Buy Avianca LifeMiles with a 145% Bonus

Avianca puts on frequent promotions for buying LifeMiles from the loyalty program. In some cases, buying points during sales can represent a great deal, although it’s important to have an immediate plan for how to use them.

This time, Avianca is offering a bonus of up to 145% on purchased LifeMiles, which can be a great way to score premium cabin flights with Star Alliance airlines at a discount.

With this sale, you have until August 27, 2026 to take advantage of the deal if it works in your favour.

Buy Avianca LifeMiles with a 145% Bonus

From August 19 to 27, 2026, Avianca is offering up to a 145% bonus on purchased LifeMiles.

This time, Avianca is offering a different bonus depending on how many miles you purchase:

• Buy 1,000–20,000 LifeMiles, get a 125% bonus
• Buy 21,000–50,000 LifeMiles, get a 135% bonus
• Buy 51,000–200,000 LifeMiles, get a 145% bonus

Note that this promotion appears to be targeted, so the bonus you see may differ from what’s listed above, or you may not see an offer at all. Be sure to log in to your LifeMiles account to check your offer before making any plans.

Normally, Avianca sells points at a base price of 3.3 cents per point (USD).

If you were to take advantage of the 145% bonus promotion, you’d lower the cost of acquisition down to 1.35 cents per mile (USD).

A 145% bonus is a step up from the 130% offer we saw in July, though it still trails the bonuses of 160% or more that came around earlier this year.

As per the terms and conditions, LifeMiles must be purchased in increments of 1,000, and the minimum purchase amount is 1,000 miles.

LifeMiles stay active as long as there’s qualifying activity in your account every 12 months, and any earning or redemption activity resets the clock. Buying LifeMiles counts as an eligible activity.

Therefore, you’ll want to make sure that you have at least one qualifying transaction each year to protect your balance, and promotions such as this can be an easy way to extend their lifespan.

How many Avianca LifeMiles can you buy?

Also note that Avianca LifeMiles members can receive a maximum of 500,000 miles from purchases per calendar year, including any bonus miles. During this promotion, you can buy up to 200,000 LifeMiles in a single transaction, which would net you 490,000 LifeMiles for $6,600 (USD) with the 145% bonus, just under the annual cap.

Which credit card should you use to buy Avianca LifeMiles?

Avianca recently moved from selling points through Points.com back to selling them directly from its website. Therefore, your purchase will code as an airline purchase, and it’s eligible for category multipliers.

The best credit card to use will be one on which you’re working to meet a minimum spending requirement, or one with a multiplier for travel.

Keep in mind that LifeMiles are sold in US dollars. This means that if you use a Canadian-issued credit card, you’ll want to use one with no foreign transaction fees to avoid being charged a 2.5% fee.

Your best bet could be to use the Scotiabank Passport^® Visa Infinite +* Card or the Scotiabank Gold American Express^® Card, which come with no foreign transaction fees and earn Scene+ points.

When Should You Buy LifeMiles?

Avianca is a Star Alliance airline, which means that you can redeem LifeMiles for flights with Avianca and other Star Alliance carriers. Fortunately, it’s one of the better programs when it comes to pricing for partner awards, though it’s also worth noting that the program recently went through a devaluation for routes from US–Europe.

Buying LifeMiles during a sale such as this can make sense in a handful of situations, as is the case for most points sales.

For example, if you’re short by a few miles for an upcoming redemption, you can simply top up your account by purchasing miles, which are then added to your account instantly.

With enough LifeMiles available for a redemption, you can then proceed with the booking as per usual.

In other cases, you may be able to score a flight in a premium cabin at a significant discount over paying cash for a flight. As long as you’re redeeming your points at a greater value than what you paid to acquire them, you’ll come out ahead.

LifeMiles has competitive award pricing for many transatlantic and transpacific routes with Star Alliance airlines, and is one of the best North American loyalty programs within the alliance. The pricing is better than that of United MileagePlus, and is similar to what you might find with Air Canada Aeroplan, and sometimes better.

For example, one-way business class awards to Europe are priced according to the route. From Toronto, TAP Air Portugal’s nonstop flight to Lisbon comes in at 63,000 LifeMiles, plus a very modest amount of taxes and fees.

Buying 27,000 LifeMiles during this sale gets you 63,450 miles for around $891 (USD), which is a great price for a one-way flight to Europe in business class.

