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

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  It was eventually withdrawn.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, May 2021: 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 also recommend that you look at SeatSpy – see this HfP article – which is more comprehensive and usually more accurate in its BA data.

When “Avios Flight Finder” was withdrawn, Tim’s site died as well.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

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:

and

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 (December 2021)

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

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points, such as:

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel 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

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company 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

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

(Want to earn more Avios?  Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)