SBA

$149 Find Cheap Flights from Houston to Santa Barbara

This is the cheapest one-way flight price found by a KAYAK user in the last 72 hours by searching for a flight from Houston to Santa Barbara departing on 9/5. Fares are subject to change and may not be available on all flights or dates of travel. Click the price to replicate the search for this deal.
1 adult
1 adult, Economy

KAYAK searches hundreds of travel sites at once for deals on flights to Santa Barbara

 
These are the airlines KAYAK users have selected most often from within our search results in flight searches from Houston to Santa Barbara, as well as popular online travel agencies
These are the airlines KAYAK users have selected most often from within our search results in flight searches from Houston to Santa Barbara, as well as popular online travel agencies
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Cheap Flights from Houston to Santa Barbara

 
Here are some of the best deals found on KAYAK recently from the most popular airlines for round-trip flights from Houston to Santa Barbara that are departing in the next months. While these flights were available on KAYAK in the last 72 hours, prices and availability are subject to change and deals may expire.
Discover the best prices for you by selecting your travel dates on KAYAK.

Recent round-trip flight deals from Houston to Santa Barbara

Wed, Oct 1 - Tue, Oct 7
Alaska Airlines Logo
8:00 am - 6:41 pmIAH-SBA
12h 41m1 stop
Alaska Airlines Logo
7:40 pm - 6:10 pmSBA-IAH
20h 30m1 stop
$296Alaska Airlines
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Thu, Sep 4 - Mon, Sep 8
American Airlines Logo
8:33 am - 12:28 pmIAH-SBA
5h 55m1 stop
American Airlines Logo
4:36 pm - 11:28 pmSBA-IAH
4h 52m1 stop
$297American Airlines
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Wed, Oct 1 - Tue, Oct 7
Southwest Logo
9:40 am - 1:30 pmHOU-SBA
5h 50m1 stop
Southwest Logo
3:30 pm - 12:15 amSBA-HOU
6h 45m1 stop
$297Southwest
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Wed, Oct 1 - Tue, Oct 7
Delta Logo
1:13 pm - 8:03 pmHOU-SBA
8h 50m1 stop
Delta Logo
5:05 pm - 9:18 amSBA-HOU
14h 13m2 stops
$302Delta
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Thu, Sep 4 - Mon, Sep 8
American Airlines Logo
5:00 am - 12:28 pmIAH-SBA
9h 28m2 stops
American Airlines Logo
4:36 pm - 11:28 pmSBA-IAH
4h 52m1 stop
$302American Airlines
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Wed, Oct 1 - Tue, Oct 7
American Airlines Logo
10:14 am - 6:39 pmIAH-SBA
10h 25m2 stops
American Airlines Logo
6:05 am - 5:13 pmSBA-IAH
9h 08m2 stops
$307American Airlines
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Thu, Oct 30 - Mon, Nov 3
United Airlines Logo
5:15 am - 9:49 amIAH-SBA
6h 34m1 stop
United Airlines Logo
2:09 pm - 12:59 amSBA-IAH
8h 50m1 stop
$372United Airlines
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Fri, Sep 5 - Tue, Sep 9
United Airlines Logo
9:35 am - 2:39 pmIAH-SBA
7h 04m1 stop
United Airlines Logo
2:32 pm - 9:41 pmSBA-IAH
5h 09m1 stop
$377United Airlines
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Wed, Oct 1 - Tue, Oct 7
Southwest Logo
7:35 am - 1:30 pmHOU-SBA
7h 55m2 stops
Southwest Logo
5:30 am - 3:10 pmSBA-HOU
7h 40m2 stops
$378Southwest
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Fri, Aug 15 - Fri, Aug 22
Delta Logo
7:00 am - 4:07 pmIAH-SBA
11h 07m2 stops
Delta Logo
12:40 pm - 9:38 pmSBA-IAH
6h 58m1 stop
$407Delta
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Booking Insights

KAYAK's insights & trends for Houston to Santa Barbara flights

Get data-powered insights and trends into flights from Houston to Santa Barbara to help you find the cheapest flights, the best time to fly and much more.

What’s the cheapest day of the week to fly from Houston to Santa Barbara?

The average price of all round-trip flights from Houston to Santa Barbara clicked on KAYAK for each day over the last 12 months.

