What time is off-peak for flights?

Off-peak travel times vary by airline, route, and dates. Each airline has defined separate date ranges for off-peak seasons where a flight will cost fewer miles.

What is off-peak travel?

Off-peak travel is defined as traveling at a time where there is less than maximum demand. Some off-peak travel ideas would be to fly to Europe during the winter months of January through March.

Peak travel is defined as the period of travel in which there is maximum demand. You’ll often see large crowds, expensive hotel prices, and more expensive airplane tickets.

Is off-peak cheaper than peak?

Off-peak is almost always cheaper than peak travel. Because airlines don’t expect to sell out their seats, they release “cheaper” seats that you can use miles for. Also, the mileage price is cheaper during off-peak compared to peak. The exact discount varies from airline to airline, so you’ll need to reference one of the airlines above to figure out how much cheaper it is to travel during peak dates with points.

Airline Peak and Off-Peak Award Charts: The Ultimate Guide [2024]

Updated: September 20, 2024, 10:27am CDT

Edited by:

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Key Takeaways
Why Is Understanding Peak/Off-Peak Seasonality Important?
Airlines That Have Peak/Off-Peak Award Charts
Final Thoughts

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Key Takeaways

Many airlines offer peak and off-peak award charts, with lower mileage requirements for flights during off-peak seasons.
Airlines like ANA, American Airlines, and British Airways provide clear distinctions in their charts, allowing flexibility in choosing travel dates for fewer points.
Each airline has different seasonal policies, so it is best to look for specific dates before planning a trip.

Commercial aviation is one of the most seasonal industries in the world. Typically, the busiest time of the year for airlines is from May to October.

Of course, this varies depending on the exact destinations, countries, or even cities that you visit. That being said, customer demand plummets in the winter months from November to March, especially when visiting Europe.

Airline revenue ticket prices fluctuate wildly thanks to revenue management departments, crazy algorithms, and seats sold. The same is generally true for airline award tickets. As a result, many major airlines have chosen to adopt a binary award pricing scheme, whereby there is an off-peak set of dates priced cheaper than the remaining peak dates.

In this guide, we’ll be taking an in-depth look into every major airline’s seasonality charts and discussing the nuances of each program, with the ultimate goal of minimizing the number of points you’ll use for award flights.

Why Is Understanding Peak/Off-Peak Seasonality Important?

Travelers with flexible plans ought to book flights during off-peak when possible in order to spend fewer miles.

You’ve already worked so hard to earn your points and miles, so why spend any more than absolutely necessary?

By planning trips around off-peak award dates, you’ll extract the maximum value from your points and miles. There’s a minimal amount of work in understanding what constitutes peak and off-peak dates for each airline you want to fly on, but it’s all worth it in the end!

This guide is not about variable award pricing, which itemizes mileage and award prices based on distinct levels. Instead, we’re going to be talking about the major airlines that have specific peak and off-peak travel dates.

Airlines That Have Peak/Off-Peak Award Charts

Before talking about each individual airline, keep in mind that some airlines adopt different seasonality policies depending on what route you fly on, while others have a simple binary system.

Let’s look into the airlines and dissect their peak and off-peak award charts.

Aer Lingus

Image Credit: Aer Lingus

Aer Lingus is Ireland’s flag carrier. Aer Lingus is owned by the same company that owns British Airways, IAG, and its frequent flyer currency is known as Avios.

Each calendar year, Aer Lingus publishes its off-peak and peak periods. The off-peak periods constitute two-thirds of the year, whereby you can book award flights for fewer Avios.

Additionally, Aer Lingus has a distance-based award chart along with peak/off-peak pricing. You can redeem Aer Lingus Avios for great value, especially if booking during off-peak dates.

Aer Lingus’s off-peak dates for 2024 are as follows:

January 8, 2024, to March 21, 2024
April 8, 2024, to June 6, 2024
September 2, 2024, to December 12, 2024

Now that we’ve pieced together the seasonality, let’s talk briefly about how many Avios you’d save by booking off-peak. Here’s Aer Lingus’s award chart for one-way flights:

