When it comes to booking flights and hunting down deals, having a crystal ball would be nice, wouldn't it? But airfare is constantly changing and unpredictable – and ditto for finding award availability to redeem your points and miles.
Still, we're going to try as 2025 really gets underway. Our team of Thrifty Traveler Premium flight deal analysts searches for low fares and award availability day in and day out. Plus, we're on top of all the latest travel industry news. Put those two together, and we can't exactly predict the future … but we can forecast some trends.
Just a few weeks ago, we rounded up the best flight deals we've found for each month of 2025. If you haven't already filled out your 2025 travel calendar with one (or more) of those deals, here's what you might see over the next 360-ish days.
1. Domestic Fares Will Go Up (But Not Right Away)
Airfare was good to most travelers in 2024 … especially here in the U.S., where we've seen consistently cheap domestic fares available flying all over the country. It's a big part of the reason why “The American Traveler” won our inaugural First Class Award of 2024.
But you may not be able to count on fares like these forever…
Sadly, we think fares are poised to go up soon.
As travel demand exploded coming out of the worst of the pandemic, airlines flooded the market with more planes and more seats than they could reliably fill – especially domestically. Almost every major airline CEO has faulted that overcapacity for their struggles.
“There's simply more capacity than on the domestic side than demand right now,” Southwest CEO Bob Jordan told investors over the summer.
“We’re in a marketplace that couldn’t absorb all that capacity,” American Airlines CEO Robert Isom said the same day.
That overcapacity has hurt airlines – especially the budget carriers like Frontier and Spirit. But it's been a major win for everyday travelers: With so many extra seats to fill, airlines were forced to cut prices.
Do you know what Isom, Jordan, and their peers hate more than anything? Low fares. Airlines don't make good money on low fares – they want high demand and high fares, too. Don't think for a second they're not doing everything in their power to charge you more.
Those efforts are already underway … but haven't taken hold quite yet. We're still seeing unbelievably cheap domestic airfare for the winter months and even for summer, too.
But we're betting those low summer fares will not hold on for much longer. In fact, by March or April, I'd expect most of the lowest fares to dry up. Don't wait: Book your domestic flights right now!
2. But Domestic First Class Fares Will Come Down
It's almost as if Oprah is managing the entire U.S. airline industry: “You get first class seats! And you get first class seats! And you do, too!”
Carriers big and small are chasing the financial success of Delta and United and their premium travel focus. Spirit Airlines is doubling down on its own first class seats while Frontier will debut its own first class offering later this year. JetBlue is expected to follow suit starting next year.
More premium seats means more premium competition, which we think will continue to drive down domestic first class flight prices in 2025. That trend has been underway for a few years now, but it should accelerate this year and beyond.
Take this flight deal departing from New York City we sent to our subscribers a few weeks ago, for example.
With tons of options under $400 roundtrip – and some sub-$300! – many of these fares are just $100 less than a standard economy seat. In years past, you might have seen these same fares in the $800s or $900s roundtrip.
It's not just that there are more cushy first class seats to fill. It's also that airlines were tired of not selling the first class seats they already had.
For years, major U.S. airlines practically gave them away, rewarding passengers with status with a complimentary upgrade. How much money do airlines make on those free upgrades? Nada.
So the airlines have been cutting prices on these first class seats to sell them ahead of time instead. Delta President Glen Hauenstein admitted as much recently: Now, Delta is selling more than 80% of its first class seats at time of purchase and through paid upgrades. Money in the bank.
Delta might be the poster child, but they're not alone: By dropping fares on their most expensive seats, airlines are selling far more of them. It's a strategy they've copped to, and a strategy that could help you fly to your next destination in style in 2025 … for less than you might expect.
3. Close-In Domestic Fares Will Remain a Sweet Spot
Sometimes, it can actually pay to procrastinate.
While we're guessing the days of dirt-cheap domestic fares may be numbered, another trend will hold up: Prices on domestic flights will continue to bottom out just 30 to 60 days ahead of travel.
If you want to travel domestically and couldn't book further in advance, waiting until a month or so before you leave might be the move in 2025. The only time you don't want to book is in that mushy middle.
Or is it? Do what I do and you can come out ahead either way:
- Book at least a main cabin economy ticket – unlike basic economy fares, these can be changed or canceled for free
- Set (or keep) a Google Flights price alert on your flights to get an email when fares drop
- See a price drop? Rebook that flight and pocket the difference as a travel voucher or airline credit.
