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Virgin Atlantic launches a new reward seat sale – save 20% on 90% of routes, for ALL of 2024

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Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Red have teamed up to offer a 20% discount on reward flights to (almost) all Virgin Atlantic destinations.

Impressively, you can travel for ALL of 2024. These offers often come with tight travel windows so Virgin Atlantic is treating you here.

Premium and Upper Class flights are included, as well as Economy.

Flight upgrades are included.

‘2 for 1’ bookings made using a Virgin Atlantic credit card voucher are included.

Get 20% off Virgin Atlantic redemptions in ALL CLASSES

Taxes and charges are unchanged and remain high, with an Upper Class redemption to New York pricing at 76,000 Virgin Points + £996 off-peak. The 20% reduction in points from the usual 95,000 does take the edge off.

You need to book by midnight on 31st January, departing before 31st December. You can’t yet book for late December 2024 because Virgin Atlantic only allows you to book 331 days in advance.

The offer does not apply to the ‘we will open up any seat, any flight for double points for Gold members’ benefit.

Where can you go?

To give Virgin Atlantic credit, this sale includes (virtually) all routes, all classes and all bookable dates.

The only 2024 flights you can’t book are for the final few days in December which are currently not available due to the 331 day booking window.

The list of current routes (we think) is in the pricing chart below. These are all from Heathrow.

The only excluded Heathrow routes for the 20% discount are:

  • Tel Aviv
  • Delhi
  • Lagos

From Manchester you can book:

  • New York
  • Atlanta
  • Orlando
  • Barbados (seasonal)
  • Las Vegas (seasonal)

There is also Edinburgh to Orlando which operates in Summer-only.

Virgin Atlantic now guarantees that 12 seats are opened to redemption on every flight – two in Upper Class, two in Premium and eight in Economy Classic. Obviously some of these may already have gone, as some of these flights have been on sale for almost a year.

Get 30% off Virgin Atlantic redemptions in ALL CLASSES

What do Virgin Atlantic redemptions cost?

Here is the current pricing chart, EXCLUDING the 20% discount – remember that Tel Aviv, Delhi and Lagos are not included in the sale:

Return pricesStandard economyStandard PremiumStandard Upper ClassPeak economyPeak PremiumPeak Upper Class
Antigua20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Atlanta25,00045,00095,00045,00065,000115,000
Barbados20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Bengaluru20,00035,00075,00040,00055,00095,000
Boston20,00035,00095,00040,00055,000115,000
Cape Town25,00050,000115,00045,00085,000135,000
Delhi20,00035,00075,00040,00055,00095,000
Dubai20,00035,00075,00040,00055,00095,000
Grenada20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Jamaica20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Johannesburg25,00050,000115,00045,00085,000135,000
Lagos25,00045,000115,00045,00065,000135,000
Las Vegas30,00055,000135,00050,00075,000155,000
Los Angeles30,00055,000135,00050,00075,000155,000
Maldives (Male)25,00050,000115,00045,00085,000135,000
Miami25,00045,00095,00045,00065,000115,000
Mumbai20,00035,00075,00040,00055,00095,000
New York20,00035,00095,00040,00055,000115,000
Orlando25,00045,00095,00045,00065,000115,000
San Francisco30,00055,000135,00050,00075,000155,000
Seattle30,00055,000135,00050,00075,000155,000
Shanghai25,00045,000115,00045,00065,000135,000
St Lucia20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
St Vincent20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Tampa25,00045,00095,00045,00065,000115,000
Tel Aviv18,00032,00056,00022,00040,00066,000
The Bahamas20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Tobago20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Turks & Caicos20,00035,000115,00040,00055,000135,000
Washington DC20,00035,00095,00040,00055,000115,000

You can find peak and off-peak dates on this page of the Virgin Atlantic website.

Virgin Atlantic redemptions now earn tier points

Don’t forget that, unlike almost any other airline, redemptions on Virgin Atlantic earn you tier points.

On redemption flights, you will usually earn the following:

  • Economy: 25 tier points each way
  • Premium: 50 tier points each way
  • Upper Class: 100 tier points each way

You don’t earn Virgin Points on reward tickets, for obvious reasons!

You can learn about tier points on this page of the Virgin Atlantic website.

Get 30% off Virgin Atlantic redemptions in ALL CLASSES

What can you expect flying Virgin Atlantic?

Virgin Atlantic now flies three different Upper Class seats. We have reviewed them all:

In addition to the usual amenities you’d expect form a business class flight, Virgin Atlantic aircraft also feature a bar or social space for Upper Class passengers – a unique feature that only the Middle Eastern airlines such as Emirates and Qatar Airways usually offer.

You’ll also get access to the impressive Virgin Clubhouse at Heathrow, which we’ve reviewed here.

You can read our review of Premium on Virgin Atlantic here.

Economy redemptions book into Economy Classic with a 23kg checked baggage allowance.

