Best Uses of Avios (British Airways, Iberia, Qatar, Loganair and Aer Lingus)

“Avios” is the name of the points currency shared by several airline frequent flyer programs: British Airways, Iberia, Finnair, Aer Lingus, Loganair and Qatar Airways. Points earned through one of those programs can be moved around to any of the others. That provides quite a bit of flexibility, but also creates some complexity as well.

Each of these Avios programs have slightly different rules and pricing for booking awards. In some cases British Airways (BA) is the best choice. Other times, it might be Iberia or Qatar. This post explains the best uses of Avios across all programs.

This post has been updated for 2025 to take into account Iberia’s recent award price increases and the addition of Loganair to Avios.

Avios Redemption Tips

Avios can provide great value with short flights

One key sweet spot for Avios is short flights on oneworld airlines. Since the various Avios programs use distance-based award charts, you’ll pay fewer points for shorter flights. You may only need a small number of Avios to fly to a nearby city or country and that can be very useful when moving between nearby countries on the borders of different award pricing “zones.”

Many of the best uses highlighted below focus on the best values to/from North America in economy class and business class, but keep in mind that Avios can come in handy when you’re looking to take a short hop on Japan Airlines from Tokyo to Seoul or to fly between Melbourne and Sydney on Qantas or between the Maldives and Sri Lanka on Sri Lankan. In some cases, flights like those can be quite expensive when paying with cash, making them excellent value when using Avios instead.

Lap infant awards are a sweet spot with British Airways

For those traveling with a lap infant, British Airways is one of the few programs to charge a percentage of the award cost rather than a percentage of the cash cost. Lap infant award tickets booked via British Airways Club cost 10% of the Avios for an adult ticket. In other words, if an adult ticket costs 60,000 Avios, the lap infant ticket costs 6,000 Avios.

Unfortunately, Iberia follows the more common pricing model of 10% of the cash fare and Qatar Privilege Club charges 15% of the cost of a revenue fare (and the process sounds difficult). If you’re traveling with a lap infant, you probably want to book via British Airways in most cases.

Taxes and fees can vary dramatically between programs

British Airways is well known for having very high carrier-imposed surcharges on its own flights; if you must fly British Airways you could easily be on the hook for over a thousand dollars round trip in premium cabins.

That said, British Airways has now made it easier to pay more Avios to reduce those surcharges. For instance, an off-peak Business Class award from New York to London was long advertised as costing 50,000 Avios one-way — and $950. These days, while you can still pay that amount, the default option when I search on an off-peak date is 80,000 Avios and $350. One still has the option to pay 50K + $950, but the alternative of paying an additional 30K Avios to avoid $600 in fees yields a reasonable value of $0.02 per Avios for the extra points:

Iberia charges much more reasonable fuel surcharges on its own flights when they are booked via Iberia Plus Avios. For instance, on the same off-peak date used above for the British Airways flight from New York to London, one could instead fly from New York to Madrid on Iberia in business class for 40,500 Avios and $117.10.

In that particular instance, British Airways charges the same 40,500 Avios and $117.10 one-way on Iberia. If you’re a parent traveling with a lap infant, you’d be better off booking via BA since they will charge 10% of the adult price for a lap infant ticket.

Avios award cancellation policies vary between programs

There are significant differences in the award cancellation policies of the various Avios programs:

Aer Lingus AerClub

Changes or cancellations on an award are allowed up to 24 hours before departure for a €42.50 fee by contacting Aer Lingus.

British Airways Club

For accounts that are registered in the US, there is a fee to change or cancel an award ticket that is equal to the total taxes and fees or $55, whichever is less. That fee goes up by $25 if it’s done via a call center.

Finnair Plus

Changes on an award are allowed up to 24 hours before departure for a €50 fee. Award ticket cancellations are allowed up to 24 hours before departure, but taxes and fees are not refunded (points are).

Club Iberia Plus

For travel on Iberia, you can change or cancel an award up to 24 hours before departure for a €25 fee. Within 24 hours, awards can’t be changed or cancelled for a refund. Partner awards are non-refundable.

Loganair Loyalty

All Loganair award tickets are non-refundable, but changes are allowed for date, time, or route, provided the Avios required remain the same. If a Reward ticket is not used or cancelled, Avios will be forfeited, but airport tax refunds may be available (admin fee may apply).