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Zone	Origin	Destinations	Off-Peak Economy	Peak Economy	Off-Peak Business	Peak Business
Zone 1	Belfast	Birmingham, Cardiff, East Midlands, Edinburgh, Exeter, Leeds Bradford, London, Manchester, Newquay	4,000	4,500	N/A	N/A
	Cork	Amsterdam, Birmingham, Bristol, Brussels, Edinburgh, Glasgow, London, Manchester, Newcastle, Paris	4,000	4,500	N/A	N/A
	Donegal	Glasgow	4,000	4,500	N/A	N/A
	Dublin	Aberdeen, Amsterdam, Birmingham, Bordeaux, Bristol, Brussels, Cardiff, Donegal, Doncaster, Dusseldorf, East Midlands, Edinburgh, Exeter, Glasgow, Isle of Man, Jersey, Kerry, Leeds Bradford, London, Manchester, Nantes, Newcastle, Newquay, Paris, Rennes	4,000	4,500	N/A	N/A
	Shannon	Birmingham, Bristol, London, Paris	4,000	4,500	N/A	N/A
Zone 2	Belfast	Palma	6,500	7,500	N/A	N/A
	Cork	Alicante, Barcelona, Faro, Geneva, Lisbon, Malaga, Munich, Nice, Palma	6,500	7,500	N/A	N/A
	Dublin	Alghero, Alicante, Barcelona, Berlin, Bilbao, Bologna, Copenhagen, Faro, Frankfurt, Geneva, Hamburg, Lisbon, Lyon, Madrid, Marseille, Milan, Munich, Murcia, Nice, Palma, Perpignan, Pisa, Prague, Pula, Salzburg, Santiago de Compostela, Stuttgart, Toulouse, Venice, Verona, Vienna, Warsaw, Zurich	6,500	7,500	N/A	N/A
	Shannon	Barcelona, Faro, Malaga	6,500	7,500	N/A	N/A
Zone 3	Belfast	Alicante, Faro, Malaga	8,500	10,000	N/A	N/A
	Cork	Dubrovnik, Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, Tenerife	8,500	10,000	N/A	N/A
	Dublin	Agadir, Athens, Bourgas, Brindisi, Budapest, Catania, Corfu, Dubrobnik, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria, Izmir, Lanzarote, Malaga, Naples, Rome, Santorini, Split, Tenerife	8,500	10,000	N/A	N/A
	Shannon	Lanzarote	8,500	10,000	N/A	N/A
Zone 4	Dublin	Rhodes	10,000	12,500	N/A	N/A
Zone 5	Dublin	Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Hartford, Minneapolis, Newark, New York, Philadelphia, Toronto, Washington	13,000	20,000	50,000	60,000
	Shannon	Boston, New York
	Manchester	New York
Zone 6	Dublin	Los Angeles, Miami, Orlando, San Francisco, Seattle	16,250	25,000	62,500	75,000
Zone 6	Manchester	Barbados, Orlando	16,250	25,000	62,500	75,000

Suppose you wanted to fly from Miami (MIA) to Dublin (DUB) in Aer Lingus business class on September 18, 2024. Assuming you find availability on this date, you’ll be traveling on off-peak dates, meaning you’ll pay 62,500 Avios one-way as opposed to 75,000 Avios (the peak season price).

Let’s also suppose that the departing segment of your trip falls on peak dates while the returning flight falls on off-peak dates. In this case, you’d simply pay the peak price one-way and the off-peak price the other way.

Aer Lingus’ system is pretty straightforward, but you can save up to 12,500 Avios each way by planning your off-peak travel accordingly.

All Nippon Airways

Image Credit: All Nippon Airways

All Nippon Airways’ Mileage Club loyalty program is a fantastic overall program. Although its online user interface is somewhat dated, ANA has so many fantastic redemptions that you can’t miss out on.

ANA Mileage Club takes some time to learn about, but once that time is invested, you’ll find yourself digging up value redemption after value redemption.

Hot Tip: You can start racking up ANA miles pretty easily by following our guide on how to earn lots of ANA Mileage Club miles!

You can only book round-trip award bookings with ANA, so keep that in mind, too.

However, you can book one-way award bookings on ANA using Virgin Points via Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club.

Most airlines split up their peak/off-peak dates into a simple binary system, whereby a date is either a peak or off-peak date. ANA has 3 seasonality periods — low season, regular season, and high season.

ANA uses seasonality only for ANA flights. Seasonality does not apply to partners like United Airlines. The following is a chart that depicts the most updated seasonality dates for flights between Japan and Europe/North America until early 2025:

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ANA Seasonality Periods	2024	2025
Low Season (L)	January 4 – February 29 April 1-24	January 4 – February 28
Regular Season (R)	March 1-31 May 13 – July 18 August 26 – December 15	March 1-31
High Season (H)	January 1-3 April 25 – May 12 July 19 – August 25 December 16-31	January 1-3

Keep in mind that there are different seasonality periods depending on what regions you’re flying to/from, and even for domestic flights. For example, Hawaii has a slightly different set of dates to the above as it is in Zone 5, while the rest of North America is in Zone 6.

