American Airlines AAdvantage to South America
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Adding “Better Than Free” One-Ways on American Airlines: Fly to South America for 20,000 Miles All Year!

ByThe Miles Professor

Update: American Airlines recently changed its award rules and stopovers are no longer permitted. As a result, this is no longer possible. 

Let’s take a look at redeeming American Airlines AAdvantage miles. A one way economy flight from Hawaii to New York costs 17,500 to 22,500 miles, depending on when you go. A one way economy flight from Rio de Janeiro to New York costs 30,000 miles. But how much do they cost together? It can cost as little as 20,000 miles! Not 47,500 to 52,500. Today we will learn more about adding “better than free” one-way trips on American Airlines where you SAVE miles by taking more trips.

Last time, we talked about how we can fly from the Caribbean in winter and then go to Europe in summer for 20,000 American Airlines AAdvantage miles total. Now we’ll talk about how we can take a trip within North America in the fall or spring (US, Canada, Hawaii, Caribbean, Mexico) and then fly to South America in winter (or anytime we want, but winter in South America is nice!) for 20,000 miles total.

Samba for Miles and I are going to Rio de Janeiro for Carnival 2014. We booked her ticket with US Airways miles getting a round trip ticket from LA to Rio de Janeiro and adding a free one-way trip from Vancouver for 60,000 miles total. I am flying from New York. Since February is still high season for traveling to South America, a ticket from New York to Rio would cost 30,000 miles. But I managed to bring it down to 20,000 by adding a one-way trip from LA in the fall. More trips, fewer miles! Couldn’t be happier with that outcome!

Rio de Janeiro View from Corcovado
Rio de Janeiro View from Corcovado

Overview

In our strat­egy, we com­bine two aspects of Amer­i­can Air­lines awards:

  • Amer­i­can Air­lines allows a free stopover in the North Amer­i­can gate­way city on an award between dif­fer­ent continents. This is the city from which you leave the continent.
  • The AAd­van­tage award chart only charges only 20,000 miles when fly­ing between North Amer­ica and southern South America if your trip starts dur­ing the off-peak period between March 1 – May 31 and August 16 – November 30.

A stopover can be cre­ated by con­nect­ing a seg­ment back from somewhere in North America to your home city and then from your home city to southern South America. The date of the award is decided by when the award starts. The date you fly to south America is com­pletely irrel­e­vant; the only restric­tion is it must be within a year from when the ticket is issued. If you start the award during the off-peak period between March 1 and May 31 or between August 16 and November 30, the entire award will price at 20,000 AAd­van­tage miles total. 

In my exam­ple, I will explain how you can fly from Hawaii to New York and also from New York to Rio de Janeiro all for 20,000 miles! Of course, you’ll need more miles to get back, but this is big opti­miza­tion com­pared to 52,500 miles.

Adding Free One-Way Trips on American Airlines

I previously explained how American Airlines’ award routing rules lets you add a free one-way if you live in an international gateway city. For a full refresher course, you can check out my post on how to add free one-ways on American Airlines, but let’s quickly recap:

  • American Airlines transcontinental one-way awards allow a free stopover (for up to a year from ticket date issue) in the city from which you leave or enter the North American region.
  • If you live in an international gateway city, you can add a free one-way award by creating a stopover in your home city.

Let’s go through a few examples for South America. I live in New York and want to go to Rio de Janeiro. If I find a direct flight from New York to Rio de Janeiro on American Airlines, New York becomes my international gateway city. That means I can add a one way trip from anywhere in North America to New York on the same award ticket. Any of the following gets a free stopover in New York and prices as a single one-way award ticket.

  1. LAX – New York – Rio de Janeiro.
  2. Rio de Janeiro – New York – LAX – Honolulu.
  3. Grand Cayman – Miami – New York – Rio de Janeiro.
American Airlines AAdvantage to South America
Adding a one-way trip from Maui before flying to Rio de Janeiro can save 10,000 miles

American Airlines Off-Peak Award Dates: 20,000 AAdvantage miles from North America to Southern South America

Amer­i­can Air­lines AAd­van­tage award chart has cer­tain off-peak award pric­ing dur­ing their less-busy times on cer­tain routes. Fewer peo­ple visit Rio de Janeiro in May than do in December so it makes per­fect sense the awards should cost fewer miles. With Southern South America, the off-peak period is Mar 1 – May 31 and Aug 16 – Nov 30.

