Credit card sign-up bonuses are constantly changing. For the latest offers, see out Hot Deals page.
The sign-up bonus on the American Airlines Barclaycard AAdvantage Aviator Red World Elite Mastercard just increased to 50,000 AA miles. The unique thing about this card is that you get the bonus after your first purchase and paying the card’s $95 annual fee (instead of having to meet a high minimum spending threshold). Your purchase on the card can be as big or small as you want—you could even buy a pack of gum!
If you have a spouse or partner who can also apply for this card separately, you would have a total of 100,000 American Airline miles for making two purchases and paying $190 total in annual fees. If you get four award tickets out of the miles, that’s only $48 per ticket!
This card does not pay us commission, but we still want to highlight it because it can be a great deal for some people.
How Far Will 100,000 AA Miles Take You?
Domestic round-trip tickets start at 25,000 miles for the MileSAAver level. If you have a family of four, you could get four round-trip tickets. You could also get four tickets at the MileSAAver off-peak rate to Mexico, Central America or the Caribbean.
100,000 miles would be enough for two round-trip tickets to Hawaii or two round-trip tickets to Europe during the off-peak season. Even if you have a larger family, you could pay cash for the rest of the tickets, or also sign up for the CitiBusiness/AAdvantage Platinum Select World Elite MasterCard that I mentioned in It’s Raining AA Miles! Should You Scoop Them Up?
(Note: The CitiBusiness/AAdvantage Platinum Select World Elite MasterCard does pay us commission. It currently has 60,000 bonus miles after spending $3000 in the first 3 months. You can read more about it in our Hot Deals page).
See American Airline’s award chart for more ideas on how to spend the miles.
Who Should Get This Card?
If you have been hesitant to apply for a new credit card because of high spending thresholds to get the bonus points, this is the card for you. You do have to pay the $95 annual fee, but you do not have to keep track of future spending amounts on the card.
If you live near an AA hub, you could benefit from these miles easier than those who don’t. I live near Dallas, and I have had great luck redeeming my AA miles at the MileSAAver level to Hawaii, Canada and Denver.
You will have an easier time using these miles if you are flexible in your travel plans and can plan your travel around mileage award availability. Some of the lower redemptions are during the school year and other off-peak months.
Lastly, if you need some free hotel stays, you can even use your AA miles for that. See Leana’s post for more information.
Readers, are you going to apply for the Barclaycard AAdvantage Aviator Red World Elite Mastercard now that the bonus is 50,000 miles?
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Author: Nancy
Nancy lives near Dallas, Texas, with her husband and three kids. Her favorite vacations include the beach, cruising and everything Disney.
Is this card churnable?
@HML Officially, yes, after 24 months of closing the card. This is in the terms and conditions: “This one-time AAdvantage® bonus mileage offer is valid for first-time cardmembers with new accounts only. Existing cardmembers, existing accounts, and previous cardmember with accounts closed in the past 24 months may not be eligible for this offer.” However, I’ve seen people share that they’ve had success re-applying after just six months. YMMV. I have the old converted version of this card that used to be US Airways, and I plan on applying for this because I’ve read that this one is considered a different product.
How about the Barclay one?
Oh, six months for barclay one you mean?
@HML Yes, if you scroll towards the bottom of here under “First Purchase AAdvantage Bonus Miles” https://www.barclaycardus.com/applycontent/TnCs.jsp?tc35216
I applied for both personal and biz JetBlue cards back in January and didn’t get approved. In February I closed my Barclays Miles and More card. I’m a bit scared of Barclays… I wonder if I have any chances of getting approved for this one. Do we know for how long will this offer last?
@Leticia I have not seen any info on how long this offer will last. I will update if I hear anything. It seems that Barclays is getting more sensitive to recent inquiries when it comes to approving applications, unfortunately.
We both signed up for the this card when it was us airways still for our Alaska trip…. And we have about 60k points left from it still!!
@Emily Sounds like you should plan another trip! 🙂
We both got the cards just a few weeks ago, and Barclaycard won’t give us the additional 10,000 points each for the new sign-up bonus. Even though I lost out on 20,000 AA points, at least I got 80,000 points for 2 packs of gum 🙂
@Stephanie I’m sorry to hear that Barclaycard won’t match the higher offer. I don’t think anyone expected this higher offer to come around. At least you still got 80k points. 🙂
I signed up for a deal like this a few years back. All I had to do was make one purchase and pay the annual fee and I got 50,000 AA points. I was literally just thinking I wish that deal was still around, because it’s nice not to have to meet a big spend for once. I’ve had my eye on the MIA to CUR route for a while now. It’s a nonstop short flight, and for some reason availability is really good. We’ve been on a scuba trip there before we had kids and I would love to go back either with the kids or a couple’s trip. Thanks for the heads up!
@Jennifer I got the same deal a few years back too, when it was a US Airways card. Curacao looks like a dream! I hope you can make it happen.
Pending! ?
I hope you get approved! I’m sure there have been a lot of applications in the past 24 hours.