Almost two years in the making, InsideTrip has emerged from its beta testing period with what it claims is a full service search engine that incorporates many other elements of a journey.
Launched in mid-2008, Seattle, US-based InsideTrip has combined traditional metasearch technology with features such as the ability to browse results based on bag and drink fees or type of legroom is on offer for a particular flight.
Incorporated alongside the existing TripQuality tool are other methods of slicing and dicing search results including information on how difficult making a connecting flight could be as well as ability to find multi-city itineraries, business class and first class fares.
Other ways a user can search for fares is by reliability, type of route the aircraft takes and location of gates within airports.
The original TripQuality functionality included during the Beta phase for InsideTrip included information within search results as part of a drop-down menu to illustrate the supposed speed, comfort or ease of a particular flight.
An additional tool, known as MarketQuality, is also unveiled for the first time in the full version of InsideTrip in order to aggregate older scores from the TripQuality rankings.
Dave Pelter, founder and CEO, says:
"There really are some great air itineraries out there with new planes and generous legroom, and flown by airlines that don't believe in using nickel- and-diming fees for bags and drinks. You just need to know how to find them.”
Meanwhile the site has struck a number of deals with carriers and online travel agencies such as American Airlines and Orbitz to offer special rates.