American Airlines Off Peak South America

While one-way award tick­et with Amer­i­can Air­lines AAd­van­tage nor­mally costs 30,000 miles the rest of the year, the award ticket only costs 20,000 between Mar 1 – May 31 and between Aug 16 – Nov 30.

American Airlines Off Peak
American Airlines Economy Class to South America

So if you’re flying from Hawaii to Brazil in October, it will only cost 20,000 miles.

Two One-Way Trips for 20,000 Miles TOTAL

As I mentioned, I am going to Rio de Janeiro in February 2014 for Carnival. Since February is still during peak-season, an economy class ticket should cost me 30,000 miles. But what do I do make it cheaper? Instead of just booking a ticket from New York to Rio de Janeiro, I combined it with a trip to Los Angeles.  My itinerary:

  • Fly from Los Angeles to New York on October 14, 2013.
  • Fly from New York to Rio de Janeiro on February 26, 2014.

This is still only a one-way trip with a stopover. New York is my international gateway city. But since my trip starts in October during the off-peak period, both trips together cost only 20,000 miles. 

American Airlines AAdvantage Award Booking
American Airlines AAdvantage Award Cost

 

But what if I wanted to go to Hawaii?

No problem. If I started in Hawaii instead, it would still cost only 20,000 miles total as long as my trip from Hawaii starts in the off-peak season.

I can return from Maui in November, stop in New York for a few months and then take my trip to Rio de Janeiro for Carnival.

American Airlines AAdvantage Award Booking
Two one-way trips on American Airlines for 20,000 miles: From Maui and to Rio de Janeiro

Important Note: If you miss a segment in your itinerary, the rest of your trip will get canceled. So if you add a one-way trip in North America during the off-peak dates before your actual trip, you do have to fly the first segment. That is, I can’t skip the Los Angeles to New York segment or my trip to Rio de Janeiro will get canceled.

You can skip your second segment, though. It certainly isn’t recommended, but at least your first segment won’t get canceled. So if you’re taking an international trip and might want to go somewhere else domestically afterwards, you may as well go ahead and add it on to your trip. You have nothing to lose and you could always just not fly that segment. So it’s like a free option on a domestic ticket. Don’t forget, you can change dates for free up to 21 days in advance or change destinations for just $75. 

I go over in detail how to book these types of awards on the American Airlines website in my posts:

From Caribbean in Winter + To Europe in Summer for 20,000 American Airlines miles TOTAL

How to Add Free One-Way Trips on American Airlines Awards

And if you live on the West Coast and like going to Hawaii, don’t forget to check out my post on how to optimize British Airways Avios to Hawaii:

West Coast to Hawaii for 12,500 British Airways Avios Each Way!

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46 Comments

  1. Awesome redemption! I love AA miles. Also, you’ll get 10% of the redeemed miles back if you are a Citi AAdvantage cardholder, so it’ll be 18K miles!! :)

    I recently booked LAX-NYC (stopover)-MUC for Oktoberfest coming up in Sept for the same price (18K miles b/c I am a cardholder). Feels fantastic! :)

  2. Obviously this can’t work if you aren’t in a gateway city like Detroit, right?

    1. If you aren’t in a gateway city, you can still save miles by taking advantage of the free stopover on American Airlines, but not at the 20,000 miles total value. A possibility is booking your stopover at a nearby gateway city and using British Airways miles to add travel between your city and the gateway city.

      For example, you can use Chicago or New York as your gateway city. Since Detroit is fewer than 650 miles to NYC or ORD, a flight to either of these is 4,500 British Airways miles each way. So you can book a trip from say, Hawaii (or anywhere in North America) to Detroit, stop for a few months, and then continue to South America for a total of 20,000 AA miles + 9,000 British Airways miles. It’s not quite as good, but still a massive savings over booking the trips separately. British Airways miles are actually quite easy to get as well… you can credit any AA flight to BA and they are a transfer partner of Membership Rewards and Ultimate Rewards.