Qatar Airways

You can change or cancel an award up to 24 hours before departure by paying a $25 fee. Between 3 and 24 hours of departure, that fee goes up to $100. Within 3 hours of departure, there is no refund for changes or cancellations.

How to Earn Avios

Credit Cards

One of the easiest and quickest way to earn Avios is through credit card welcome offers.  Below are the current cards that earn Avios directly:

Card Offer

Chase British Airways Visa Signature® Card ⓘ $855 1st Yr Value EstimateClick to learn about first year value estimates 100K Avios Non-AffiliateThis is NOT an affiliate offer. We always present the best offer even when it means less revenue for Frequent Miler Earn 100K Avios after $7.5K spend in 6 months$95 Annual Fee Learn more This card is subject to Chase's 5/24 rule (click here for details). Information about this card has been collected independently by Frequent Miler. The issuer did not provide the details, nor is it responsible for their accuracy. Recent better offer: Expired 7/4/22: 100K after $5K spend

Card Offer

Chase Iberia Visa Signature® Card ⓘ $630 1st Yr Value EstimateClick to learn about first year value estimates 75K Avios Non-AffiliateThis is NOT an affiliate offer. We always present the best offer even when it means less revenue for Frequent Miler Earn 75K Avios after $5K spend in 6 months$95 Annual Fee Learn more This card is subject to Chase's 5/24 rule (click here for details). Information about this card has been collected independently by Frequent Miler. The issuer did not provide the details, nor is it responsible for their accuracy. Recent better offer: Expired 7/4/22: 100K after $5K spend

Card Offer

Chase Aer Lingus Visa Signature® Card ⓘ $855 1st Yr Value EstimateClick to learn about first year value estimates 100K Avios Non-AffiliateThis is NOT an affiliate offer. We always present the best offer even when it means less revenue for Frequent Miler Earn 100K Avios after $7.5K spend in 6 months$95 Annual Fee Learn more This card is subject to Chase's 5/24 rule (click here for details). Information about this card has been collected independently by Frequent Miler. The issuer did not provide the details, nor is it responsible for their accuracy. Recent better offer: Expired 7/4/22: 100K after $5K spend

Transfer from Partners

The following transfer currencies can be converted to Avios:

In some cases, a transferable currency might only directly transfer to one Avios program. For instance, Citi ThankYou Rewards can only be transferred to Qatar Airways, but once you’ve done that, you can then move the Avios to your British Airways, Iberia, or Aer Lingus account.

How to combine Avios across programs

Avios can be freely moved across BA, Iberia, Finnair, Loganair, Qatar and Aer Lingus. To do so, you must have an account with each program.

It’s very important to ensure that all of your personal information (name, email, birth date, address, phone number) is exactly the same with each program.

If you want to move points to/from Iberia, note these additional requirements:

• You cannot move points to/from Iberia within 90 days of joining the Iberia Plus program. This is a good reason to enroll in Iberia Plus now, even if you don’t have any immediate need for it.
• Your Iberia account must have had some activity within the past 36 months (points earned or redeemed). An easy option is to transfer 1,000 points from Amex Membership Rewards or Chase Ultimate Rewards.
• If moving points from Iberia to British Airways, your British Airways account cannot be a household account (but you may be able to get around this by transferring points first to Aer Lingus and then to British Airways).

You may be able to book Qatar Airways flights using Avios in your British Airways Executive Club account without even moving them to Qatar Privilege Club. More detail can be found here: Finding Qatar availability and booking it without moving Avios.

How to share Avios with others

The best way to share Avios with others is via a Household Account, which allows to pool together Avios that were previously held previously in separate accounts. Full details about Household Accounts can be found on BA’s website here.

Avios Award Charts

When booking an award on British Airways or Iberia-operated flights, the number of Avios required depends on which airline you want to fly. Whether you book the award from your BA account or your Iberia account, the number of required Avios will be the same.  Strangely, the taxes and fees often vary between the two, so it makes sense to look up award prices on both websites in order to find the cheapest option.

British Airways is notorious for the high surcharges that it imposes on its award flights. In addition to the charts listed below, it has now implemented an additional redemption option called “Reward Flight Saver.” This effectively allows you to pay additional Avios in exchange for lower fees. It can sometimes be a much better deal than paying those fees directly in cash.

