Commuters can stand up to 50% off prepare tickets this month – however solely at particular time

If you’re sick of forking out large sums of money for train tickets, there are some seriously impressive discounts up for grabs this month – but only if you book within a specific time frame

Commuters can bag discounts of up to 50% on their train tickets this month, but only if they book within a particular window.

Tickets will be sold with up to half price off from Tuesday (January 14) thanks to the the government’s annual rail sale. This will continue until Monday, January 20.

The bargain tickets will be available on selected advance and off-peak journeys between January 17 and March 31. Taking to Instagram, bargain-hunters Catch A Gem shared some more information about the kinds of deals you might be able to secure.

“London to Birmingham for £3.20, Birmingham to Bristol for £15, Manchester to Newcastle for just £10, London to Cardiff for £24 – these are prices from the Great British rail sale that happens every single year, and it’s happening again this year,” they explained. “The government have announced that they’re going to be slashing the prices of train tickets across the country to get more people out on trains.

“To get these prices, you can go to the official website at midnight or what you can do is go to Trainline or the official train (website) that you get your train tickets from.” He added that on the day the sale goes live, Catch A Gem will be posting some of the best deals available. The government website states that the rail sale will offer up to half price discounts on over two million tickets on thousands of popular routes across almost all UK train operators, including Transport for Wales and ScotRail.

It warns these offers “will not last long” and there are “only a limited number of tickets, so passengers are being encouraged to snap up these deals quickly if they want to save more on their train fares”. On the website you can also see examples of fares during the rail sale such as London to Edinburgh for £26.15 – usually £62.50 – Leeds to Manchester Airport for £5.90 – discounted from £11.90 – and Newcastle to Carlisle for £6 – usually £12.

Catch A Gem’s Instagram reel has amassed 690,000 views, 8,171 likes and dozens of comments. It has also been shared more than 1,000 times, increasing awareness of the slashed train ticket prices.

One Instagram user commented: “I was literally about to book a train ticket so thanks lol.” Another said “thanks for sharing” and a third tagged someone else suggesting to go to Newcastle together next week.

They added: “…and also with this sale at least I’m not going to pay a lot for train from St Pancras to Luton”. However, not everyone was hopeful or positive.

One person claimed: “These trains about to be so packed”. This comment received 300 likes indicating that many others agreed.

Another advised people not to be “stupid” and that the sale is a “con”. They said: “This is the government planning to get people to stop driving.”

Last year, the rail sale “saved passengers around £5.8 million in total”. This year the government has “tasked the rail industry to deliver an even bigger sale to offer cheaper tickets for passengers and encourage more people to travel by train”.