In light of the new Chase Iberia Visa Signature that came out last week, a reader asked about 11,000 Avios round-trip redemptions on American Airlines. I was surprised by the question because at the time I didn’t know what he was talking about. Somehow, a great sweet spot for North American flight redemptions had been hiding under my nose undetected.
I’ve often said that it’s hard to maintain an encyclopedic knowledge of all of the domestic and foreign airline programs, so while I’ve booked my share of awards, I’m still constantly learning and re-learning the best sweet spots. Still, with Iberia having long been a transfer partner of American Express Membership Rewards and more recently becoming a direct transfer partner of Chase Ultimate Rewards (it was previously possible to transfer UR–>British Airways–>Iberia, but direct transfers are nice), I was surprised that I’d missed this one and disappointed that I’d wasted points unaware there was a better option for short flights on American Airlines.
A quick caveat: Be aware that Iberia doesn’t allow changes or cancellations on partner award flights. If you book a flight on American Airlines with your Iberia Avios, it will be nonrefundable and nonchangeable. Keep that in mind and make sure your plans are set in stone if you plan to take advantage of this one.
Iberia Avios: cousin to British Airways Avios (and Aer Lingus Avios)
Iberia, British Airways, and Aer Lingus share a loyalty currency: Avios. It has for a long time been possible to move (transfer) Avios between British Airways and Iberia, though not without some challenge. You can use Avios.com as a middle-man to move points between the programs, though this requires having had accounts open with both programs for a minimum time period and at least some activity crediting Avios to both (could be from a Membership Rewards transfer) and all of the information down to email address has to match between the two loyaly accounts. Adding to all that, in the past you had to register for Avios.com with an address in the UK, requiring US residents to claim a phony temporary UK address (like a friend’s place, a hotel, etc).
That all sounded convuluted enough that I’d avioded it. According to recent reader comments, US residents can now register for Avios.com with a US address and move points between the two programs, though I haven’t tried it. There is also a link directly within your account to “Combine Avios” as seen below.
When I clicked that link, I got an error message. I think there’s a way to make it work, but I haven’t fought with it much. For more about moving Avios, see: Bet you didn’t know: 3 Methods To Transfer Avios Between Iberia and British Airways. This post isn’t about that, but I thought it important to highlight that those with large balances in British Airways or Aer Lingus should be able to take advantage of Iberia’s sweet spots with some persistence in getting the programs linked up.
Of course, with Iberia now a direct transfer partner of Chase Ultimate Rewards in addition to being partnered with Amex Membership Rewards, it should be easy to accumulate some Avios one way or another.
British Airways was the great American sweet spot
For years, the best option for redeeming miles for short-haul flights was British Airways Avios. Until a couple of years ago, you could book any direct Oneworld alliance flight that covered a distance of 650 miles or fewer for 4,500 Avios one-way plus the taxes. This meant that shorthaul Amerian Airlines flights could be had for many fewer Avios than the number of American Airlines miles required — and without the close-in booking fee.
Unfortunately, that’s no longer possible as that shortest band — 650 mile direct flights for less for 4500 Avios — no longer applies to flights within North America. Today, the cheapest American Airlines flights using British Airways Avios are 7,500 Avios one-way (and American now charges the same 7,500 AAdvantage miles on many of those routes).
The problem for me is that I live near a small airport. That means I can fly direct on American Airlines to a grand total of four destinations. If I want to fly anywhere other than Philadelphia, Chicago, Charlotte, or DC, I need to connect. British Airways then adds the cost of each segment to the award price. For example, if I wanted to fly from Albany, NY to Myrtle Beach, SC, I would have to connect in Charlotte.
British Airways charges for each segment separately, so it would cost 7,500 Avios from Albany to Charlotte plus 7,500 Avios from Charlotte to Myrtle Beach plus 7,500 Avios from Myrtle Beach to Charlotte, plus 7,500 Avios from Charlotte back to Albany — for a grand total of 30,000 Avios round trip. Believe it or not, I’ve still used Avios on routes like this to save the $75 close-in booking fee that American Airlines would otherwise charge.
