Avianca's frequent flyer program with zero fuel surcharges on partner flights, saving hundreds of dollars compared to booking through other Star Alliance programs. Miles are easy to acquire through frequent buy-miles sales and transfers from major US credit card programs.
These cards earn transferable points that can be converted to Avianca LifeMiles.
Our Valuation
1.8 cents per point(CAD)
1.3 cents per point (USD)
Avianca LifeMiles offers zero fuel surcharges across all Star Alliance partner bookings and some of the cheapest buy-miles promotions in the industry. However, Canadians have no direct transfer partner – miles must be purchased in USD or earned via US credit cards – and two devaluations in 2024-2025 have eroded its once-exceptional sweet spots. Lufthansa First without surcharges and Avianca business to South America remain strong use cases.
Last updated: February 8, 2026
Avianca is a pan-American airline that has been in service since 1919. Primarily the flag carrier of Colombia, Avianca also owns subsidiaries based in El Salvador, Ecuador, Costa Rica, and Guatemala – all of which are operating and codesharing under the Avianca brand.
Avianca mostly flies to destinations within North and South America, with a few routes between South America and Europe.
Its frequent flyer program is LifeMiles, which unlocks reward seats on flights operated by Avianca and its subsidiaries. Moreover, since Avianca is a member of Star Alliance, LifeMiles enables redemptions on Avianca’s partners, such as Air Canada, Lufthansa, Swiss, United, All Nippon Airways (ANA), and more.
In this guide, we’ll cover everything there is to know about Avianca LifeMiles, including how to optimize your earning and redeeming within the program.
Marriott Bonvoy points could also be converted to Avianca LifeMiles at a rate of 3 Bonvoy points = 1 LifeMile. Unfortunately, with LifeMiles, you won’t get the bonus 5,000 miles every 60,000 Bonvoy points converted, as you would with other airlines.
It’s an unfavourable exchange altogether, so you should only convert your Marriott Bonvoy points to LifeMiles when you need a top-up on a planned redemption. Otherwise, you should save your Bonvoy points for aspirational hotel and resort stays.
Other than Marriott Bonvoy, you could also transfer points from the following hotel programs at suboptimal rates:
Avianca offers three fare classes in economy cabin as basic, classic, flex, as well as a single fare class in business. Each fare class is differentiated by pricing, inclusions, LifeMiles earned, and change/cancellation policies.
Note that with Avianca’s recent retrofitting program, its entire narrowbody fleet only features economy class with Plus and Premium seats. Its widebody fleet, on the other hand, still features lie-flat seats in business class.
As a revenue-based program, you’ll earn LifeMiles based on the amount you spend on Avianca flights, rather than the distance you fly. Depending on your fare class, you’ll earn the following LifeMiles per every US dollar you spend on your base fare:
Unlike flying with Avianca, you’ll earn miles based on the distance you fly with partners, rather than the amount you spend on your fare. Note, however, that the number of miles you’ll actually earn depends on the fare class and cabin you booked, with partner airlines having different accrual rates.
The following are Avianca’s airline partners:
Star Alliance
Star Alliance Airlines
| Star Alliance Airlines | ||
|---|---|---|
| Aegean Airlines | Air Canada | Air China |
| Air India | Air New Zealand | All Nippon Airways (ANA) |
| Asiana Airlines | Austrian Airlines | Avianca |
| Brussels Airlines | Copa Airlines | Croatia Airlines |
| EgyptAir | Ethiopian Airlines | EVA Air |
| LOT Polish Airlines | Lufthansa | Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) |
| Shenzhen Airlines | Singapore Airlines | Swiss |
| TAP Air Portugal | Thai Airways | Turkish Airlines |
| United Airlines |
Non-Alliance Partners
If you’re intent on purchasing LifeMiles, you should definitely wait for promotions, which are usually held monthly. Historically, promotions entail bonuses of 125–170% more LifeMiles.
Therefore, if you chance upon a 170% bonus promotion, you can buy blocks of 2,700 LifeMiles for $33 each, bringing your acquisition cost down to 1.2 cent per LifeMile.
An alternative to buying LifeMiles directly is “Multiply your Miles”, which lets you double or triple the LifeMiles you earned through Avianca or any partner.
Through the program, you’ll still pay the normal price of each LifeMile at 3.3 cents (USD), with discounts being offered occasionally. However, there’s no maximum number of LifeMiles you can “multiply”, and the LifeMiles you multiply won’t count towards your annual purchase limit.
For hotels, LifeMiles has a dedicated booking portal, where you can earn up to 14,000 LifeMiles per night. You might also chance upon promotions, which allow you to earn bonus LifeMiles.