For flights between North America and Japan, here’s the round-trip award chart:

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Cabin Class	Low Season Price	Regular Season Price	High Season Price
Economy	40,000	50,000	55,000
Premium Economy	62,000	72,000	77,000
Business	75,000	85,000	90,000
First	150,000	150,000	165,000

So, if you choose to fly on ANA business class round-trip from New York City (JFK) to Tokyo (NRT), departing on January 10, 2024, and returning on January 31, 2024, you’ll pay the low season price — an incredibly low 75,000 ANA miles.

On the other hand, flying during high season on the same route will cost a decent 90,000 miles. This represents a 20% hike in prices just for flying during different times.

Bottom Line: In order to figure out the price you’ll pay for a specific ANA flight during a specific date range, you’ll need to figure out the seasonality of the route first. Then, you can figure out the award price by matching the award chart pricing with the correct seasonality and route. Keep in mind that this only applies if you intend to use ANA miles on ANA flights.

American Airlines

Image Credit: American Airlines

American Airlines does offer off-peak awards, and these off-peak awards are often fantastic deals. However, American Airlines only does this for economy flights. Additionally, qualifying tickets include partner airlines and aren’t limited to flights operated by American Airlines.

That being said, American Airlines has off-peak economy tickets for just 2 regions — Contiguous 48 U.S. states and Canada and Europe — and these tickets are called Main Cabin Off-Peak.

The Main Cabin off-peak dates for 2024 are January 10 to March 14 and November 1 to December 14. Tickets are 22,500 AAdvantage miles one-way.

Hot Tip: In order to minimize your out-of-pocket costs at the hands of fuel surcharges, try to plan your travel solely on American Airlines flights.

Asiana Airlines

Image Credit: Asiana Airlines

Asiana Airlines has deservedly garnered a great reputation with its loyalty program Asiana Club. In addition, Asiana Airlines continues to be a top airline of choice to earn miles on, thanks to its attractive (and niche!) ways to redeem for maximum value.

Asiana Airlines has off-peak and peak pricing only for its own flights. It also has different peak season dates departing on your exact route. Lastly, you can avoid peak season surcharges if you’re an Asiana Club Diamond Plus or Platinum member for both award bookings and upgrades.

Asiana Airlines charges 50% additional miles for flights during high season, so you’ll absolutely want to avoid flying during popular times. Here is the peak season chart for 2024:

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Route	2024 Peak Dates	2025 Peak Dates
International Flights Departing From the Americas	May 12 – July 4, 2024 December 7-31, 2024	May 12 – July 4, 2025 December 7-31, 2025
International Flights Departing From Non-Americas Locations	January 1-2, 2024 February 8-12, 2024 February 29 – March 3, 2024 May 3-6, 2024 June 6-9, 2024 July 19 – August 18, 2024 September 13-18, 2024 October 3-9, 2024 December 24-31, 2024	January 1, 2025 January 24 – February 2, 2025 May 1-5, 2025 June 5-8, 2025 July 18 – August 17, 2025 October 2-12, 2025 December 24-31, 2025
Domestic South Korea Flights	January 1, 2024 February 8-13, 2024 February 24 – March 2, 2024 May 3-6, 2024 May 15, 2024 June 6-8, 2024 July 27 – August 24, 2024 September 13-19, 2024 October 3-5, 2024 October 9, 2024 December 25, 2024 December 31, 2024	January 1, 2025 January 27-31, 2025 February 22 – March 3, 2025 May 1-6, 2025 June 5-7, 2025 July 26 – August 23, 2025 September 13-19, 2025 October 3-11, 2025 December 25, 2025 December 31, 2025

Off-peak dates are every other date not listed.

