United Airlines Cyber Monday award sale: Round-trip flights to Europe, Asia and elsewhere from only 30,000 miles

Meghan Hunter

5 years ago

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Update: One or more card offers in this post are no longer available. Check our Hot Deals for the latest offers.

If you’ve got a stash of United miles and are looking to plan a winter trip, now’s your chance. Today only (it’s Cyber Monday, didn’t you know?) United Airlines is offering discounted award tickets to spots like Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand. With prices starting at 30,000 miles round-trip, you’ll be hard pressed to find a better use of your United miles.

These discounted award tickets must be booked by 11:59 p.m. local time today, Dec. 2, 2019, and are valid for travel from Jan. 12, 2020 through Mar. 29, 2020. Just note, there’s a pricing differentiation based on elite status and whether or not you hold a United card like the United℠ Explorer Card.

United Airlines recently moved to dynamic pricing, but the standard award rate for round-trip economy flights to Europe is still 60,000 miles. So with this deal, you could potentially save 50%. You can see the full list of sale details here.

For example, here’s a look at the calendar for flights from New York (Newark and LaGuardia) to Paris:

I have the United℠ Explorer Card, so for cardholders, it looks like round-trip economy flights on this particular route are 36,000 miles.

In searching without logging in, I’m seeing round-trip flights for 42,000 miles on this same route. So even if you aren’t a United cardholder or don’t have elite status, it’s still worth a look at this sale to see if you can find a deal that fits your travel schedule.

I even found tickets out of my home airport (Missoula, Montana) to Paris for 36,000 miles round-trip (not too shabby for flights out of a tiny airport). And I found round-trip award tickets from the U.S. to Japan for 42,000 miles. So again, it’s certainly worth checking out this sale if you’re planning a trip within the coming months.

Ways to earn United miles

You won’t be able to cash in on this particular sale, but if you want to earn more United miles (and take advantage of future sales) check out cards like the:

United℠ Explorer Business Card — Earn up to 100,000 United miles: 50,000 miles after you spend $5,000 in purchases in the first three months. Plus, an additional 50,000 miles after you spend $25,000 total in the first six months of account opening.
United℠ Explorer Card — For a limited time, earn up to 65,000 United miles: 40,000 miles after you spend $2,000 in purchases in the first three months. Plus, an additional 25,000 bonus miles after you spend $10,000 total in the first six months of account opening.

And don’t forget, you can transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to United at a 1:1 ratio if you have any of these cards:

Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card — Earn 60,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first three months.
Chase Sapphire Reserve® — Earn 50,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first three months.
Ink Business Preferred Credit Card – Earn 80,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards after you spend $5,000 on purchases in the first three months.

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