Why do I use British Airways Avios (miles) to book award flights on American Airlines? And how do I do it? These are some questions a reader recently asked me. Let’s dig in!
Why to use BA Avios to book an AA Award Flight
There are two main reasons I sometimes use British Airways Avios to book AA award flights: cheaper cost (in miles) and miles/points availability in my personal stash.
British Airways is a partner of American Airlines. Unlike AA, however, the cost of partner award flights on BA depends on the distance flown. Sometimes, booking the same AA flight using BA Avios will cost fewer miles. Here is an example:
This AA flight from DFW to Denver on February 3, 2024 costs 11,000 AA miles on aa.com:
The SAME EXACT flight on the same plane, when booked on britishairways.com with British Airways Avios, is only 7500 Avios:
Here is a better example. This nonstop flight from LAX to Honolulu in October is 20,000 AA miles:
The same exact flight using British Airways Avios is only 13,000 miles:
Note that the same is true for Alaska Airlines award flights.
The trick with using British Airways Avios is to find a nonstop partner award American Airlines (or Alaska Airlines) flight, because BA charges by distance for each leg flown. I still reference this handy online calculator to determine how many Avios a flight will cost. If you live near an AA hub, you will have an easier time finding AA nonstop flights.
Aside from the (sometimes) lower award cost, I might also use BA Avios to book AA flights based on what I currently own in my miles and points stash. I may not have enough AA miles to book the flight. But, if I have Chase Ultimate Rewards, Capital One miles, Bilt, Marriott or Amex Membership Reward points, I can transfer all of those to British Airways Avios. I can also move Avios from Aer Lingus, Qatar and Iberia to my British Airways Avios account (I will cover that in a separate post).
How to Book AA Flight Using BA Avios
Step 1: Join British Airways Executive Club here. This is BA’s frequent flier club. It’s free to join.
Step 2: Create a Household Account with your spouse or Player 2. That way, you can combine your Avios together to book flights for your family.
Step 3: Find AA partner award availability. This used to be easier to do when AA had MileSAAver awards differentiated on their website. Now that AA award pricing is dynamic, it’s a bit trickier to find. If you have a specific date in mind, you can sign into your Executive Club account and look at that date on the British Airways site for availability:
Input your to/from city, date, number of passengers, and check check one-way:
You will be able to see availability for the date you input. If you click on the flight, you can see the price. You must click on dates before or after to see availability.
A slightly faster/less cumbersome way to search for AA award availability is by using Alaska Airlines website. If you see an AA flight on Alaska Airlines site, it should be available on British Airways:
Step 4: After finding award availability you like, transfer points to British Airways. This process varies depending on which bank/credit card you are transferring from. For example, this is what it looks like with Capital One miles:
Step 5: Go back to British Airways site to do the actual award booking. You will repeat the same screen inputs as shown above in Step 3.
Step 6: Select your seat on AA.com. You will receive an email after your flight has been ticketed. Use your confirmation number on AA.com to select your seat.
Optional Step: Add your AADvantage number to your reservation. If you have an AA credit card or status that gives you free baggage or other perks on AA flights, that won’t be recognized since your status is tied to your AA AAdvantage number. You can have your AA AAdvantage number added to your ticket at the check-in counter, or reach out to AA on Twitter to ask a rep to add it.
Credit cards to increase your British Airways Avios stash
As I mentioned above, the major bank cards have miles/points that you can transfer to British Airways. Chase also has its own British Airways credit card. The best way to get the most miles is to apply for a new credit card when it has a big welcome bonus. A few cards and their current welcome bonuses:
Chase British Airways Visa Signature Card (75k Avios)
Chase Ink Business Preferred (100k points)
Chase Sapphire Preferred (60k points)
Capital One Venture X (75k miles)
Capital One Venture Rewards (75k miles)
American Express Green Card (60k points)
Note that welcome bonuses change often. Visit our credit card page for the latest deals. If you’re new to the miles and points hobby, check out this post which discusses bank application rules and read this beginner’s post.
What questions do you have?