The award chart for Asiana Airlines flights is as follows for round-trip flights:

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Type of Ticket	Route	Economy Peak	Economy	Business Peak	Business	Business Smartium Class Peak	Business Smartium Class
Nonstop	Domestic Flight	15,000	10,000	18,000	12,000	–	–
	Korea ⇄ Japan, China/Northeast Asia	45,000	30,000	67,500	45,000	75,000	50,000
	Korea ⇄ Southeast Asia	60,000	40,000	90,000	60,000	105,000	70,000
	Korea ⇄ Southwest Asia	75,000	50,000	112,500	75,000	135,000	90,000
	Korea ⇄ US, Oceania, Europe	105,000	70,000	157,500	105,000	187,500	125,000
Connecting via South Korea	Japan ⇄ China/Northeast Asia	67,500	45,000	90,000	60,000	105,000	70,000
	Japan, China/Northeast Asia ⇄ Southeast Asia	82,500	55,000	105,00	70,000	127,500	85,000
	Japan, China/Northeast Asia ⇄ Southwest Asia	90,000	60,000	120,000	80,000	150,000	100,000
	Japan, China/Northeast Asia ⇄ US, Oceania	112,500	75,000	165,000	110,000	202,500	135,000
	Japan, China/Northeast Asia ⇄ Europe	112,500	75,000	165,000	110,000	202,500	135,000
	Southeast Asia ⇄ Europe	127,500	85,000	187,500	125,000	232,500	155,000
	Southeast Asia ⇄ Southwest Asia	105,000	70,000	157,500	105,000	195,000	130,000
	Southeast Asia ⇄ US, Oceania	127,500	85,000	187,500	125,000	232,500	155,000
	Southwest Asia ⇄ US, Oceania	142,500	95,000	210,000	140,000	262,500	175,000
	Oceania ⇄US	157,500	105,000	240,000	160,000	300,000	200,000
	Oceania ⇄ Europe	157,500	105,000	240,000	160,000	300,000	200,000

For example, let’s say you want to fly from Los Angeles (LAX) to Sydney (SYD) via Seoul (ICN) on Asiana Airlines, using Asiana Club miles, departing on July 3, 2024, and returning on August 20, 2024. The first segment is during the peak season, while the returning segment is during the off-peak season.

Furthermore, these flights have Business Smartium Class installed, which is Asiana’s best long-haul business class seat. This means that you’ll pay 150,000 miles plus 100,000 miles for the returning flight during off-peak season. You’ll definitely want to be careful to avoid peak season if you can since a 50% price hike is huge.

Bottom Line: Asiana Airlines raises prices for peak season award tickets by 50% across the board. Therefore, if flying on Asiana Airlines while redeeming Asiana Airlines miles, you should book off-peak tickets when you can.

British Airways

Image Credit: British Airways

British Airways has previously employed a distance-based award chart with multiple zone brackets. In addition, there’s off-peak and peak pricing. British Airways also has had multiple award charts, but British Airways, Iberia, and Aer Lingus were the only airlines eligible for off-peak pricing.

While award rate charts for 2024 have not been made publicly available, according to Head for Points, British Airways’ peak and off-peak dates for 2024 are as follows:

Off-Peak Dates:

January 8 – February 8, 2024
February 13-14, 2024
February 20 – March 14, 2024
March 16-28, 2024
April 2-3, 2024
April 9, 2024
April 15 – May 3, 2024
May 7-24, 2024
May 28, 2024
June 3-7, 2024

June 10-14, 2024
June 17-21, 2024
June 24-28, 2024
July 1-5, 2024
July 8-9, 2024
July 16, 2024
July 23. 2024
July 30, 2024
August 6, 2024
August 13, 2024

August 20, 2024
August 27, 2024
September 9-13, 2024
September 16-20, 2024
September 23-27, 2024
September 30 – October 25, 2024
October 29, 2024
November 4 – December 6, 2024
December 9-13, 2024
December 26, 2024

If your travel dates fall outside of these dates, your award ticket will be priced as a peak flight.

British Airways’ peak and off-peak calendars have consisted of wide bands, but they also contained multiple single-date occurrences for off-peak dates. Once you’ve identified the seasonality of your travel dates, you’ll want to figure out how much your flight will cost, which has historically been distance-based. Great Circle Mapper is a valid resource to gauge your flight distance.

Hot Tip: See our guides on the top ways to earn lots of British Airways Avios, and then make sure you’re redeeming them for the best value possible!

Iberia

Image Credit: Iberia

Iberia is Spain’s flag carrier. The airline happens to be owned by the same company that owns British Airways and Aer Lingus (discussed in earlier sections of this guide), but interestingly, the peak and off-peak calendars haven’t matched those when using Avios from different frequent flyer programs.

Additionally, Iberia has used peak and off-peak dates for flights on Iberia, Iberia Express, and Iberia Regional/Air Nostrum. For all other airlines, a different award chart will apply and seasonality is not used.