Those fares might be a bit higher than they were a year ago. But by booking (or re-booking) late, you still stand to save.
4. Virgin Atlantic Award Rates Will Get More Expensive
In November, we saw a monster 40% transfer bonus from Chase to Virgin Atlantic. Our reaction: “Whoa!”
That's massive: If you sent 100,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points over to Virgin, you get 140,000 points in your Virgin account. It can't possibly get any better than that … until Dec. 1 came around, when American Express matched with its own 40% transfer bonus to Virgin Atlantic.
Two back-to-back, record-setting bonuses led to a massive influx of points into Virgin's program. And that's making us nervous.
Think of it like inflation for airline miles: With more and more points in circulation, an airline inevitably raises award rates to bring things back in balance. That brings us to the dreaded “D” word: Devaluation.
Virgin's done it already, raising award rates to book many Delta flights as well as All Nippon Airways (ANA). Other sweet partner redemptions like Air New Zealand or ITA Airways business class to Italy could be next on the chopping block.
And while there was some positive news on the Virgin Atlantic front to close out 2024 – 6,000-point economy redemptions to London or 29,000 points, anyone? – that was part of the airline's transition to dynamic award pricing. And now that award pricing rises and falls with the cash price, it's even easier to Virgin to eventually raise award rates on those trips to London and back.
5. American Airlines Award Rates Will Go Up, Too
We've been predicting it for years, but we're running it back: 2025 (or maybe early 2026 – cut us some slack) will be the year that American Airlines finally nukes its ultra-lucrative award chart and raises award rates across the board.
Here's the thing: Though American has transitioned to dynamic award pricing for its own flights, its separate award chart for booking Oneworld partner airlines has remained untouched … for almost a decade. That has left amazing redemptions like 57,500 miles to Europe in Finnair business class and 60,000 miles for a Japan Airlines business class seat to Tokyo intact. It'll still be painful, but changes feel overdue.
And in 2025, American Airlines will have a reason to set those changes in motion as it formalizes a new, exclusive credit card partnership with Citi. Our Credit Cards editor and all-around award travel guru Jackson Newman broke down how this could impact the AAdvantage program but here are the two biggest bullet points:
- It opens the door for transferring Citi ThankYou Points straight to American Airlines, making AAdvantage miles much easier to earn
- More miles + cheap redemptions = Not a great return for the airline
In the long run, there's no way American Airlines is going to be OK with that formula. So whether it happens this year or next, it's only a matter of time.
6. Award Space Will Get Harder to Find (& More Dynamic)
As travelers pile up points and miles in record amounts, finding award space to actually redeem those miles has gotten harder and harder – especially if you want a lie-flat business class seat.
That trend will continue in 2025. Now more than ever, airlines want to you to buy your tickets with cold hard cash – not use your points and miles.
Once-reliable redemptions now only pop up once or twice a year. Previously tried-and-true patterns like booking 10-plus months out or within three weeks of departure is no longer a sure thing for many airlines. Some award deals like booking ANA business class via Virgin Atlantic to Tokyo or EVA Air business class to Southeast Asia have all but disappeared entirely.
All the while, more airlines are pivoting to “dynamic” award pricing. So while the lowest fares for your Virgin Atlantic business class flight could be 29,000 miles each way, that could cost you 120,000 points instead if you book during the peak summer travel season. United, American Airlines, and especially Delta have been doing it for years, but other airlines will surely copy them.
That doesn't mean it will be impossible to redeem your miles for a bargain this year. It just means you'll need to be flexible and pick your battles – and maybe enlist some help.
There's been an explosion of powerful award search tools you can use to help zero in on award flights. We can help out too: We're running thousands of searches a day for precious points and miles availability for our Thrifty Traveler Premium members. Whenever we find deals, we send them to our members' email inboxes right away so they can have a first crack at booking before it disappears.
If you have time to run your own searches through 20 to 30 different airline websites, go for it. If you want some help, join Thrifty Traveler Premium and let us do it for you.
Bottom Line
There's good news and bad news for travelers on the horizon in 2025.
A years-long trend of cheap domestic flight may finally come to a close – though not for first class fares. And while some prized award rates may go up this year and others will get harder to book using points, opportunities will still be out there.