    2. LOL, ugh. Sorry, so this would be using an open jaw as well? In simple terms, I go to Hawaii. I schedule a one way back from Hawaii (or a different NA city) to Detroit using AA miles. I wait for up to a year (330 days I believe) as needed in Detroit. On same ticket I schedule a one way to let’s say Bogota. However, I would more than likely have to find a direct flight to Bogota from either NYC or OHD which I could save on buying using Avios for. Sorry, I think I may be overthinking this.

      1. American Airlines doesn’t concern itself with open jaws as every award is independently priced as a one-way. American Airlines only flies non-stop to Dallas and Miami. You could try to do HNL-DFW(stop for a long time)-BOG, for example for 17,500 miles (or 15,000 if you start in the off-peak). This could technically save you at least the 22,500 miles you’d normally pay to get back from Hawaii. However, you’d need to then buy a ticket or use 7,500 Avios each way and you’d still come out ahead technically though with some involved two-trip planning. The savings are a lot greater if you can set this up to work going to a region where the off-peak savings is even higher (e.g. 10k for southern South America vs. only 2,500 for northern South America). Hope this helps!

        1. Ahhh, so Detroit (DTW) would be off the radar completely. I see. So in simple terms, I fly home from HNL with a stop in DFW in which I schedule a loooonnngg layover. From there I have my final leg to BOG since DFW would be (presumably) a direct flight there. The part about me getting home from DFW to DTW and back again I can cover with Avios that I have.

  3. Amazing amazing post. Thanks for the great insight in how to get the most out of our miles. I’ll be taking advantage of this very soon!

  4. Really useful post. I’d also be interested in reading about how you book the return leg on free one-ways. I took advantage of free stopovers recently, and honestly, they’re a bit of a PITA. I either had trouble finding award availability for the return leg, or revenue ticket prices were higher than what I wanted to spend. It’s still a great deal, but it requires a bit of planning. I’d love to see how you put the entire trip together.

    1. In this particular case, I actually booked the return with United airlines miles because I wanted to return on a Saturday/Sunday night and AA availability was not too good. I am 1K on United and will likely extend that to another trip with a stopover in NYC; i can make changes for free once I figure out my plans. I did a similar thing last year using United miles to get back connecting my trip back from Rio with a trip to Europe saving lots of miles: http://milesprof.wpengine.com/2013/01/29/travel-with-miles-thanksgiving-in-grand-cayman-new-years-in-rio-and-fourth-of-july-in-greece-3/. The trick is to be flexible with miles in many different programs and put trips together piece by piece optimizing your miles. I will post a full trip plan shortly where I’ll go over which miles Svetlana and I used to plan the whole thing (a combination of AA, US Airways and United) as well as the hotel plan too! :)

    2. I too am curious about how to put the entire trip together. In the Maui – NYC – Rio example, you still need to get to Maui during an OFF Peak period, but coming back from Rio is at a PEAK time. So, aren’t TWO more one-way award tickets be needed? One to Maui at OFF peak (12,500 miles for a MilesSAAver award), and another from Rio at PEAK time (30,00 MilesSAAver PEAK)?

      What am I missing? So 10k of miles might have been saved by booking the start of the trip at off peak from Maui, does it still make sense when all the segments are put together?? Total trip: ORIGINAL 20K TRIP + 12.5k to Maui + 30k return from Rio = 62.5k miles.

      I guess it’s a saving from booking two separate trips : NY Maui (25k miles RT off peak) + NY Rio (60K miles RT PEAK) = total 85k miles for a savings of 22.5k miles [85k – 62.5k].

      1. NYC-Maui is actually 35,000 miles round trip off peak or 45,000 during peak (Hawaii has different pricing). Yes, you’re completely right, you do have to pay more miles to get back and forth, but you need to compare to what you’d be spending otherwise assuming you’d be taking trips at those times. I always maximize my vacation time and look for ways to stretch my miles. Even on the returns, I am still maximizing miles with taking free stopovers, free one-ways, etc so the savings don’t stop there :)

        In my example, I really want to go to Los Angeles and Rio de Janeiro anyway. If I didn’t combine trips for free one-ways and maximize off-peak periods, I would be paying 60,000 miles round-trip to Rio and booking my Los Angeles segment separately. By combining with my trip to Los Angeles, I actually managed to free up 10,000 miles to use for the trip out to LA so I’d already be getting an almost free trip to Los Angeles even if I just used those miles for the domestic ticket. And, of course, if my dates were more flexible, I’d probably use AA miles back and add another free one-way for a later trip. But most likely, because United has better availability, I will use 47,500 United miles for the flight back from Rio and another round-trip to the Caribbean later on taking advantage of stopovers and open jaws. Always planning a few trips ahead ;)

        1. Thanks MP!! that confirms what I computed w/ the correction to my calculations, you actually save 32.5k miles and would get a RT trip to Maui AND a trip to Rio. Enough savings for yet, another trip!!!