When flying from Houston to Santa Barbara, you should consider leaving on a Saturday and avoid Sundays if you are looking for the best rates. For your return to Houston, you’ll find the best rates on Wednesdays and the most expensive ones on Sundays.

What is the cheapest month to fly from Houston to Santa Barbara?

To calculate monthly average prices, KAYAK takes all prices for each month over the last year for round-trip flights from Houston to Santa Barbara, removes the top 0.1% to account for outliers, and then takes the median of all values for each month.

The cheapest month for flights from Houston to Santa Barbara is September, where tickets cost $382 (return) on average. On the other hand, the most expensive months are April and March, where the average cost of round-trip tickets is $653 and $553 respectively.

Good to know

Cheapest flight$149
Flight from Houston George Bush Airport to Santa Barbara

When to book flights from Houston to Santa Barbara

Are your dates flexible? Find out the best times to travel from Houston to Santa Barbara based on our flight data from the last year. Discover the cheapest month and even day to fly.
Estimated round-trip price
KAYAK looks at all historical flight data for each date to provide a predicted price for one-way trips or round-trips with a duration up to 40 days. While we try to provide actual minimum prices for each date, some prices are predictions and actual prices may differ.

FAQs for booking flights from Houston to Santa Barbara

  • What is the cheapest flight from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    In the last 3 days, the lowest price for a flight from Houston to Santa Barbara was $149 for a one-way ticket and $296 for a round-trip.

  • Do I need a passport to fly between Houston and Santa Barbara?

    Yes, you’ll need a passport to travel to Santa Barbara from Houston.

  • Which airports will I be using when flying from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    When flying out of Houston you will be using one of these airports: Houston Hobby or Houston George Bush Intcntl. You will be landing at Santa Barbara.

  • Which aircraft models fly most regularly from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    We unfortunately don’t have that data for this specific route.

  • Which airline alliances offer flights from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    SkyTeam, oneworld, and Star Alliance are the airline alliances operating flights between Houston and Santa Barbara, with oneworld being the most commonly used for this route.

  • How does KAYAK find such low prices on flights from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    KAYAK is a travel search engine. That means we look across the web to find the best prices we can find for our users. With over 2 billion flight queries processed yearly, we are able to display a variety of prices and options on flights from Houston to Santa Barbara.

  • How does KAYAK's flight Price Forecast tool help me choose the right time to buy my flight ticket from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    KAYAK’s flight Price Forecast tool uses historical data to determine whether the price for a flight to Santa Barbara from Houston is likely to change within 7 days, so travelers know whether to wait or book now.

  • What is the Hacker Fare option on flights from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    Hacker Fares allow you to combine one-way tickets in order to save you money over a traditional round-trip ticket. You could then fly to Santa Barbara with an airline and back to Houston with another airline.

  • What is KAYAK's "flexible dates" feature and why should I care when looking for a flight from Houston to Santa Barbara?

    Sometimes travel dates aren't set in stone. If your preferred travel dates have some wiggle room, flexible dates will show you all the options when flying to Santa Barbara from Houston up to 3 days before/after your preferred dates. You can then pick the flights that suit you best.

Reviews of the top 4 airlines serving from Houston to Santa Barbara

 
See real verified KAYAK customer reviews for airlines flying from Houston to Santa Barbara. Airline scores are aggregated from all reviews left by passengers on KAYAK after flying with an airline. KAYAK doesn’t show reviews that are older than 5 years. Learn how KAYAK collects reviews.
Need help choosing which airline to fly with from Houston to Santa Barbara? KAYAK airline reviews give an overall score for each airline based on loads of factors, including comfort, boarding, in-flight entertainment and more, to make your decision easier. See airline scores according to verified KAYAK customer reviews.
8.0
SouthwestOverall score based on 4241 reviews
7.5Entertainment
8.1Boarding
7.0Food
8.6Crew
8.0Comfort
Airline reviews

Very smooth checking in our luggage with a super pleasant SW agent. I enjoyed a fun entertaining movie.

10.0 ExcellentGordon, Jul 2025GEG - OAK
Read more Southwest reviews

Very smooth checking in our luggage with a super pleasant SW agent. I enjoyed a fun entertaining movie.

First time traveling on Southwest since bag fees were implemented. Usual good service. Just more expensive now.