Iberia Avios is now the great American sweet spot
However, what I didn’t know until last week was that Iberia also has a distance-based award chart — and unlike British Airways, Iberia does not price each segment separately. Instead, they rely on the cumulative distance of your flights. Here is Iberia’s chart for travel on American Airlines (note that you may have to open that link in an incognito browser if you’ve previously been logged into Iberia with the browswer you’re currently using). Add up the cumulative miles of your segments to determine which band’s pricing applies.
As you can see, itineraries up to 4,000 cumulative miles cost fewer Avios than the comparable rates with American Airlines AAdvantage miles — with the trade-off being that Iberia Avios are nonrefundable. This means the first three bands are really where the most attractive options are found.
Take my itinerary from Albany to Myrtle Beach for example. The cumulative distance is about 1,600 miles:

Since that rings it at less than 2,000 cumulative miles round trip, it would fit within the third band: just 17,000 Aivos round trip. And sure enough, that’s exactly how it prices out:
At 8,500 Avios each way and $26.20, that’s a steal compared to cash prices, which are often $200+ each way on this route ($605 round trip on the last-minute itinerary shown above). And it also beats what American would charge on the same route — 25,000 miles and $86.20 since departure is this week.
The shortest itineraries are just 11K Iberia Avios round trip
Backing up to the top of the chart, the lowest band is just 11,000 Avios round trip. That low redemption level requires a round trip flight of 600 miles or less. Living in New York State, and sick of being in the frozen tundra, I decided to see how far south one could get from NYC this weekend for 11K round trip. The answer: Norfolk, VA, at just 592 miles round trip:

If you wanted to escape the winter chill this weekend, Norfolk might not be the best place to do it as I see high temps of only around 50 degrees. However, if you wanted to take a long weekend away, you could fly out on Friday and back on Monday this weekend for just 11,000 Iberia Avios and $20.20 round trip:
That’s not a bad deal at all for a last-minute getaway.
Includes AA flights to Mexico/the Caribbean/etc
A nice bonus here is that since it’s a distance-based chart, it doesn’t matter if you cross into another region. For example, Los Angeles to Los Cabos, Mexico is a distance of fewer than 2,000 miles round trip, meaning it’s just 17,000 Avios plus $90 in taxes round trip:
For the same flights, American would charge 30,000 miles round trip since you’re flying to Mexico plus $161.13 since we’re within 21 days of departure.
Or maybe you’re in Miami, but you’d like to spend the weekend in the Grand Cayman islands. Since the distance is under 1,000 miles round trip, it’ll cost 12,000 Avios.
Flights to Central America and northern South America could also be a great value depending on your departure point and destination.
This type of cumulative distance-based chart is probably most useful for people who live a little too far from a major airport but have a small regional option nearby. For example, I could drive to New York or Philadelphia and pay 15,000 British Airways Avios round trip for direct short-haul flights. But I’d much rather pay 2,000 extra Iberia Avios to save myself 3-5 hours each way in the car, meanwhile paying $6 a day to park and getting through TSA in 95 seconds….without pre-check.
Fiding availability
I found it much easier to find availability on the American Airlines site. Iberia’s site is not intuitive. If you can find saver availability on American Airlines (i.e. the lowest level economy class options: 7.5K or 12.5K one-way), it should be bookable with Iberia Avios. That said, in my limited searches, I came up empty when looking for flights within 48 hours of departure. Three days ahead, availability matched AA.com. I’m not sure if this is an Iberia limitation or glitch (both are equally likely), but you may not be able to book travel on AA for today or tomorrow with Iberia.
I also had trouble with the home page failing to recognize airport codes. What I found to work was putting in any two airport codes in the initial home page search box and then clicking the “pay with Avios” box:
That prompted me to log in to my Iberia Plus account. Once I was logged in, it brought me back to the Avios search tool anyway:
While you’ll see the one-way button, Iberia does not allow one-way awards on American.