You can likewise earn LifeMiles on paid stays at major hotel chains and booking platforms, including:
Lastly, LifeMiles has plenty of restaurant and shopping partners in Guatemala, El Salvador, Colombia, and Costa Rica. At these establishments, you can earn anywhere between 1–3 LifeMiles per dollar (USD) spent.
Like Aeroplan, LifeMiles imposes dynamic pricing for redemptions involving Avianca-operated flights, while the program uses a zone-based award chart for flights solely operated by its partners.
The partner award chart can get quite complicated, as LifeMiles has separated the world into 20 different regions. The contiguous US alone is separated into zones 1, 2, and 3.
While we won’t get into detail on LifeMiles’s complicated redemption pricing, here are some sample redemptions:
For a non-stop Avianca flight from Toronto to San Salvador, a basic economy ticket, which includes only a personal item, may cost 12,570 LifeMiles. Should you need more baggage allowance, you can redeem for a higher fare class with LifeMiles or pay for baggage separately with cash.
For a non-stop Avianca flight from Toronto to Bogota, a business class ticket may cost 73,960 LifeMiles.
As for a flight operated by a Star Alliance partner, a one-way business class ticket from Washington, D.C. to Lisbon on TAP Portugal costs 63,000 LifeMiles.
For a domestic GOL flight from Sao Paulo to Foz do Iguaçu, a one-way economy ticket costs 6,000 LifeMiles.
To search for award flights you’ll have to go through to the LifeMiles website and not the Avianca website itself.
In contrast, for Star Alliance-operated flights, you can request for a one-cabin upgrade based upon a zone-based redemption chart.
Examples of upgrade pricing are:
To qualify for an upgrade with LifeMiles, tickets must be booked under eligible fare classes, and they must be paid for as commercial tickets and not redeemed with miles.
Through the dedicated LifeMiles portals for hotels and car rentals, you can redeem your LifeMiles at a rate of 1 LifeMile = 0.5 cent (USD).
You can also transfer your LifeMiles to another member for $15 per every 1,000 LifeMiles. Keep in mind that you can only transfer up to a maximum of 75,000 LifeMiles each calendar year.
In fact, you can book Lufthansa First Class from the US to Germany for around 120,000–130,000 LifeMiles (up from a previous sweet spot of 87,000, after multiple devaluations in 2024–2025), plus about $27 (USD) in taxes and fees. Remember, unlike other loyalty programs, LifeMiles doesn’t tack on carrier-imposed surcharges.
With cash fares on Lufthansa First Class going for well over $10,000 (USD) per way, this is a remarkable deal.
You can also find good value on trans-Atlantic business class redemptions with LifeMiles. For example, you can redeem a one-way ticket from New York to Switzerland on Swiss, or Chicago to Frankfurt on Lufthansa for around 63,000–80,000 LifeMiles (pricing increased following the February 2025 devaluation, up from the previous 63,000-mile floor).
Using Smart Search, you’ll see symbols for low-priced redemptions (blue dot) and high-priced redemptions (gray dot). No symbol means unavailable.
As you search for awards, you can use the filter option to show Avianca and/or Star Alliance flights, as well as economy and business class awards.
The Smart Search feature is also useful for searching “saver awards” or low-priced Star Alliance awards, since the calendar shows availability for entire months.
You can, for instance, look up award availability on Swiss flights using Smart Search, then compare redemption pricing with another Star Alliance loyalty program of your choice.
Qualifying miles are defined as follows:
Note that, currently, there aren’t any LifeMiles co-branded credit cards in the US and Canada.
Interestingly, you’ll earn qualifying miles when you buy LifeMiles. Therefore, you can earn elite status by flying the required number of miles on Avianca; then, you can complete your elite qualification requirement by buying LifeMiles.
As a LifeMiles elite member, you’re entitled to several benefits, including:
If you own US credit cards, you can easily transfer points from American Express Membership Rewards, Brex Rewards, Capital One Miles, and Citi ThankYou Rewards to LifeMiles. You can also buy LifeMiles and take advantage of the frequent bonus promotions LifeMiles holds.
Subsequently, you can redeem your LifeMiles for aspirational premium award flights, such as Lufthansa First Class and Swiss business class, though note that multiple devaluations in 2024 and 2025 have increased award pricing significantly from the historically low levels.
First-year value
$336
Monthly fee: $15.99
• Earn 1,250 points per month upon spending $750 per month for 12 months
Earning rates
Key perks
Monthly fee: $15.99
• Earn 1,250 points per month upon spending $750 per month for 12 months
Earning rates
Key perks