Award chart for travel on British Airways, Finnair, Iberia or Qatar

Both British Airways (BA) and Iberia (IB) offer peak and off-peak pricing on their own metal based on the date flown. British Airways doesn’t publish official award charts, but old charts provide a rough estimate as to how much flights will cost.

Here is an old award chart for British Airways:

Here is Iberia’s new award chart (which also applies to Vueling flights):

As you can see above, during off-peak dates, it is almost always a bit cheaper to fly BA economy vs. Iberia economy, the exception being for the very shortest flights. However, to fly business class, BA is only cheaper for short flights whereas Iberia is much cheaper for everything else. Peak dates follow a similar pattern, but the award price differences are more modest.

Finnair’s award chart for flights on its own metal looks a bit different than both Iberia and BA, primarily because it still prices everything based on zones instead of distance and doesn’t use peak/off-peak pricing:

In general, Finnair tends to be slightly more expensive across the board for most flights, with the notable exception of some long-haul business routes (especially when compared to peak Iberia/BA pricing). Award flights on Finnair’s own metal are priced by segment, so a connecting itinerary will cost the sum of the prices for each individual leg.

Loganair is by far the most simple program when booking award flights, as all awards cost the same: 6,500 Avios. There is no variance based on distance or cost. If there are two legs involved, each leg prices separately and the total cost will be 13,000 Avios. This can be an excellent deal for some routes, like London to the Shetland Islands. Loganair only allows award bookings on its own flights and Inter-Orkney Islands flights cannot be booked with Avios.

Qatar Airways doesn’t publish a chart for its own flights, instead offering an online calculator tool, which allows you to search the amount of Avios that are required for various redemptions. Even though there’s no published chart, Qatar still prices its awards by geographic zone and utilizes peak and off-peak pricing. All cities in the US and Canada belong to the same zone. In general, a saver flight between Doha and North America cost 35,000-47,500 in economy, 70,000-94,500K in business and 105,000-142,000 in First Class (depending on whether the pricing is peak or off-peak).

Award chart for travel on a single Avios partner

If you intend to fly another airlines using British Airways, Finnair Iberia or Qatar Avios, then the following chart is in effect for most partners:

Not all partner airlines follow this chart completely and there are numerous exceptions, as outlined below.

British Airways

Starting in 2021, British Airways began introducing slightly different pricing for flights in certain zones on specific partner airlines. The following partners are affected in the listed zones:

American Airlines and Alaska Airlines (inter-America flights only)

• Zone 1 (0-650 miles): 12,000 economy / 24,000 business
• Zone 2 (651-1151 miles flown): 16,000 economy / 32,000 business
• Zone 3 (1151-2000 miles flown): 18,000 economy / 40,000 business
• Zone 4 (2001-3000 miles flown): 20,000 economy / 50,000 business

Cathay Pacific

• Zone 1 (0-650 miles): 7,500 economy / 16,000 business
• Zone 2 (651-1151 miles flown): 10,000 economy / 25,000 business
• Zone 3 (1152-2000 miles flown): 11,000 economy / 25,000 business

Japan Airlines

• Zone 1 (0-650 miles): 7,500 economy / 12,500 business
• Zone 2 (651-1151 miles flown): 10,000 economy / 24,000 business
• Zone 3 (1152-2000 miles flown): 11,000 economy / 24,000 business

Qatar Airways

• Zone 1 (0-650 miles): 7,000 economy / 16,000 business / 21,000 first
• Zone 2 (651-1151 miles flown): 10,000 economy / 24,000 business / 39,000 first

Finnair

Finnair’s partner award pricing generally follows a similar (though not identical) structure to the BA award chart listed above. However, since Finnair still operates based on zones, it lists a separate chart for each partner with pricing displayed by region according to the home country from which that partner operates.

Unlike its own flights, Finnair prices partner awards by destination and origin, regardless of whether or not there are multiple legs.