Also note that sometimes, you need a little persistence. At least once, it told me no flights were available the first time I hit “Flight Search” despite the fact that I knew availability was there — but a second click did the trick.
Also be aware that Iberia will let you choose a different class of service on each segment. For example, I could fly my segment from Charlotte to Myrtle Beach from the above example in business class:
That short segment in business class added 1,650 Avios to the round trip price (18,650 total). Will it come with free checked bags? I’m not sure. But it’s good to know that you could put yourself up front on a segment if that’s important for one reason or another (a tight connection / work to do / etc).
Bottom line
Iberia Plus has some award chart sweet spots that I’d totally overlooked for domestic travel. While I don’t often redeem miles for domestic flights, I know many people do. And I know that flights out of smaller airports can be disproportionately expensive, increasing the value of this option. I think it’s probably best for close-in bookings, when you know your plans are set and you can avoid American’s $75 close-in booking fee while also saving points/miles. Coincidentally, that’s also when you’ll find the best American Airlines saver availability — though in my anecdotal searches, saver availability in general has been improving.
With Ultimate Rewards and Membership Rewards transferring directly, and with good current offers on both the British Airways Visa Signature and Iberia Visa Signature, there are a myriad of ways to get Avios right now. If you’re looking to use your miles for short-haul or medium-haul economy class flights on American, and you know your plans won’t change, Iberia is the place to look.

[…] The short story: Iberia Plus offers a distance-based award chart that can be useful for short itineraries on American Airlines (even those with connections) with no close-in booking fee. See: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions. […]
[…] The short story: Iberia Plus offers a distance-based award chart that can be useful for short itineraries on American Airlines (even those with connections) with no close-in booking fee. See: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions. […]
[…] The short story: Iberia Plus offers a distance-based award chart that can be useful for short itineraries on American Airlines (even those with connections) with no close-in booking fee. See: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions. […]
[…] a post about a sweet-spot that had been hiding in plain sight on me in the Iberia award chart (See: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions). At the time, I was pretty excited about using Iberia for award flights on American Airlines […]
[…] saver-level economy class ticket in the US with several Amex transfer partners, and it’s even enough for a short-distance round trip flight in some […]
[…] From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions […]
[…] From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American redemptions […]
[…] You should also be able to combine / move your Avios across the Aer Lingus and Iberia programs. Short flights within the United States start as low as 11K Avios round trip with Iberia (See: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions). […]
This just might be as good for my family as the SW companion pass – if I can figure it out. We want to take more trips to the Caribbean (from Florida to Bonaire) for scuba diving. We don’t have any Avios accounts, nor Avios earning cards, yet. But we do have plenty of transferable points, and one of us is under 5/24. And we are willing to drive to Miami, though TPA and MCO would be more convenient. Will this only work when AA has saver awards (right now TPA-BON is 65k points)?
That’s correct — only SAAver awards are available to book with partner miles.
[…] From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions […]
I am curious why it shows 20.20 USD for the RT. Shouldn’t it be 11.20 USD? Also you selected one segment to be in business (domestic), I do not know how the added 1,650 Avios was calculated from. Even I searched ROA-CLT-BOS, BOS-PHL-ROA roundtrip in coach, it shows 17,050 rather than 17,000; but for ROA-CLT-BOS, BOS-CLT-ROA or ROA-PHL-BOS, BOS-PHL-ROA, either will show 17,000 Avios. Really do not know how the system calculates the Avios.
Every carrier is a bit different in which taxes/fees they pass along. Note that the flight to Norfolk shows $20.20, whereas the flight from ALB-MYR shows $26.20. I don’t know where they got the numbers, but either total is a good deal considering the low mileage requirements (11K / 17K).
I have no idea why you have an itinerary priving out at 17,050….but as for how they calculated the 1,650 Avios, see this follow up post that Greg did:
https://frequentmiler.com/2018/03/21/business-class-sweet-spots-in-iberias-one-world-award-chart/
Long story short: it prices the segments by their distance in relation to the overall distance of the entire round trip. See that post for a longer explanation.
