What are the cheapest cities to fly to on United?

November 21, 2013 1:42 PM

I'm in San Antonio. I am going to be 1,454 miles short of making platinum on United Airlines at the end of the year. I'm trying to find a site or something that would allow me to find the cheapest round trip flight that would get me another 1,500 miles I could make on a single day before the year is out. Is there anything like this?

Or if you just happen to know a really cheap United flight that's at least 1,500 miles round trip from San Antonio, I would take that as well. Thanks!

posted by nushustu to Travel & Transportation (16 answers total)

Not exactly what you need, but Kayak's explore feature is pretty nifty.
posted by melissasaurus at 1:46 PM on November 21, 2013

How cheap is really cheap? Also, do you have the Chase United Visa?
posted by hapax_legomenon at 1:47 PM on November 21, 2013

The Flight Deal highlights trips based on the best dollars/mile ratio. You may be able to find something there on United.
posted by Partial Law at 1:52 PM on November 21, 2013

Probably the most useful tool for this kind of search at the moment is Farecompare. Use the filters to restrict to United (and probably US Airways, since credit is reciprocal). The best deal I see right now is SAT to San Jose with two stops for $202 base. You might also want to scour the mileage run forum on Flyertalk.
posted by Lame_username at 1:55 PM on November 21, 2013

One option is to book a flight, use the award accelerator to buy miles (if the rate is decent), and then cancel the ticket within 24 hours (after the miles post) with no fee.

Seconding the Mileage Run board.
posted by idest at 1:56 PM on November 21, 2013

Apologies that this doesn't answer your direct question, but I have had luck converting credit card loyalty points to airline miles, if that's an option for you.

In my case it was American Express points for Southwest miles, several years ago. The conversion was expensive, points-wise, but it got me to the "mile milestone" I was seeking at the time. It was a normal cash-in-points option on the AmEx site.
posted by juliplease at 2:10 PM on November 21, 2013

You can buy 2,000 miles for $75.
posted by djb at 2:18 PM on November 21, 2013

This is a classic mileage run. Thirding flyertalk Since you want to be sure you will get full miles posted for the effort. good luck!
posted by wingless_angel at 2:21 PM on November 21, 2013

Sometimes the United Specials (under Deals & Offers) are pretty good for last minute (i.e. this weekend) trips. Most of them are very short hops, but occasionally there's bigger stuff. Worth a quick check to see what's there from your city.
posted by ktkt at 2:39 PM on November 21, 2013

Eep, scratch mine, just noticed you want to go there and back on the same day.
posted by ktkt at 2:41 PM on November 21, 2013

You can buy 2,000 miles for $75.

Purchased miles don't count towards elite qualification, so that would be a waste of money.
posted by strangely stunted trees at 2:42 PM on November 21, 2013

I'm not strictly answering your question, but are you sure you want to get to Platinum? I cant find info on united.com to see whether this is true for them, but on delta, any 'post-qualification' miles roll over into the new year, giving you a boost for earning or maintaining status in the next year. i.e. if I have 66K miles this year and dont travel again, I am gold, but I start on Jan 1 2014 with 14K miles already accrued towards status. So I actively try NOT to get to the next level as it gets closer to the end of the year.

As I said - I cant find info on the United program to see whether this applies, but it might be worth looking into
posted by darsh at 3:23 PM on November 21, 2013

Are you sure you don't have enough flight segments to make it already? Sometimes people do and don't know it.

Chicago might be a good one-day destination, otherwise.
posted by BibiRose at 6:35 PM on November 21, 2013

Saturday, December 7: Cleveland, through Houston. Get to Cleveland 2:03; flight back through Washington-Dulles. $257.60. Over 3200 miles. This is definitely an advance purchase (7 or 14 days) but the point is you can do this kind of thing to Cleveland on a Saturday. If you get the right person when you call reservations, they will help you find things like this.
posted by BibiRose at 7:01 PM on November 21, 2013

I'm not strictly answering your question, but are you sure you want to get to Platinum?
It's not my question, but yes, United Platinum is worth doing a mileage run for, and credits toward status do not roll over.

A single day, though - not even for the weekend? Rough. I second the advice to use Kayak. Another option is to use ita, and to input a bunch of cities at one time into the search function.
posted by kanewai at 7:11 PM on November 21, 2013

Here's what I'd do.

Go to the United Site, and select Round Trip, SAT as the departure airport. Click "My Dates are Flexible".

This gives you a way of selecting Deaprture Month, then a drop down for number of days, select 0 days (you'll scroll up for it.)

Now for the arrival airport, select the United Hubs. Here are the hubs and prices:

San Francisco--$353 in December 2964 Miles
Chicago--$322 November 29
Dulles--$440--Christmas Day 2724 Miles
Cleveland $258-December--Connect through Houston, 2946 Miles
Denver $215--December--1588 Miles (Nonstop)
Los Angeles--$342 in December 2420 Miles
Newark--$337--December--Connect through Houston on the return--2991 Miles


Based on the above, I'd do Denver. It's the cheapest at $215 and you'll get just enough miles. The dates are Dec 16 and Dec 17, it's round-trip.

But play around. You may come up with some fun stuff.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 8:17 AM on November 22, 2013