Like British Airways, Finnair also has elevated minimum pricing for many partners, with some bizarre variances in premium cabin pricing:

Alaska Airlines

• Within Continental US/Canada: 11,000 economy / 40,000 first

American Airlines

• Within Continental US/Canada: 11,000 economy / 30,000 first

Cathay Pacific

• Hong Kong – China: 11,000 economy / 18,000 business / 30,000 first

Iberia

• Flights within Spain: 9,200 economy/ 15,000 business
• Spain – Canary Islands: 12,500 economy / 23,000 business
• Spain – Europe: 14,000 economy / 27,000 business

Japan Airlines

• Flights within Japan: 8,500 economy/ 14,500 business
• Japan – Korea: 11,500 economy / 19,000 business

Qantas Airlines

• Flights within Australia: 13,000 economy/ 22,500 business / 42,000 first

Qatar Airways

• Qatar – UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman: 8,500 economy / 15,000 business / 26,500 first

Royal Jordanian

• Flights within Jordan: 9,000 economy / 12,000 business

Sri Lankan Airlines

• Sri Lanka – India (except for Delhi), Maldives: 10,000 economy / 18,000 business

Iberia

For years, Iberia had a different award chart for each partner that they had (and still posts a separate chart for each one). That said, most are identical now, and follow the same pricing as BA for single partners.

The only redemption partner that still has a different award chart is LEVEL, Iberia’s low-cost carrier. Those awards are priced based on the following tiers:

Off-Peak LEVEL awards

• Zone 6 (4001-5500 miles): 21,250 economy / 31,750 premium economy
• Zone 7 (5501-6500 miles flown): 25,500 economy / 38,250 premium economy
• Zone 8 (6501-7000 miles flown): 29,750 economy / 44,250 premium economy

Peak LEVEL awards

• Zone 6 (4001-5500 miles): 25,000 economy / 43,750 premium economy
• Zone 7 (5501-6500 miles flown): 30,000 economy / 52,500 premium economy
• Zone 8 (6501-7000 miles flown): 35,000 economy / 61,250 premium economy

Qatar Airways

Qatar uses the same partner award chart as BA. Qatar only allows partner awards with a single partner airline, doesn’t allow stopovers, but will permit open-jaws.

Like BA, Qatar has elevated pricing for inter-North America flights on AA and Alaska:

American Airlines and Alaska Airlines (inter-North America flights only)

• Zone 1 (0-650 miles): 9,500 economy / 20,000 business
• Zone 2 (651-1151 miles flown): 13,000 economy / 27,000 business
• Zone 3 (1152-2000 miles flown): 14,500 economy / 34,000 business
• Zone 4 (2001-3000 miles flown): 16,000 economy / 43,000 business

Qatar also has a partnership with JetBlue, and this can be a surprisingly good use of Avios.

Award chart for travel on multiple British Airways partners

Unlike Iberia and Qatar, BA will allow award bookings with multiple partners and it can be a appealing sweet spot for Avios. That said, it’s a complex award to book and, if you plan to fly multiple BA partners on a single award, yet another chart comes into play:

Rules for booking a multi-partner award with British Airways

• Currently, multi-carrier awards must be booked over the phone
• There is a maximum of eight flight segments and seven stopovers
• Travel must be completed within twelve months
• One open-jaw is allowed
• Your route must follow whatever BA considers to be a “logical” sequence
• You can only use oneworld partners
• You have to include at least two oneworld airlines besides British Airways

• The Avios price of your trip is based on the cumulative distance of your flight segments, as opposed to pricing each segment individually (like a normal BA award).

Best uses of Avios for Economy Class

Intra-Europe from 3.5K one way on Iberia

British Isles and Western Norway from 6.5K one way on Loganair

Domestic US from 8.5K one way on JetBlue

North America to Europe from 13K one-way

Hawaii for 13.5K – 15K from the US east Coast

South America from 15.5K one-way via Iberia

Best uses of Avios for Business Class and First Class

Europe from 40.5K one-way via Iberia

Fly Qatar Airways to Doha for 70K one-way

North America to Europe from 78,000 Avios one-way on JetBlue

Fly Cathay Pacific between Asia and North/South America for 85K one-way

Oceania / Multiple Carrier tickets (build-your-own-round-the-world)

Bottom line

Avios can be a helpful currency to keep in your tool belt for great deals on Iberia business class and for short oneworld award flights all around the world. The ability to move your miles freely between British Airways, Iberia, Qatar, Finnair, Loganair and Aer Lingus gives you the ability to pivot as necessary to easily take advantage of all of the various Avios sweet spots.

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