Great post Nick! This why I follow FrequentMiler
Hi Nick- I’m following your directions but continuing to get the error messages (either, “No availability has been found for the selected journey” or ‘We regret to inform you that there are no connecting flights between the cities selected.’ I am logged in and I have even tried using the cities you listed, but no results. Does it matter that I don’t have any avios points in my account (haven’t transferred them yet)?
Thanks-
LM
[…] the two programs. Iberia has some sweet-spot redemptions on American Airlines operated flights (see this post on Frequent Miler) as long as there is sAAver availability. However, you can only book roundtrip tickets and sAAver […]
[…] has run, you should think twice before buying at a cpp of 1.8 cents. Here’s a great article about how to use Iberia’s Avios for American short-haul flights. It is a great use of the Spanish carriers rewards points especially when they are now a transfer […]
[…] Nick posted in detail about a sweet-spot on Iberia’s American Airlines award chart: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions. His post showed that Iberia Avios may be the best currency for flying American Airlines on short […]
[…] a good post. Hey, someone actually does research! And they follow it up with this must read post: From 11K RT on American: A sweet spot for North American flight redemptions. I hope I get to book some RT Detroit New York LGA trips at 11k Avios before they fix it lol. […]
I rarely book round trip rewards for a number of reasons including the difficulty of finding availability on the same airline in both directions. So I’m not sure how often this will be practical.
Tried several searches, including the same routes Nick posted. Always got error message saying ‘We regret to inform you that there are no connecting flights between the cities selected.’ Anyone know how to fix it? Thank you!
Are you logged in to your Iberia account? Maybe try a fresh browser? I just ran a couple of searches shown in the post and they still priced out fine on my end.
To reiterate my process, I start on Iberia.com. Let’s say I want to search Albany to Myrtle Beach. I can put Albany in for the origin, but for whatever reason the home page won’t let me put in Myrtle Beach for the destination. So I put in another city — Madison, Wisconsin. I put in the dates – March 24 to March 28 — and check the box “Pay with Avios” and then click search.
From there, it prompts me to log in if I haven’t done so already. Once I’m logged in (or if I was already logged in), it brings me from the home page to the Avios award search tool — where I again need to confirm my cities and dates. On that page, I switch Madison to Myrtle Beach and use my dates (March 24 to 28) and it shows the options in the post.
It’s not at all intuitive…and maybe there is a better method….but that’s what’s working for me thus far.
Nick — Thank you so much for the detail information.
Tried again, got those same flights in the post.
Also searched for SFO–MKE (March 27 to April 3), transfer at ORD, just below 4000 miles for round trip. Got 23K miles + $20ish fee. Good deal.
Tried once more for March 27-April 4, same route, bang, back to the ‘We regret to inform’ page….
Looks like the critical step is how to smoothly move from the home page to the Avios award search tool
Hi Nick, not sure if you can offer any insight. But, am looking for a flight from ORD > CLT using my Avios. British’s website shows availability, but on Iberia’s award search tool – I get “No availability has been found for the selected journey”
Nick, can you book one way or round trip only?
Round trip only. That’s in the post, but it’s kind of buried in there. Iberia shows the button for one-ways, but doesn’t allow one-way AA awards.
Thanks! This was a fantastic post. In an era where good value domestic coach awards are hard to find, this was a good one for those of us living by regional airports.
What is avios.com? I clicked on it and cannot see how to even create an ID. My BA Avios number is 8 digits long, but Avios.com requires a 16-digit number to join. Nick, have you written any articles about it?
I believe you’ll have to click “Join Avios” on the right side of this page to register for an Avios.com account:
https://www.avios.com/gb/en_gb/my-account/log-into-avios
See this Method #3 in this post for more on using Avios.com, though note that it was written a while back and I *believe* that you can use a US address now:
https://frequentmiler.com/2015/12/11/bet-you-didnt-know-3-methods-to-transfer-avios-between-iberia-british-airways/
I already found your 2015 article and enrolled, but it’s a real clusterf##k to figure out. I have a BA Avios acct with about 200K points, plus an Iberia account with zero, to do the transfer recommended awhile back (Iberia flights are cheaper than BA using Avios thru Madrid etc. etc.). But you cannot DIRECTLY enroll in avios.com…you have to open an Aer Lingus FF account first, then that 16-digit number becomes your avios.com account number. So it’s sort of a hierarchy: Aer Lingus is mandatory, and BA, Iberia, Meridiana et. al. are subsidiary.
