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A new Avios travel app for iOS – Avios Flight Finder

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If you have an iPhone or iPad there is a new (beta) Avios travel app now available in the App Store – Avios Flight Finder.  It is not available on Android at the moment unfortunately.

It does what it says on the tin.  It is a fairly straightforward app that lets you search for Avios flight availability from London.  You can pick a specific month or you can have the app show you everything available.  Once you have found seats, the app drops into a version of the avios.com booking page to allow you to book your flight.

This app makes it substantially quicker to look for availability over long periods.  This is probably bad news from BA!

For example, it took me just 14 seconds from opening the app to discover that the first day that I can get 2 people to Los Angeles in Club World is Sunday January 1st 2015.  The first day I can get 2 people to San Francisco is November 25th.

Some of the findings are bizarre.  On the 4th July I can get 4 people to San Diego in Club World.  That is the ONLY day in the next 355 days, according to the app, that there are two San Diego seats in Club World available.  On December 31st, February 15th, March 17th and May 20th there is one seat.   That is to a destination which, frankly, is unlikely to be attracting floods of redemptions.

I really don’t think BA wants people to be able to discover this information in 14 seconds ….

Avios Flight Finder app

Here are some things you should know before using it:

it is an avios.com and not BA app, so to book via the app you need to have your Avios in avios.com and not ba.com – otherwise you will need to use the normal BA website

avios.com has better availability for European economy redemptions than BA.  If you need to book one of those seats, you will need to do it via avios.com and so you wouldn’t be able to use a BA Amex 2-4-1 voucher.

the app does not appear to show avios.com partner airlines in the headline search (eg Flybe, Aurigny, Monarch, Air Malta) although it will bring up their flights during the booking process – I found Air Malta seats for example.

airports only served by partners (eg Guernsey) are not on the drop-down city list so you cannot search for them at all.  The reason Air Malta comes up is that BA also has its own flights to Malta.

it only lets you search for flights from London.  If you want to look for a one-way flight TO London you would need to pretend you wanted to fly a return trip.

the app will not show oneworld partner airline seats because you can only book those airlines via ba.com and not via avios.com

All in all, though, I was impressed – as a way of checking reward seats on British Airways flights on the go it is quick and it is easy.


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2024)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

In February 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

Barclaycard Avios Plus card

Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

Get 25,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £10,000 Read our full review

Barclaycard Avios card

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard

5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £20,000 Read our full review

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the famous annual 2-4-1 voucher Read our full review

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending £15,000 Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points. These points convert at 1:1 into Avios.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital on Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

Huge 30,000 points bonus until 12th May 2024 Read our full review

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus.

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

There are also generous bonuses on the two American Express Business cards, with the points converting at 1:1 into Avios. These cards are open to sole traders as well as limited companies.

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

Comments (66)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Fenny says:

    San Diego is great, even when ComicCon isn’t on.

  • MDM says:

    Maybe I am missing something here but why would BA dislike this app? It doesn’t do anything Avios search engines don’t already do, it jst does it quicker and on the move.

    And you need to charge your phone up Rob, it looks like it is nearly flat!

  • cmcbugg says:

    Looks like it’s a bit buggy still. When you search for availability by month it may say no flights available, but when you find a month that is available and then scroll back through the months you will see that there is availability. Ie One Way, Club, LON-JNB April. Nothing. Check May, yes – scroll back – and lots come up in Apr.

    • Denhoward says:

      I find it’s the same with the BA calendar search online

  • Geoggy says:

    If this is Avios.com availability then it isn’t guaranteed to ba.com for 241 usage, is that right?

    I often find availability for Avios usage better on Avios.com website than BA.

    My wife and I have 2 x 241 vouchers and really want to go to SFO and do Yosemite etc. is there somewhere other than SFO we can fly to for a hol like that where availability might be better?

    I’m thinking of Tampa as an example for Orlando, as I didn’t realise it was so close until I drove to Busch Gardens

    • Lipton says:

      You could always fly from Dublin to SFO using avios. Three flights a week. April to October. I am doing this next month. Fed up of lack of BA availability with avios. Was looking at this route for two months solidly last year for flights this summer and only two economy were available. Aer lingus usually have 9 seats in economy for booking via avios and 2 in business when they first come out 330 days in advance.

      • avidsaver says:

        How and where is the best place to check Aer Lingus redemption availability?

        • Lipton says:

          Ring up BA. They will tell you. You don’t pay a phone booking fee either because you can’t book avios flights online with aer lingus. Taxes/fees with aer lingus dub to sfo £58 per person in economy. £253 per person with BA minus the cost of getting to Dublin.

        • Phillip says:

          United’s website is good for checking Aer Lingus availability, at least to give you an idea before double checking with BA over the phone.

          • Rob says:

            It is not perfect match but is a guide. Same with the Qantas site.

    • Rob says:

      In theory only economy short haul should have availability differences

    • steve says:

      Hi Geoggy — in theory Yosemite is drivable from Vegas… not that availability is necessarily better

    • Edd M says:

      SFO availability is non-existent- the route is at capacity without Avios seats being given away! In any case, it’s not the best stopping off point for Yosemite. (It’s an OK city but overrated in my opinion)

      You’d be better off trying LAX (we got avios seats summer last year) or Las Vegas and stopping by the Grand Canyon too. As Will says above the solution may be to go to NYC then to hop over with AA.

      You’ll have a great trip but you also need to reserve accommodation in Yosemite miles in advance – it’s got Avios level availability 🙂

  • Nick says:

    Thanks for the heads up. This is in incredibly functional app.

    Anyone know the best way to check for award seats on virgin atlantic ? Specifically o and m class seats?

  • Oliver Bennett says:

    Excellent app 🙂

  • Gadgeteer1066 says:

    I had heard about this from somewhere else a few weeks ago and when I saw this I went straight onto my iPad to download it… But I can’t see it on the App Store. Has it been taken down?

    • DV says:

      Select iphone only.

      • Lipton says:

        Great app. Only glitch I am finding is when I search by departure month and input a later month for return availability it defaults back to the same month as departure.

    • Rob says:

      It’s an iPhone app so you need to select ‘iPhone apps’ in the app store at the top.

      • dh says:

        doesn’t seem to be available to those of us in the US.
        and yes, San Diego is a great place to live, but not a great place to fly out of if you use Avios points!

  • Paul says:

    Just a data point, as I decided to test it by looking for something specific like a Christmas shopping trip to New York.

    I found several midweek dates with 9+ Club World seats, although weekends were understandably more sparse. In January there a NO dates without some Club availability.

    • Rob says:

      New York is pretty good – but with, what, 11 flights a day including the City Airport ones you would expect that …. between 600 and 800 Club World seats per day to fill!

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