Award rates and eligible peak/off-peak dates for 2024 have not been made publicly available yet.

Korean Air

Image Credit: Korean Air

Just like its main competitor airline Asiana Airlines, Korean Air uses peak and off-peak pricing. Korean Air SKYPASS is a fantastic program to redeem miles on, with plenty of options ranging from Korean Air first class to Etihad first class.

Although there aren’t very many ways to accrue Korean Air miles from transferable points, there are still great ways to earn lots of Korean Air SKYPASS miles.

Korean Air employs a region-based award chart. Also, one-way flight redemptions are only allowed on Korean Air. For all partners, you must book round-trip if you want to use miles.

Hot Tip: Korean Air is one of the few airlines that still operate the A380. Check out our review of Korean Air’s A380 first class.

To determine whether or not your flights fall into peak season, you’ll need to know the route and the travel dates. Peak dates for Korean Air are:

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Route	2024 Peak Dates	2025 Peak Dates
Korea Domestic	January 1, 2024 February 8-13, 2024 February 24 – March 2, 2024 May 3-6, 2024 May 15, 2024 June 6-8, 2024 July 27 – August 24, 2024 September 13-19, 2024 October 3-5, 2024 October 9, 2024 December 25, 2024 December 31, 2024	January 1, 2025 January 27-31, 2025 February 22 – March 3, 2025 May 1-6, 2025 June 5-7, 2025 July 26 – August 23, 2025 October 3-11, 2025 December 25, 2025 December 31, 2025
International (Excluding Departures From the Americas)	January 2-14, 2024 February 2-8, 2024 July 19 – August 11, 2024 August 24 – September 5, 2024 September 13-18, 2024 October 2-9, 2024	January 2-14, 2025 January 24 – February 1, 2025 July 25 – August 10, 2025 August 22 – September 6, 2025 September 27 – October 12, 2025
International (Departures From Americas)	May 10-12, 2024 May 16 – June 29, 2024 August 2-11, 2024 December 5-8, 2024 December 12-21, 2024	May 9-11, 2025 May 15 – June 28, 2025 August 1-10, 2025 December 11-24, 2025

Korean Air’s round-trip award chart is as follows (one-way awards are half the price):

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Routes		Season	Economy	Prestige	First
Domestic Within Korea		Off	10,000	12,000	–
Domestic Within Korea		Peak	15,000	18,000	–
Korea	Japan, China/Northeast Asia	Off	30,000	45,000	65,000
	Japan, China/Northeast Asia	Peak	45,000	65,000	95,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	40,000	70,000	90,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	60,000	105,000	135,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Off	50,000	90,000	115,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Peak	75,000	135,000	175,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
Japan	Korea	Off	30,000	45,000	65,000
	Korea	Peak	45,000	65,000	95,000
	China/Northeast Asia	Off	40,000	60,000	90,000
	China/Northeast Asia	Peak	60,000	90,000	135,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	50,000	70,000	90,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	75,000	105,000	135,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Off	60,000	90,000	115,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Peak	90,000	135,000	175,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
China/Northeast Asia	Korea	Off	30,000	45,000	65,000
	Korea	Peak	45,000	65,000	95,000
	Japan	Off	40,000	60,000	90,000
	Japan	Peak	60,000	90,000	135,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	50,000	70,000	90,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	75,000	105,000	135,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Off	60,000	90,000	115,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Peak	90,000	135,000	175,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
Southeast Asia/Guam	Korea	Off	40,000	70,000	90,000
	Korea	Peak	60,000	105,000	135,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Off	50,000	70,000	90,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Peak	75,000	105,000	135,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Off	85,000	150,000	190,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Peak	125,000	225,000	285,000
Southwest Asia	Korea	Off	50,000	90,000	115,000
	Korea	Peak	75,000	135,000	175,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Off	60,000	90,000	115,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Peak	90,000	135,000	175,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	70,000	120,000	160,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Off	95,000	170,000	210,000
	North America, Oceania, Europe/Middle East	Peak	140,000	255,000	315,000
	Southwest Asia*	Off	25,000	45,000	60,000
	Southwest Asia*	Peak	37,500	67,500	90,000
North America	Korea	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Korea	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	85,000	150,000	190,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	125,000	225,000	142,500
	Southwest Aisa/Tashkent	Off	95,000	170,000	210,000
	Southwest Aisa/Tashkent	Peak	140,000	255,000	315,000
	Oceania	Off	110,000	195,000	240,000
	Oceania	Peak	165,000	290,000	360,000
Europe/Middle East	Korea	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Korea	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	85,000	150,000	190,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	125,000	225,000	285,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Off	95,000	170,000	210,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Peak	140,000	255,000	315,000
	Oceania	Off	110,000	195,000	240,000
	Oceania	Peak	165,000	290,000	360,000
	Europe*	Off	25,000	45,000	60,000
	Europe*	Peak	37,500	67,500	90,000
Oceania	Korea	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Korea	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Off	70,000	125,000	160,000
	Japan/China/Northeast Asia	Peak	105,000	185,000	240,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Off	85,000	150,000	190,000
	Southeast Asia/Guam	Peak	125,000	225,000	285,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Off	95,000	170,000	210,000
	Southwest Asia/Tashkent	Peak	140,000	255,000	315,000
	North America, Europe, Middle East/Africa	Off	110,000	195,000	240,000
	North America, Europe, Middle East/Africa	Peak	165,000	290,000	360,000

