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Comparing multiple award charts to determine the cheapest use of points and miles when you have multiple options is a huge pain. To do it manually, you have to find each airline or transfer partner’s award chart, determine what your regions are according to that award chart, and note down all of the mileage costs. Well, I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to do this manually!
Enter FlyerMiler.
FlyerMiler is a really cool site that allows you to enter where you are flying to and from and in what class of service and it will compare airline award charts for you and rank them in terms of which will cost the least miles.
Let’s look at an example: Say you want to fly from Denver, Colorado to Osaka, Japan. You enter those cities into the To and From fields, and the table at the bottom of the web page populates with a listing of awards you can book with different types of miles and the corresponding prices of those awards.
As you can see, booking an award with Japan Airlines is the cheapest, and because Japan has a distance based program, the notes column contains information about what route will be at that price point. For 21,000 miles in economy, you can theoretically fly DEN – LAX – HNL – KIX, providing that there is availability. Now, the notes column also notes that Japan Airlines does pass on fuel surcharges, so even though your mileage cost will be lower, you will need to take into consideration that your dollar cost will likely be higher. The second cheapest award is also bookable with Japan Airlines but on a different routing. If you have Starwood Preferred Guest points, you have the option to transfer to Japan Airlines.
The new two cheapest awards can be booked with airlines that you are probably more familiar with. Alaska Airlines, when flying Cathay Pacific for 30,000 miles and American Airlines miles for 32,500 miles one-way.
Now, let’s say that you’re not interested in flying economy. Instead, you would like to fly in business class from Atlanta, GA to Amman, Jordan. In the top right of the page, we can select that we are only interested in seeing business and first class prices. The cheapest option, costing 57,500 miles, is to book with Singapore Airlines, but the notes sectional also notates the possibility of high fuel surcharges. Providing that you are able to fly on the cheapest route, Japan Airlines, and ANA also present options costing between 63,000 and 65,000 miles. When we finally get to a US-based carrier, the cheapest option is booking with American Airlines miles for 67,500 miles one-way.
Now, assuming you are relatively familiar with award charts when considering flights starting and ending in the US, this may not be that helpful of a tool in those cases, but it can be even more helpful when considering booking award flights from regions you are less familiar with.
Let’s look at an example flying from Budapest, Hungary to Tehran, Iran. The cheapest airline to book with is actually Singapore Airlines at only 17,500 miles one-way in economy. If you’re not used to booking with Singapore, it can be an easy airline to overlook, but if you have Amex Membership Rewards, Chase Ultimate Rewards, or Citi ThankYou points, you can transfer to Singapore Airlines to book this award. The next options are booking with American or British Airways on the cheapest route. You can see that ANA is also listed at 20,000 miles, but if you click on notes, you will notice that this pricing is for their around the world award and one of the requirements is that you must cross both oceans. Since flying between BUD and IKA will not cross both oceans, this is an invalid option.
FlyerMiler makes my life so much easier when I’m comparing what miles to use for a flight. Hopefully, it will make yours easier too!
How do you compare different award charts?
[Image via Getty]
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