monthly users and a commercial agreement, and the usage guidelines bar live-price calls made without a user action. Booking happens on supplier sites.

Duffel Flights and Stays API

1. Send Duffel-Version: v2 on every request or you get a version error
2. Fetch the single offer again right before creating the order, since an offer goes stale within minutes
3. Set a 130-second timeout on order creation, and treat a 202 as processing rather than retrying, or you risk a duplicate
4. Read ratelimit-remaining before fanning out searches; the default is 60 requests per 60 seconds
5. Count offer requests. Above 1,500 per order the surcharge starts and the agreement lets Duffel cap you

Skyscanner Travel APIs

1. Send the key in the x-api-key header on every call to https://partners.api.skyscanner.net. CORS is not supported, so call from a server
2. Create a live search only when a user has given origin, destination and exact dates. Use the indicative price endpoints for open-ended questions
3. Poll /search/poll/{sessionToken} until status is RESULT_STATUS_COMPLETE, and replace earlier results only when action is RESULT_ACTION_REPLACED
4. Start a new session when a poll returns 400. Flight session tokens last about an hour and hotel sessions at most 15 minutes
5. Pass each deepLink to the traveller unchanged, since altered encoding breaks Impact tracking, and never put personal data in subid2