Identifying Saver Availability
The biggest challenge to booking award flights is finding award availability. There are two types of award seats we can book with airline miles: saver and standard. Standard availability tends to be more common, with fewer date restrictions, if any. But standard awards cost a lot more and usually cannot be booked through airline partners. Meanwhile, saver availability is what we usually look for when traveling on points. Saver awards are the ones that enable us to use one airline's miles to book a flight operated by a completely different airline.
What Are Saver Awards?
In general, saver award space is any availability that you find with an operating carrier's partners. For example, if you are looking to fly on an American Airlines flight and find award space on that flight through a partner such as British Airways or Qantas, you have found saver award space. On the other hand, if you are only seeing award availability on American's website and with no other partner's website, then you are looking at non-saver space, meaning it cannot be booked with partners.
Airlines label their award types differently. But in the vast majority of cases, awards fall under either “saver” or “standard” awards. Here are some examples of how airlines call these awards:
| “Saver” | “Standard” | |
| Cathay Pacific | Standard | Choice |
| Emirates | Classic Rewards | Cash+Miles |
| Etihad | Guest Seat | Open Seat |
| Qantas | Classic Flight Reward | Any Seat |
| Singapore Airlines | Saver | Advantage |
Regardless of how the two types of awards are labeled, the main differences are the same. Saver awards are cheaper and can be booked through airline partners, but because of this they are also less common. Standard awards are more widely available, usually cost a lot more, and cannot be booked through airline partners.
Saver Awards for Domestic Airlines
The big three US airlines all have moved towards dynamic pricing and away from fixed award charts. Dynamic pricing makes it harder to identify saver awards since pricing changes often and there is no real floor (or ceiling) for an award flight. This means you can't tell that an award flight with any of American, Delta, or United is necessarily a saver award based on the price alone.
To its credit, United still labels saver awards as “saver” on its website. Yet not all United awards that United labels as “saver” on its website are available through partners. (Thanks for making this even more confusing, United.)
The bottom line when it comes to flights operated by American, Delta, or United, is that you can only tell whether an award is really a saver award if you're seeing it on a partner's website.
Finding Saver Award Availability
Generally, only saver awards can be booked with partner airlines. This means that to book a flight with an alliance partner's miles, the operating airline must have released saver awards to its partner airlines.
For example, to fly from Tampa to San Francisco on United Airlines, we can book a flight with United miles. To book with United's Star Alliance partners like Singapore Airlines, Air Canada, and avianca, we need to find saver award space.
If we find award availability with one of these partners, then we are good to go, because partners only show saver availability. Here is an example of United saver space showing on Singapore Airlines' website:
This award space also shows up with other Star Alliance partners such as Air Canada and avianca.
Tips for Finding Saver Award Space
That said, award availability comes and goes. Just because you don't find something today doesn't mean it won't show up tomorrow or in a few days. As such, we recommend searching early and often. (Check out these other excellent tips for improving your award searches.)
Also, flexibility can go a long way. Being flexible with your departure or return dates opens up more options for finding award space. The same goes for airports. For example, if you live New York, consider searching for award space out of other East Coast airports like Washington or Boston. The greater your flexibility, the more options you will have to redeem your points for flights.
A note for those in smaller cities: Folks based near smaller airports will usually have to position to a larger airport. “Positioning” means catching another flight, usually on a completely separate ticket, to a major airport where your award flight leaves. So when searching for availability, try searching from one of these major airports to your destination first, and then searching a separate leg from your home airport to that major airport.
Identifying Saver Availability: ToP Thoughts
The main draws of saver awards is that they are cheaper and bookable through the airline's partners. Learning how to identify and find saver availability is a big step of learning how to travel on points.
If you want to learn more or have any questions, make sure to join the discussion in our Facebook group!
