It got buried in the groundbreaking news that they're now listing fares on Google Flights, but Southwest recently made another consumer-friendly change – this one on its own website.
As of this week, there's no more need to filter or dig through through tons of connecting itineraries to find a nonstop option. Southwest recently began automatically sorting its results with the nonstop flights right on top.
It's a small but slick change, prioritizing the nonstop flights you're probably looking for over one- and two-stop itineraries below. Southwest made this positive change at Southwest.com as well as on its smartphone app.
So long as nonstop flights exists, those fastest routes will show up on top under a new, “Nonstop” green header. Flights with stops only show up below.
That's a positive change compared to the airline's old setup, which required filtering the results at the top – or simply scrolling through to see nonstop flights.
Is saving travelers a click huge news? Hardly … but it is a positive change. With thousands of nonstop flights a day between cities and big and small across the country, this will surely save some travelers from missing a nonstop option buried in the results.
Southwest has added this same functionality to its app.
Southwest's search results in the app are now automatically sorted by “number of stops.” You can tweak that using the “Sort” button in the top right corner of the app.
Sadly, the airline still hasn't made it possible to filter for nonstop flights when you use its otherwise awesome Low Fare Calendar. It's one of the most powerful tools for finding cheap Southwest fare – adding the ability to filter this calendar result to only display nonstop flights would have made it even better.
But it might be a moot point now. Instead, you can use Google Flight's own nonstop filter to pull up a calendar that is already filtered for the cheapest Southwest flights available. That could be the difference between paying $450-plus for these nonstop flights from Minneapolis-St. Paul (MSP) to Las Vegas … or just $160 total.
It's one of the many reasons why Southwest's partnership with Google Flights is such positive news for travelers.
Bottom Line
Southwest is now sorting its nonstop flight itineraries at the top of flight search results, making it easier for travelers to find the fastest flights instead of sifting through connecting itineraries to find the best ones.
It may be small potatoes compared to Southwest fares now showing up on Google Flights … but this is still a positive change for travelers searching at Southwest.com and the airline's app.