          Thx again!

  5. Wow…I am having issues understanding how to make this free stop over. I live in Dallas and am thinking I can take advantage of this fairly easy. Can you give me an example how to use the free stop over method for Hawaii or Caribbean islands…using maybe Brazil or Europe as my international destination? Thanks!

  6. Can you please give me an example of how to utilize adding free one ways? I live in DFW. How would I set up a trip to Belize and then use my one way to go to Hawaii or Caribbean? Thanks!

    1. Hi Kristi, American Airlines flies directly to Belize. As long as you have the DFW-BZE segment in your itinerary, you can add free one-ways and stopovers within North America.
      1. Free one way routing within North America – DFW (stop for months) – BZE
      2. BZE-DFW (stop for months) – Free one way routing within North America

      Follow my guide on how to add free one-ways on American Airlines for how to plan these trips and search for availability. Good luck!

  7. I really love reading your blogs. In your above example, can I just skip the LA to NYC trip and just use the NYC to RIO segment to save miles for off-peak travel? Thanks.

    1. Thank you! Unfortunately, once you skip a segment in an itinerary, the rest of your trip gets canceled. So you do have to take that first flight. I will add a clarification of this to the post and start pointing out which segments can or cannot be skipped in the future; that’s a very important point! :)
      This is different from adding a free one-way on US Airways, where Svetlana skips the last segment to get the award to follow the routing rules: Rio for Carnival 2014 and Adding Free One-Way Trips on US Airways Miles Awards.

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  9. This no longer works. American now requires that “all travel must occur in off peak season.”

    From the AA website:

    Economy MileSAAver
    Off-Peak
    Valid for travel in Economy Class
    Subject to Capacity Controls
    May be subject to travel embargo dates
    Valid during off-peak season (all travel must occur in off peak season)

    I tested this rule and it appears to be in place.

    1. As of right now, this still works. I searched dates:
      LAX-NYC Sep 29, 2013
      NYC-Rio de Janeiro Jan 23, 2014
      It still priced to 20,000 miles even though the NYC-Rio segment is in the peak period.

  10. Professor, big fan of this blog – thank you so much for writing it. We’re learning everytime you publish a new post & it’s helping us do some really fun things.

    Quick question, I’m pricing out CUN-DFW-OGG but its not working as one trip. I thought the Hawaii portion would count as my free one way from my gateway city (DFW) but that’s not happening. Please let me know if there’s something I’m not considering.

    To clarify, 8/29 CUN-DFW is 12.5k AA miles. Then 9/2, DFW-OGG is 17.5k AA miles.

    Thanks again, happy travels!!

    1. Glad you enjoy the blog and that it’s improving your travels! :)

      Unfortunately, this won’t work as Mexico is within North America according to how American Airlines breaks down the regions and you have to either start or end outside North America for this to work. If you want to add a free one-way to Hawaii at the end of your trip, you need to start outside North America and make sure DFW is the first city where you touch North America. For example, you can do:
      Belize-DFW-OGG
      Panama City-DFW-OGG
      Rio de Janeiro-DFW-OGG
      as Belize and Panama City are in Central America. But Mexico and the Caribbean are still within North America.

  11. How far out do you need to make the bookings? I am looking now and only 60,000 miles to fly that route are available?
    Great posting and info..

    1. I booked my trip I believe end of April as I know seats during peak times can fill up to Rio. I saw the seats and jumped on them. It does seem that, at this point, everything from NYC to Rio mid-December to mid-March is coming up at 60k. Christmas to Carnival is a really busy period for them.

  12. How would I take advantage of this? I want to travel (OGG or LAX) – ORD//ORD-(central America or South America), round trip?