Get 30% off Virgin Atlantic redemptions in ALL CLASSES

Conclusion

Virgin Atlantic has launched a major reward flight sale. What’s important is that (almost) ALL routes and ALL classes are included and that you have a full 11 months to travel.

You need to book by 31st January, for flights departing before 31st December 2024.

The savings should be live on the Virgin Atlantic website here – although we wrote this last night so we are trusting Virgin Atlantic to have done it. Just enter your destination and dates. To find reward flights, simply click ‘Advanced’ and select ‘Points’.


How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2025)

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

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 18,000 Virgin Points and the free card has a bonus of 3,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

3,000 bonus points, no fee and 1 point for every £1 you spend Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with 50,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 50,000 Virgin Points.

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up 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 Virgin Points

Comments (101)

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

  • Jonathan says:

    VS are unfortunately very good at changing the aircraft you’ve booked to fly on and shafting you onto their old UC seat on the 789, and simply hope you won’t notice

    • TomB says:

      Couldn’t agree more. Was excited having booked the A350 UC 241 and they changed both legs to the shoddy 787 UC which is worse than BA premium and terrible for couples. Also don’t see any point in Virgin silver status unless you travel economy.

    • Go197 says:

      Just like Qatar, who have shafted me on 12 out of 12 flights in 24 months.

      Imagine if you bought champagne and they gave you Sunny D, or a Mercedes and they gave you a Dacia. Why is the airline industry allowed to get away with falsely advertising a top-class product and setting terms that say you may not get it and there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s a scam.

      • TomB says:

        It would be fairer if there was an operational change in aircraft you were offered a a chance to accept or have a full refund regardless of cash or reward… but life ain’t fair lol

      • Andy says:

        I would have stopped buying the champagne after the 3rd or 4th swap.

      • JDB says:

        You buy a seat in specific class, not a seat of any particular type or on any particular aircraft. Nobody is obliging you to fly with QR and you could get them to refund if it’s such a big deal.

        • meta says:

          Indeed you can get a refund and also a partial refund if an airline switches the aircraft/seat type last minute.

        • Numpty says:

          If you have ever booked a flight with QR then you would see that during the booking process it tells you specifically what kind of plane it will be and whether it will be Q suite or not, and so it informs the decision making process at the time of booking.

          Based on that alone, if QR then change the plane, rather than hope you don’t notice, they should be open and pro-actively inform you.

  • Nick says:

    What about an outbound say 25 December returning on say 10 January

    I plan on using a 2 -4-1 voucher Will book flights separately as soon as released.

    Outbound book over phone. Inbound – book over phone when available and ask agent to link flights.

  • Nick says:

    I will use points and the voucher for the above. Will they only discount the outbound flight points by 20 percent?

  • Chris W says:

    Meh. We’ve seen 50% and 30% discounts in the past

  • @mkcol says:

    Damn!
    Booked LHR-MIA & TPA-LHR 3 days ago.
    If I were to cancel & rebook how quickly do the points return to my account?

  • Martin says:

    mkcol
    I called up to do my change, so they did it instantly.

    • Leo says:

      @Martin
      Were you charged cancellation fee for the rebooking?
      Man at the pub claims he was able to get an existing booking rebooked at the Black Friday reduced rates, at no cost for the change.
      Tried this morning, Virgin said no possible.
      Any experience?

  • Jan M says:

    So ignorant question but imagine I’m points and voucher rich but cash poor… what is the best route from a taxes and charges perspective?

    • Ryan says:

      I did LHR – PVG in Upper for £450 return, 13 hours out / 15 hours back

      88k miles, voucher and black friday meant it cost me 33k miles

    • Rob says:

      None of them.

      Do something like ITA returns, Rome to somewhere, with taxes of £75 return in Business. US, Japan, Maldives, whatever.

      • cin3 says:

        On which airline are there taxes of £75 return in J?

        • Blair Waldorf Salad says:

          Airlines that depart from countries that don’t levy punitive and barmy APD

          • Rob says:

            ITA long haul using Virgin Points is £75 return. Decent size network now too, out of Rome, inc Maldives, Tokyo.

            SAS using their own miles (via Amex MR) is £50ish each way IIRC.

          • cin3 says:

            I wasn’t aware that Italy was one of these countries. Are there any resources that focus on this? I don’t care about the price in points, only in cash component.

      • Jan M says:

        ITA wasn’t on my radar as a redemption option. Used KLM a few times but the charges there are excessive. If I wanted to use the voucher is Shanghai the least bad option? 450 is alright.

        • Rob says:

          Obviously depends if you want to go to Shanghai 🙂

          • Jonathan says:

            I’ve booked to travel there, but I’ve got hardly any intention of spending much or if any time there at all, Shanghai is a good in between place if you want to go to say South Korea or Japan, and maybe the Philippines, and you don’t mind breaking up the journey a bit and buying tickets on separate bookings

  • paul says:

    Difference between Redemption flight and Reward Flight?

    Is Redemption using points and Reward using a voucher instead of points?

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

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