Here are the best airlines for booking holiday travel with points

If you're relying on points and miles to cover the cost, you might want to consider whether booking award flights for the holidays is the best use of your travel rewards.

In NerdWallet's annual analysis of airline mile values, holiday flights in December often didn't provide the highest per-mile value compared with flights booked 180 days out or 15 days out from the date of departure.

With flight prices up 43% from last year, according to the latest Consumer Price Index data, you'll likely have to use a lot of miles to pay for the flight. You may prefer to save your miles for a time of year when you are able to get more value from them.

Aim for 1.4 cents per mile

NerdWallet examined nine major U.S. airlines and analyzed the prices of nearly 600 domestic flights in 2022. In this analysis, holiday flights were defined as those departing on Dec. 18 and returning on Dec. 29. Of the nine airlines examined, four airlines tied for the highest baseline value for miles spent on holiday flights, which was 1.4 cents per mile. They were American, Delta, Frontier and Southwest. If you choose them, you should aim to get about this much when you divide the cash price by the number of miles.

For example, a $600 round-trip flight should cost about 42,857 miles (or less, if you're getting an even better deal).

Frontier is unique

Frontier is the exception where redeeming your miles during the holidays is smart because miles are worth more than normal. Frontier's non-holiday valuation is 0.9 cent.

Avoid using miles worth less than 1 cent

This is a good rule at any time, but particularly during the holidays. A valuation of less than 1 cent per mile is abysmal considering you can often redeem credit card points for cash back at a standard rate of 1 cent each. And that's low when compared with travel credit cards that let you redeem at 1.25 cents or 1.5 cents each.

For the holidays, you probably won't want to book Hawaiian or Spirit flights with miles, which are worth 0.9 cent and 0.7 cent, respectively.

Some airlines, like Delta, allow you to book with cash and miles. The value of your points and miles will depend on your redemption. Do the math and aim to get 1 cent to 1.4 cents per mile.