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It’s back – the only FREE and fast Avios reward finding tool you need

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Those of you with long memories may remember the short lived “Avios Flight Finder” app.  This was an official app from Avios Group which was meant to be a quick way of checking reward seats on British Airways flights.  The problem was that it used cached data, and the results it showed were not accurate.  It was eventually withdrawn.

Smartphones were less common at that point (2014) so Head for Points reader Tim created “BA Redemption Finder”.  This sat at www.baredemptionfinder.com and was a desktop site.  It used the same data feed that Avios was using for its app, so it suffered from the same issues over accuracy.  However, it was lightning fast.

EDIT, March 2022: If you found this article via Google, hello!  Since we published it, ‘BA Redemption Finder’ has become ‘Reward Flight Finder’ – the links below still work.  We now recommend that you look at SeatSpy – see this HfP article – which is more comprehensive and usually more accurate in its BA data.

Avios wing 11

When “Avios Flight Finder” was withdrawn, Tim’s site died as well.

Now it’s back, using the BA app data feed.  “BA Redemption Finder” is, easily, the quickest way of checking Avios availability for British Airways flights.

The best bit is the site is free.  It is a website not an app, but is optimised for both mobile and desktop.

It is simplicity itself.  Type in where you want to fly from, where you want to fly to, how many seats and what cabin and you will see – instantly – full availability for the next 355 days.  On mobile it looks like this:

BA Redemption Finder

Here are some results for two Club World seats from Heathrow to Tokyo – on the actual site, you get the full year on one scrolling screen.  The left column is outbound, the right is return:

BA Redemption Finder 1

and

BA Redemption Finder 2

It gets even better.  You can set up email alerts.   Set a date range, route, class and number of passengers and you will be notified when seats become available.

There are a few issues with the site, but none are major:

It cannot handle connections, only direct point to point searches

It does not show oneworld partner airlines – so it is best used to check availability when you want to use an Amex 2-4-1 voucher.  If you are not using a 2-4-1 voucher you should use ba.com instead as it will show you Qatar, Finnair, Royal Jordanian, American etc as well.

There is still a slight delay on the data feed, but very modest – Tim said no more than an hour

It does not show the extra economy Avios seats made available to BA Gold members

These are mainly trivial points, however, in the context of what is an amazingly fast and usable site.  It will take a while for me to be certain how accurate it is, but on the few checks I’ve done so far it has been fine.

You can take a look at BA Redemption Finder here.

The site is totally free to use.  Tim is happy to accept voluntarily monthly donations, and in return your availability queries will be checked hourly instead of daily – increasing the chances that you can grab any seats which open up.


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 (153)

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

  • Colin MacKinnon says:

    Nice tool.

    Might it be an idea to shade the dates that are peak?

    • Tim Rogers says:

      Thanks Colin – glad you like it! I’ll take a look at highlighting peak vs. off-peak dates – that’d be a great idea! Do let me know if you have any others – my email is on the site.

      • Stephen says:

        That’s just what I was going to suggest too, but I had a feeling I wasn’t tho only one with that idea!

        Peak/off peak identification would be very useful, especially for those of us who don’t have kids and so are less aware of school holiday dates.

  • Alan says:

    Amazing tool, well done Tim. I wonder if you might be better making the email bit all paid-for only (eg £3/mo for daily check, £5/mo for hourly check) rather than giving it away for free!

    • Tim Rogers says:

      Thanks Alan – fantastic to hear that you like the tool! I did originally think about making the alerts paid-only, but I wanted to provide wider value than that, even if I definitely would have made more money! I’m hoping to get plenty of elite memberships to help support the site and keep it up.

      • Alan says:

        Sounds good, as long as you’re happy! Just think you’ve created something valuable and don’t want you to undersell what you’ve created! Myflighttracker charges more but I suspect they have the higher cost of Amadeus data stream access.

  • Titus Adduxas says:

    I just tried to change a flight from ATL-LHR to MIA-LHR and having spent 40 minutes on the phone was told it wasn’t available despite tshowing as such on the redemption finder.

    • barey cutters says:

      And you didn’t think to double check on ba.com at all. After reading this article which clearly states this is not 100% live .

    • Tim Rogers says:

      Sorry to hear that Titus – can you drop me an email at help@baredemptionfinder.com with the dates and class and I’ll look into it?

  • What's the Point says:

    Just did a quick check LHR – HKG in First return for next April. Dates shown on the site match exactly what BA have as availability!

    Looks a great tool

    • Tim Rogers says:

      Excellent! I’ve done lots of checks on the data and have generally found it to be really reliable. It seems never to be more than an hour or so behind reality.

      Do let me know if you have any questions, comments or ideas at all – you can reach me at help@baredemptionfinder.com.

  • Darren says:

    Slightly OT,

    Does the BA CW availability on BA.com differ from that on Avios.com? I’m late to the party with the Lloyds avios rewards cards, but have used BA for quite a while. A colleague with both has commented that this may be the case.

    • Rob says:

      No, it is the same. There used to be a difference a few years ago but for the last 3 years or so it is the same.

  • Jas Gill says:

    O/T

    A massive thanks to Rob and all those who contribute regularly to this site; it has helped me immensely to exploit all avenues of earning points.

    I am writing this while on a lounger at the Domes of Elounda. The week long stay has been made possible through the knowledge gained from HfP. We received an upgrade to a stunning 2 bed villa, and all associated benefits, as Marriott Gold members. The seven night Marriott travel package must be one of the sweetest redemptions possible.

    Once again, many thanks all from a very contented Gill family.

  • kevino says:

    What a great support system.

    Almost perfect, just needs to add a way to find one way or open jaw trips.

    Thank you so far though, keep it up.

    • Kev says:

      Yes. How to just do one way trips?

    • Tim Rogers says:

      Thanks so much for your kind words Kevin – great that you like the tool. I’ll be looking at adding better support for one-way and open-jaw trips soon.

      • Leo says:

        Yes a great piece of work – used it this morning. Almost life changing! 🙂 Many Thanks.

    • Simon says:

      Easy to “work around” this. Just put in two trips – one a return to /from the airport of your arrival and the second to / from the airport of your return. I did this this morning for a trip to Delhi, returning form Mumbai and have monitors on both.

      • Mzungu says:

        Exactly my route for early next year!

        I’m a bit late to this thread, but if you’re still reading Tim:
        I’m looking for F to open up for the outbound, but I specifically want BA0257, and I keep seeing availability on the other flight (BA0187?). What are the chances of being able to set alerts for a specific flight if there are more than one per day?

  • Joseph Heenan says:

    OT: On my amex gold I seem to be getting an extra 1 MR per pound when I spend at easyjet, described as ‘Preferred Rewards Gold Airline Bonus’. I can’t find this documented anywhere via google searches; anyone know if it applies to all airlines, is it a permanent offer? If I’d been aware of it I’d have put more airline spend onto this card!

    • Natalia S says:

      it’s for all airlines.

      These are T&Cs:
      “one additional point for virtually every full £1 spent and charged per transaction directly with airlines over the phone or online via their official website or affiliated mobile apps (only transactions made directly with the airline will be included for bonus Membership Rewards points, including but not limited to flights, car hire, package holidays and insurance. Bookings made with other travel agents, comparison sites and affiliates will not be included for bonusing)”

      • Alan says:

        So frustrating the more expensive Plat card doesn’t have any MRs for this 🙁

    • Rob says:

      Airline spend earns an extra 1 point per £1, it applies to all airlines.

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

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