Flight crew and cabin crew were great. I had to rearrange flights because my original flight was 3hrs delayed for weather, the rub is the flight I moved to boarded on time then we sat at the gate for 2 hours because scheduling stole our first officer for another flight, TWICE. Then our actual FO was an hour delayed. To make it worse my original flight went from a 3 hour delay to departing 15min EARLY. Just poor scheduling operations all around.

It was a perfect flight in all aspects! Both legs!

Boarding process, crew were good. But the seats were so uncomfortable that was all I could focus on. I literally had to sit forward so that all 3 of us could fit in row. I will try to avoid Southwest in the future for any flights over 60 minutes.

Great flight, 47 passengers on a 180 seat plane. Stewardess was pleasant and cheerful.

Great experience flying Southwest. The crew was really kind and helpful, and very friendly with our toddler.

Plane late from DC to Austin 30 minutes. Crew made up much of the time enroute to San Diego.

Fine, but how to board on SW versus othrr airlines, is just lame. Goood staff though and all was solid otherwise.

Was as expected. Crowed planes. Too many carryons delaying takeoff. But the ride only took an hour and saved me a lot of time SFO is a not a great airport.

Food was surprisingly good but the WiFi was not great

My flight was extremely cold. I had a jacket and a cover was left in each seat. The cover was extremely thin and I have a disability, fibromyalgia and arthrithis and AC air is the worst. I closed my vent and my husbands vent and it still was frigid. I asked the attendant if I could get another cover and she quickly almost dismissively and totally unconcerned stating, (I quote) (one per chair) and walked off so quickly that I didn't get a chance to explain to her that I literally have adisability. I didnt want to make a seen so I set on that flight for over 5 hours in pain, joints locking up and extremely uncomfortable. When my fibromyalgia flares up my joints not only ache but they will lock up also and it takes me days to get back to my regular self even though I take medication for it. I felt like it would not have hurt anyone at all for her to just give me an extra cover because I'm sure they have all types of medical issues in people that fly every day.

Not a "Delta" issue, but a JFK issue: We booked a connecting flight with 3 1/2 hours between to clearn immigration and customs. Our inbound flight (BCN to JFK) was on the taxiway 45 minutes which ate into our layover time. Immigtration was insanely quick with the CBP MPC app; however, clearing TSA (again, after we were ALREADY cleared in Spain on the inbound international flight) took over 95 minutes. This left us with 10 minutes before boarding the connecting flight (JFK to SAN) to walk to the far end of Terminal 4 and try to find food. We didn't find any food that could promise to serve us in under 10 minutes so we boarded the Delta flight after coming off a plance and an 8-hour flight knowing that we wouldn't be served any food on the next 5 1/2 hour flight. I feel like Delta needs to put pressure on the JFK TSA to open more screening stations (by our count, we saw only 5 scanners open and a line of - as we said - over 90 minutes. The insult is that we WERE ALREADY SCREENED through TSA, but as you come off one flight into the USA, you have to go through the whole process again. It seems like if you have a connecting flight, there should be a way to pass through immigration and customs without needing to return through TSA.

There are 4 flights in consecutive gates with about the same departure time. Two flights were boarding at the same time. One was delayed or boarding would be happening at the same time. I am not sure what Delta and LAX need to do to have a better layout at the end of Terminal 2

5 hours of delay that could've been much shorter if Delta had taken the 1 hour delay they imposed on the flight before boarding to run any of the plane checks required for flight to find the hydraulic issue that required nearly 3 hours to fix. $24 of meal credit buys a sandwich and a soft drink. Poor communication within the terminal about what gate we'd be re-boarding from and when we'd be re-boarding.

The entertainment and wifi mostly didn't work on this flight.

Terrible entertainment system - kept freezing and audio kept cutting out. Snacks were mediocre at best for a 5 hour flight.

I am still upset that my bag was lost on a recent trip to Rome ; we were inconvenienced and out €150 Euros ; delta has refused to reimburse us

This had nothing to do with Delta… The flights were on time and flawless. The service was excellent. We purchased seats in (aisle/middle) comfort plus since this was a cross country flight. Unfortunately, the woman seated at the window was 300+ pounds and, as might be expected, covered up about a third of the middle seat also. there was absolutely nothing that Delta could have done about that… I just don’t know what the answer should be. If you purchase a seat, you should should be able to use the entire seat and not just the portion that someone else is not sitting/oozing in. Disappointing…there should be something that could be done….I'm just not sure what solution could be.