    1. I would do this in three steps:
      1. Find availability from ORD to South America or Central America in SAAver level such that your routing does not touch North America at all after leaving ORD.
      2. Look up the off-peak period for your destination in the AA award chart. In my case, I am using Southern South America’s off-peak period.
      3. Book a one-way flight from OGG or LAX to ORD in SAAver level that starts during the off-peak period. This can use any routing you want, but must be during off-peak period.

      Of course,you will need more miles to get to LAX or OGG and to get back from Central America/South America, but you’ll be saving lots of miles on the two segments mentioned above. Hope you can book something good! :)

      1. If I can get this to work I would use it often. But I can’t find any flights like you describe in step 1. Is there a workaround that I don’t see?

        1. Ah, American Airlines does not fly from Chicago to South America. You can also try it to Europe. Say, ORD – LON next summer. Then add a flight between Oct 15 – May 15 to Chicago. Let me know if you have any luck :)

          1. Thanks. I’ll use AA where I can, and MP for free oneways to/from South/Central America.

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  14. We want to go to Madrid from Detroit. I am still confused about how to work it out with the miles. Our trip is in Spring Break from March 28 to April 4. Could you tell me how to plan it? Thank you! ( I noticed that if you fly with your family the 20,000 miles seats become less available.

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  17. Hi Professor,
    To make sure I’m understanding how this works, can I do the following itineraries? Please indicate which segment is OK and which ones are not. Thanks so much for your help.
    Option 1
    1) HNL-LAX (stop over for 5 to 6 mos)-HKG. I need to use cash or points to get to HNL from my hometown LAX.
    2) HKG-SIN – pay cash or use points
    3) United Miles for return flight: SIN-Tokyo ( spend a week) -LAX. Is stopover allowed or I have to pay cash or use points to fly SIN-Tokyo
    Option 2
    1) United Miles one way outbound LAX-SIN (few days)-Tokyo
    2) Tokyo-HKG pay cash or use points
    3) AA miles one way return : HKG-LAX (stay for 5 mos)HNL or any place in N. America, Mexico or Canada

    1. I think the confusion here is that you can have a stopover on a one-way flight using American Airlines miles, but not using United Airlines miles. With United Airlines miles, you must be taking a round-trip to include stopovers and you are also permitted one or two open jaws. As an example, you can do:
      LAX-SIN (few days) – Tokyo
      HKG -LAX
      with United miles. This uses your one stopover in Singapore and you have an open jaw between Tokyo/HKG. You cannot stop in Singapore if you just have a one-way trip. You’d then have to just buy a ticket Tokyo-HKG. This is similar to a trip I set up for next month, though I think Tokyo is easiest to stop in either first or last: . The details may help with the planning.

      I made some comments on the itineraries below, but essentially the itineraries need to be pieced together using the rules of the two miles programs. Hope this helps!

      1) HNL-LAX (stop over for 5 to 6 mos)-HKG. I need to use cash or points to get to HNL from my home­town LAX.
      This won’t work because the route you’re flying from HNL to HKG exceeds the maximum permitted miles for that route. HNL-LAX (stop)-Tokyo works, however, and on American Airlines miles.

      2) HKG-SIN — pay cash or use points
      3) United Miles for return flight: SIN-Tokyo ( spend a week) –LAX. Is stopover allowed or I have to pay cash or use points to fly SIN-Tokyo
      You cannot have stopovers on United one-ways.

      Option 2
      1) United Miles one way out­bound LAX-SIN (few days)-Tokyo
      Again, no stopovers in United one-ways.
      2) Tokyo-HKG pay cash or use points
      3) AA miles one way return : HKG-LAX (stay for 5 mos)HNL or any place in N. Amer­ica, Mex­ico or Canada
      You cannot do HNL, but can go elsehwere in N. America, Mexico, Canada.

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  19. Thanks for the info. It’s a new trick I haven’t tried before. My problem is I can’t find any award fligts from BOS to Europe that aren’t on BA (I don’t want to pay the fees) Even though, No matter what dates I look at, they all end up using BA?

    1. Unfortunately, Boston does not have any non-stops to Europe on oneworld flights so you won’t be able to use the trick from there. You could try flying from New York, but then you’d have to go to and from Boston from there with other means and that may be a hassle.

  20. Can you also use a free stopover for a year on revenue flights? So if you wanted to just pay for the ticket back from Rio, can you stop for a year in your home city and then take another flight somewhere else?

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