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United Airlines just launched a new flash award sale for Cyber Week— but only for those who've got a MileagePlus credit card. If you've got miles sitting around, you can snag international flights from the U.S. to over 30 global destinations starting at 12,000 miles per way through December 5, 2025.
Here are all the details on United's newest flash award sale.
Overview of the United Airlines Flash Sale
United's cardmember-only flash award sale means there will be discounted award flights on offer through December 5, 2025. You can travel to places like Mexico, Australia, Vietnam, and more for up to 28% off. Here's a snapshot of the places you can travel to, plus the starting at rates:
- Barbados (BGI) — 12,000 miles one way
- Adelaide, Australia (ADL) — 45,000 miles one way
- Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (SGN) — 30,000 miles one way
- Puerto Vallarta, Mexico (PVR) — 15,000 miles one way
- Geneva, Switzerland (GVA) — 30,000 miles one way
At first glance, award availability is pretty good. That's usually the case with economy-only award sales, and the same is true here. However, it's not uncommon to see the cheapest awards tack on an extra layover, or a greatly extended one.
Key terms of the United flash award sale
This award sale is extremely straightforward. You can book one-way or round-trip tickets with MileagePlus miles — at up to a 28% discount — provided you act by December 5 and complete your travels between January 12 and May 6, 2025. Some destinations do have slightly longer windows, such as Adelaide (March 26) and Tokyo (March 14).
The only catch here is that this sale is uniquely for those with a United Airlines credit card. If you don't have one of these cards in your wallet, you can't take advantage of these discounted rates.
How to Earn United MileagePlus Miles
United's flash award sale won't be around for very long. That means you'll likely be out of luck if you don't currently have a United credit card and MileagePlus miles in your account (or credit card points that you can quickly convert to United miles). As a refresher, here are all the currencies that transfer to United:
If you're a few miles shy of a redemption, you could consider buying United miles outright. However, this is only a practical solution if you need a small amount of miles. That's because the cost of purchasing MileagePlus miles can likely eclipse the cash cost of an economy flight itself if you need a considerable amount of them.
Long term, it may be worth applying for a United credit card and collecting a sign-up bonus. This can help you fund future redemptions and/or prepare you for the next award sale.
- 2X miles per $1 spent on purchases from United®
- 2X miles per $1 spent on dining and hotel stays when booked with the hotel
- 1X mile per $1 spent on all other purchases
- 5 miles per $1 spent at Renowned Hotels and Resorts
- 3 miles per $1 spent on United® purchases
- 2 miles per $1 spent on all other travel
- 2 miles per $1 spent at restaurants
- 2 miles per $1 spent on select streaming services
- 1 mile per $1 spent on all other purchases
- 2x on United® purchases
- 2x on local transit and commuting — including train tickets, taxicabs, mass transit, tolls and ride share services
- 2x at gas stations, restaurants and office supply stores
- 1x on all other purchases
Related: From No Annual Fee to Club Lounge Access: Find the United Credit Card for You
Bottom Line
It's not exactly a secret that United has increased award prices over the past few years. Award inflation has been pretty constant since United scrapped its award chart in 2019. Flash award sales like this offer MileagePlus cardholders (sorry, non-cardholders) to book travel at what resembles award rates of old — give or take a bit on the margins.
If this sale piques your interest, you'll need to act soon. The last day you can take advantage of these discounted rates is December 5, 2025.
For rates and fees of the cards mentioned in this post, please visit the following links: United℠ Explorer Card (Rates & Fees), United Quest℠ Card (Rates & Fees), and United℠ Business Card (Rates & Fees)
The comments on this page are not provided, reviewed, or otherwise approved by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
I can’t believe I missed this! I was JUST thinking about booking a flight to Rome!
Too good to be truth. Sure there are some tricks.
This is cool to see some reward flight deals for United since they seemed to have devalued their points over the last couple years, requiring more and more points for decent flights. Hope their business class award availability is good.
Yes, I’ve found opportunites from Buenos Aires to DC for about 40k. Its amazing
I was frustrated yesterday because when I searched for flights from Ogdensburg, NY to IAD, the matrix said “4k” for the flights. But after clicking through to the “pay” page the price ramped up to 12,500 points. So I wasn’t able to take advantage of this offer.
I did get several emails about this but I do not need any trips right now. I know they are trying to boost but now I wouldn’t think they need too much. I thought I heard that searches are up for travel.
This is great! Does this also apply to COPA Airlines flights?
Amazing!
Whilst I’m sure some people will be able to make use of this, it looks a little underwhelming when compared to the AAdvantage 40th promotion.
I don’t like the limited dates on this flash sale. They know it’s too early still to travel for a lot of people. They should allow longer travel dates.
I suspect that their goal is to entice people to start traveling again. People will resume travel on their own eventually, so this is a sale to speed that up, only works if it’s for travel sooner than people are quite ready for.
The routes are listed in only 1 direction, but in case it wasn’t clear, both directions work. You don’t have to start in the city listed first, you can do your roundtrip in either direction. Every flight obviously isn’t available at the 4k rate, but in my quick search there were some good times, not only 6am flights!
What is United’s cancelation/redeposit of miles if I cannot go?
Great question! There’s no fee if you change or cancel 31+ days in advance. The fee within 30 days is $125 per passenger for general members. That fee is reduced for elite members.
Thank you for asking/answering this. That was going to be my question.
Do you know what the fee is for elite members?
Premier Silver: $100
Premier Gold: $75
Premier Platinum: $50
Premier 1K: $0
Can you combine this with United’s excursionist perk?
Potentially! We didn’t have the chance to check as we wanted to publish this ASAP!
Any offerings in Business?
Not that I’ve seen. Just standard premium cabin rates.
I usually don’t advocate for using miles for short-haul flights that only cost a couple of hundred dollars but if only using 4K miles, it would be worth it.
i booked a july 4th trip PDX-AMS (via IAH and ORD) for 40k. we’ll see if that actually happens! i put a reminder 32 days out to reevaluate before the free cxl period ends.
Nice!