*Direct flights only

If flying from New York (JFK) to Seoul (ICN) on Korean Air first class on December 17, 2024, your flight will fall into peak season. For this, you’ll pay 120,000 Korean Air miles one-way compared to 80,000 Korean Air miles for off-peak travel.

Virgin Atlantic

Image Credit: Virgin Atlantic

Virgin Atlantic employs standard and peak seasons for Virgin Atlantic flights only, so they are not applicable to airlines like All Nippon Airways. Furthermore, Virgin Atlantic splits up seasonality calendars between Caribbean routes and all others.

For Caribbean routes, the standard (off-peak) season consists of the following date ranges:

March 4-21, 2024
April 16 – May 26, 2024
June 3 – July 19, 2024
September 3 – October 24, 2024
November 6 – December 6, 2024

On the other hand, Caribbean peak dates are on all other dates.

The rest of Virgin Atlantic flights follow these standard dates:

January 4 – March 21, 2024
April 16 – June 15, 2024
September 3 – October 24, 2024
November 6 – December 6, 2024

All other dates are peak dates for non-Caribbean flights.

Flights on Virgin Atlantic can be significantly cheaper if planned during standard dates. Here’s the Virgin Atlantic award chart for round-trip, standard season bookings:

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Route To/From U.K.	Economy Classic	Premium	Upper Class
U.S. — Northeast (Boston, Newark, New York-JFK, Washington, D.C.)	20,000	35,000	95,000
U.S. — Midwest and South (Atlanta, Miami, Orlando, Tampa)	25,000	45,000	95,000
U.S. — West (Austin, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle)	30,000	55,000	135,000
Nigeria and China	25,000	45,000	115,000
South Africa and Indian Ocean	25,000	50,000	115,000
Caribbean	20,000	35,000	115,000
India and Dubai	20,000	35,000	75,000
Israel	18,000	32,000	56,000

And here’s the Virgin Atlantic award chart for round-trip peak season bookings:

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Route To/From U.K.	Economy Classic	Premium	Upper Class
U.S. – Northeast (Boston, Newark, New York-JFK, Washington, D.C.)	40,000	55,000	115,000
U.S. – Midwest and South (Atlanta, Miami, Orlando, Tampa)	45,000	65,000	115,000
U.S. – West (Austin, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle)	50,000	75,000	155,000
Nigeria and China	45,000	65,000	135,000
South Africa and Indian Ocean	45,000	85,000	135,000
Caribbean	40,000	55,000	135,000
India and Dubai	40,000	55,000	95,000
Israel	22,000	40,000	66,000

Let’s take an example flight from London (LHR) to Las Vegas (LAS), which is on the U.S. West Coast. If you book a flight during peak season in Upper Class, you’ll pay 77,500 miles, as opposed to the standard price of 67,500 miles.

Final Thoughts

Overall, there are a lot of airlines that have unique peak and off-peak season policies. For the most part, airlines tend to limit the price variation from seasonality to their own airlines. For example, Asiana Airlines levies peak surcharges only on flights operated by Asiana and not on any other carriers.

An exception to this would be American Airlines AAdvantage, which makes off-peak pricing in economy available on partner airlines such as British Airways.

Keeping track of peak dates and booking travel flexibly to avoid peak season is a recipe for conserving your hard-earned points and miles. As a result, you’ll want to confirm that you’re getting the best value redemption prior to committing to a flight.

Now, you have a one-stop shop for a guide on the airlines that carry peak and off-peak policies for award bookings. Happy booking!