Other routes are pricier. Toronto to Warsaw on LOT Polish Airlines costs 80,000 LifeMiles in business class, while nonstop economy awards to Frankfurt and Warsaw start at 40,000 LifeMiles.

Even at that level, purchasing 35,000 LifeMiles during this sale would cover the redemption at around $1,155 (USD) – still well below the typical cash fare for business class across the Atlantic.

As an added bonus, TAP Air Portugal tends to release more business class award space to LifeMiles than to Aeroplan, so it’s worth searching here even when other programs come up empty for flights to Europe.

LifeMiles is also naturally one of the strongest programs for Central and South America, and Avianca releases more business class space to its own members than to other Star Alliance programs. A one-way business class flight from North America costs anywhere from 35,000–60,000 LifeMiles, with the best pricing to destinations such as Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.

For example, Avianca’s nonstop flight between Toronto and San Salvador starts at just 35,310 LifeMiles in business class, plus modest taxes and fees.

To put together enough miles for that redemption, you’d purchase 16,000 LifeMiles during this sale for around $528 (USD) – a fraction of the cash fare for a five-hour nonstop flight in business class.

LifeMiles also runs periodic award sales that discount Avianca-operated flights by up to 55%, and these can be stacked with cheaply purchased miles for even more value.

Finally, short United flights within North America start at just 7,500 miles one-way, which makes a small top-up an easy way to cover positioning flights or quick domestic hops.

The award availability on LifeMiles isn’t always the same as what you might see in other programs. For example, you might find an award seat available on Aeroplan that isn’t available on LifeMiles; however, you may also find something available on LifeMiles that isn’t available with other programs.

Just be sure to locate the flight you’d like to book before proceeding with a points purchase. This way, you’ll be almost certain to get what you want at a steep discount, and won’t wind up being disappointed.

Other Ways to Earn Avianca LifeMiles

Before jumping on this bonus, it’s important to note that there are other methods to acquire LifeMiles, especially if you have access to US credit cards.

LifeMiles is a 1:1 transfer partner for the following US-based points programs:

• American Express US Membership Rewards
• Capital One Miles
• Citi ThankYou Rewards

Note that Citi ThankYou points only transfer to LifeMiles at a 1:1 ratio with a premium card, such as the Citi Strata Premier; otherwise, they transfer at a ratio of 1,000 points to 700 miles.

By taking advantage of a welcome bonus and then transferring the points to LifeMiles, you’re effectively “buying” LifeMiles for whatever the annual fee is for the credit card. This tends to be the cheapest way to acquire points.

We’ve also seen transfer bonuses from the above programs to LifeMiles, usually within the range of 15–25%.

Marriott Bonvoy points can also be converted to Avianca LifeMiles at a ratio of 3 Bonvoy points = 1 LifeMile. Plus, you’ll receive a bonus 5,000 LifeMiles for every 60,000 Bonvoy points you transfer, meaning 60,000 Bonvoy points nets you 25,000 LifeMiles.

Still, Marriott Bonvoy points tend to deliver more value when used for aspirational hotel and resort stays, so you should only convert them to LifeMiles when you need a top-up on a planned redemption without any other options at your disposal.

Previous Promotions

Looking at historical trends, bonuses in the 155–165% range were the norm over the past year, with the best offers reaching as high as 170%. We saw 160% bonuses as recently as March and April 2026.

By those standards, this promotion doesn’t quite measure up, but 145% is the strongest offer since April and a clear improvement on the 130% bonus from July. If you have an immediate redemption in mind, this is a reasonable time to buy.

Since these promos tend to run every couple of months, there’s no need to buy speculatively. If you can afford to wait, you may want to hold out for a stronger bonus.

Conclusion

Avianca is currently offering up to a 145% bonus on purchased LifeMiles, lowering the cost to 1.35 cents per mile (USD). It’s a solid deal if you’ve found a premium cabin redemption with award space, but less attractive if you’re just stockpiling points.

While it’s the best offer we’ve seen in a few months, bonuses of 160% or higher have come around before. If you don’t have a redemption in mind, you can afford to wait for one of those instead.

LifeMiles is also a transfer partner of American Express US Membership Rewards, Capital One Miles, and Citi ThankYou Rewards. However, if you don’t have access to those programs, buying miles during a promotion can be the quickest way to top up your balance for a planned redemption.

If you’re still keen on this sale, be sure to lock in your purchase by August 27, 2026 – but only if you’ve found award space and have a plan in place.