Author: Nancy
Nancy lives near Dallas, Texas, with her husband and three kids. Her favorite vacations include the beach, cruising and everything Disney.
When I find AA award flights the taxes show in Euro’s. Maybe I used a British address when I created my BA profile. Any comments are appreciated.
@CJH When you sign in, does it say USA-English in the upper right of the website? In your profile, there is a spot to put your address and country/region of residency. Does that say USA?
Nancy, As a newbie to the this hobby (and an individual who uses AA quite a bit!), I truly enjoyed the simplicity of this article which provided a clean and concise “pathway” on how to utilize/leverage Avios. Any option to potentially save dollars/points is always appreciated, and the step-by-step narrative you provided was particularly useful given my novice status. Thanks!!!
@John Thank you! I’m glad you found it useful.
The release of Avios bookings on AA flts seems to come in waves. I can try for days to find availability to no avail & then one day it opens!
You might also wish to include the differences in charges to cancel flights on BA v AA – definitely not as attractive to make speculative bookings!
@Pam Yes, award availability does seem to fluctuate in a lot. I look for availability almost every day. It’s part of my morning routine. 🙂 As far as cancellation costs, that deserves a separate post. The pandemic has made it easier to cancel flights for sure.
The article should mention that availability to book AA awards using BA miles is very limited because they make so few flights available to partners any more. All bloggers skip over this very important point because it does not help to promote credit card referrals.
@Alison I disagree. I’ve booked two flights on AA using Avios this year alone. However, I already mentioned in the post that finding the flights can be tricky. I live in the DFW area, which is an AA hub. If you don’t live near an AA hub, you won’t find as many nonstop AA flights with partner award availability. YMMV.
@Alison I can’t speak for other bloggers, but challenges in redeeming Avios towards AA flights have been mentioned on this blog by Nancy and me many times. Here is one example where I’ve encouraged readers to consider burning Avios on AA domestic flights due to uncertainty of what dynamic pricing will bring in the future. https://milesforfamily.com/2022/12/21/should-you-redeem-your-avios-on-american-airlines-flights-asap/
As I like to stress, there are no guarantees in the miles and points hobby. But the stakes are low, and the worst that can happen is you get stuck with Avios for a few years until you find a decent use for them. It’s not a life or death situation. As always, collecting flexible points and transferring to BA as needed is the way to go.
Old news, more important why doesnt Nancy tell us the total amount of flights she looked at and what % did she find where BA was cheapest. All too often no flights are available to BA since it has to be in AA Saver for BA to have it
That said this benefit is good only on a non-stop so if say youre looking at LAX-PHX-ABQ youd have to get 2 different tkts which most likley will result in AA being less
@Isaac Yes, this post doesn’t contain any new news, rather it’s is a tutorial for people who are new to booking AA flights with BA Avios. I mention both of your points in my post. I haven’t kept track of what percentage of flights I’ve found where using BA was the cheapest. I live in the DFW area where AA has a hub, so I’ve gotten a lot of flights using BA Avios.
@Isaac Respectfully, you aren’t being fair here. One of our readers specifically requested this information, and Nancy has laid it out clearly in the post (which didn’t cost you a cent to read). Nobody is claiming that finding AA flights is easy via Avios program. In fact, quite the opposite. We have said many times that with the introduction of AA Web specials, Avios program has become a lot less useful. But just because something is hard, doesn’t mean it’s impossible. I just came back from St. Maarten and we used Avios to book award flights there , and AA miles to return. It certainly doesn’t hurt to check Avios award availability on AA flights, which is what this post is all about.
Can this be for domestic as well…
I have used this strategy for domestic flights. I look for non-stop flights. Great strategy, but it can be difficulty to find the award space. But when it works, it has been a great redemption.
@Dave Both domestic and international. However, many international flights cover a long distance, which means using BA Avios might not be cheaper in those cases.
wonderful informative post. I used Twitter to contact the AA rep to have my AA advantage number added and this process only took minutes.
@CJH Thanks, and I’m glad you were able to get your AA number added quickly!