What I don’t get is why I would use the avios.com site at all, when I can just leave the points in the BA account and transfer them when needed to the other partners. So my initial question remains unanswered: What is avios.com and what benefit does it confer on me to join it? I didn’t find any posts on this topic.
Are you able to transfer directrly from British Airways to Iberia? When i try that, I get an error every time. The Avios.com site is a go-between where you can move from BA->Avios.com->Iberia. It’s also got some of it’s own redemptions. For example, I know a while back you could use Avios on Avios.com to buy tickets for the Eurostar between London and Paris (for I believe 4500 Avios if I remember correctly? Been a while).
If you’re able to transfer directly from BA->IB, you don’t need Avios.com. It’s just one of the three methods to transfer your Avios back and forth.
I haven’t tried the transfer because (1) I have not had the Iberia account open for 90 days yet and (2) I wasn’t planning to try it until I had a flight to Europe in mind. So I can’t say whether it will work or not. I guess we’ll see sometime soon.
I love the family points pooling using BA avios. Do you think I could do the same with Iberia Avios too ?
Good question. I don’t know.
Great post, I didn’t know about this either.
“For the same flights, American would charge 30,000 miles round trip since you’re flying to Mexico plus $161.13 since we’re within 21 days of departure.”
I don’t understand the math here, if the Avios option costs $90.63 then wouldn’t total taxes and fees with AA be $165.63? Also seems a bit unfair to lump in taxes to that calculation – you’re gonna pay the same taxes regardless of who you ticket the award through, the only difference should be the $75 close-in ticketing fee with AA.
Airlines often have slight disparity in the “fees” portion of taxes & fees. It “should” be $75 more to book a flight with AA miles as AA just adds the $75 close-in booking fee — but for whatever reason it works out to a difference of $70.50 here. The numbers in the post are what each airline quoted. I see what you’re saying — I didn’t mean to insinuate that the $161 was the close-in booking fee. My point was to show a comparison on your out of pocket costs both in terms of miles and money. It’ll cost you both more miles and more money to book it close-in with AA — or fewer Avios and less money if you book with Iberia.
Been trying to book a flight to Fort Lauderdale that I know AA serves and I know has availability but it never shows anything on Iberia’s site. Should I just call to book?
I’m not sure. Are you searching round trip? And clicking flight search more than once maybe? Logged into your account? What’s the route?
Hey Nick, Can you provide the link to the site that mapped your miles? It was provided in another article but I can’t find it now. It provides a nap and distance travelled in miles.
Thanks for asking — it’s Great Circle Mapper (GCMap.com). I just updated the post with captions on those images. That site is very helpful in finding these opportunities.
Great post. I also live in one of those little towns where AA flies direct to 4 cities. The problem is that AA is eliminating saver fares for those non stops. My wife and I have the BA card with 100K each and at first, it was easy to get the non stop saver fares. Extremely rare now. The Iberia route may be more useful. I have also found that calling AA and giving them the dates, our names, the BA record locator, they will then populate MY Trips at AA and I can pick and change seats, whereas i cannot do that on the BA site until day of flight.
You can avoid the call and do that yourself by logging into Finnair, populate your BA record locator and add your AA ffn. It will show up in AA site in 24hrs
Thanks!!! Great post as always.
Nick
Great post I LOVE AA points because u can change the dates unlimited times BUT not in this case like stated in BOLD LETTERS .I used all my AA to go Downunder good but I can transfer my Chase points to Ibera to do this too.
GOLD MINE !!!
Thank You
CHEERs
You also avoid the ridiculous AA 150 fee to book using AA points!