Seats are much much more comfortable than United, which is what I usually fly

the delay for 3 hours was understandable due to weather conditions but the flight should’ve provided some on flight compensations or at least provide more food.

United could have one single once of customer service. No human United employee would help me with the invalid mileage plus number, they said I had to speak with the computer.

Overall it was good. I missed my connection but I was put on another flight.

Although the flight was delayed the crew and the flight itself were very good. Couldn't fault anything and after the disappointment of being abandoned in the US by BA it was a welcome relief to travel with United

Boarding experience was smooth. Flight attendants were friendly and helpful. Entertainment system on the Houston-Edmonton flight did not function for passengers on the left side of the aisle. On the bird's eye flight from Quito to Houston, they should not serve a meal. No one needs to eat after midnight and it is disturbing for those passengers trying to sleep.

Great experience…left a bit behind schedule but made up fir that in the air and landed 10 minutes early 😁

Smooth flight. Boarding was chaotic. Could not hear the gate agent over the intercom. People were lined up in the wrong lines. Groups one and two were told to board through line one and group 3 through line 2. All very confusing. Once in the air, the flight was smooth. There was no entertainment option on this aircraft, even though it was a larger aircraft.

My suitcase was completed destroyed. The top part is broken and unusable now.

We boarded but then sat there waiting on some missed connection people to get on so we sat for about 15 minutes for that. Then we sat again because the passenger manifest was wrong and they had to figure it out before we could leave. That took about another 20 minutes or so. The crew was working hard to figure it out so it’s not their fault. It ended up being a system glitch where someone was upgraded to first class while another person was also in the same seat and it just created a mess that took a little while to figure out. They literally went to every person on the plane asking their names to see who was sitting in the wrong seat. I also hate the entertainment that must be watched on your phone or tablet. Just give us setback screens. It’s so much better. Almost every Delta flight has this now and it is so nice to have them. The crew did a great job. I have no complaints from them. They were very hard working, even with the mishap and a disgruntled passenger.

My priority checked bag was not loaded on the flight. I had to sit in baggage claim in Las Vegas for 2 1/2 hours waiting for the next flight. All baggage staff were very helpful, tracking showed it as scanned for loading. Nobody told me why it wasn't on my flight.

Amazing food, great staff, with one noticable detail missing ...but no seat entertainment in any of aircraft ...I am not a fan

Boarding gate in Honolulu was staffed with a great clerk with a soothing voice despite the flight delay of over an hour. Flight attendants in the plane were all grumpy, not pleasant looking bunch. Their sour attitude showed throughout the flight. Inly able to get a select few movies started. Most of the movie links in the “free entertainment” did not work.

This was a horrible experience. For a first class experience, my chair was held together by 3M tape - and I have a photo. The crew weren’t very attentive, somewhat dismissive and forgot my drink and snack, the chair reclined about 3 inches on a 6-hour cross country flight. I was also not informed that there was no lounge available in Newark airport because of renovations, so all around this was one of the worst experiences and I would actively avoid both American and Alaska Air going forward.

Boarding was very efficient. Everyone got on board and we got on our way very quickly. It was frustrating that the entertainment app was not functioning properly. I was not able to activate some of the movies offered. The crew on this flight appears to be pretty grumpy. They had no smile on their faces. I felt like they were doing us a favor for being there.

Loved the staff, boarding and drink options! Wish the comfort of the seat could have been better nevertheless

Honestly, I haven’t flown American in years, probably due to the pandemic and my being unable to travel for certain periods in the last two years, but it was a good experience to dig out or obtain a new American Airlines account after many years of traveling for business with American in the past.

Long 5 hour and 45 min flight and only one drink service and cookie snack

One bottle of water and a package of cookies for comfort plus. We had to literally beg a flight attendant for an extra bottle of water later in the flight due to feeling dehydrated.

Flight boarded from Gate 39 at OGG, the farthest gate in the terminal. There were no Hawaiian themed amenities for the flight. The first class service was mediocre at best; I received not special welcome or recognition as an executive platinum member of American Advantage program. The flight attendants were more concerned with their cell phones than saying "thank you" to the passengers as we disembarked. Fortunately, the flight arrived at LAX a few minutes early.

Bigger seats. Board back to front! Disembark front to back!

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