If you’ve been earning Free Spirit points on your flights with Spirit Airlines, you’re probably quite eager to start redeeming these points. You’re probably wondering, “How many Spirit points do I need for a free flight?” Though the airline has made some passenger-friendly changes over the past few months, Spirit Airlines is still best known for its fees and confusing fare bundles. The good news is that Spirit’s Free Spirit frequent flyer program is actually quite straightforward.
Despite utilizing a dynamic pricing model for its award flights, Spirit’s award flight pricing isn’t all that dynamic. This makes determining the number of points you’ll need for a flight a pretty easy task. Additionally, knowing the minimum points required for a free flight is key to maximizing the value of the Free Spirit program.
So, whether you’ve been traveling with Spirit since the airline operated the MD-80 or you’re just starting out with the Free Spirit program, it’s important to understand how many points you’ll need to book your preferred flight. In this post, we’ll explore the number of points needed for Spirit Airlines award tickets and offer tips to help you get the most out of your Free Spirit points.
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How Many Spirit Airlines Free Spirit Points Do You Need for a Free Flight?
As previously mentioned, Spirit Airlines, like many low-cost carriers, does not use a fixed pricing structure for its award flights. Instead, Spirit Airlines employs a dynamic pricing model. What does a dynamic pricing model mean for you and your points? The number of points you’ll need for a free flight with Spirit depends on a variety of factors including when you book, the current cash price of the flight, and overall demand on a route.
Unlike other airlines that utilize a dynamic pricing model, Spirit’s pricing relies almost entirely on the current cash fare. This is actually good news as it makes pricing award flights extremely straightforward. In short, if the current cash fare is cheap, award flight pricing will also be cheap.
There is a quick answer to the question of how many Free Spirit points you will need for a free flight. The minimum number of points you need to book a flight on Spirit is 2,500 points. At this price point, you will be able to book many of Spirit’s cheaper flights priced from $20 to $50. Flights priced above the $50 mark are going to cost you additional points.
It’s also worth noting that, for Spirit’s cash and points redemptions, award flights start at just 1,000 points plus the cash co-payment. However, cash and points bookings are usually not a great way to maximize value.
Related: How Many Southwest Points Do You Need to Book a Flight?
To better understand just how many Spirit points you’ll need for a flight, let’s determine the average value of Free Spirit points.
How To Calculate How Many Spirit Points You’ll Need for a Flight
With the number of Free Spirit points closely tied to the cash fare, you can expect the number of points needed for a flight to increase with the cash fare. On average, you can expect to get around 1.27 cents in value from each point. So, if the cash fare for a flight is $100, you’d need around 7,800 points. But, given the dynamic pricing model, this is not set in stone. You might be able to find awards for flights priced at $100 requiring less than 7,800 points.
An example of this is a flight later this year from Detroit to Cancun priced at $112. At that price, you would expect to need around 8,800 points. That same flight can be booked using Free Spirit points for just 3,500 points. So, you will want to check schedules and pricing before booking any award flight to ensure you’re getting the most from your Free Spirit points.
Here is an overview of what you can expect to get from your points:
- Low Value per Point: 1.10 cents per point
- Average Value per Point: 1.27 cents per point
- High Value per Point: 1.50 cents per point
The absolute minimum number of points needed for a Spirit Airlines flight is 2,500 points one-way. As award flights are tied to the cash fare, you can expect the number of points required to increase with the cash fare.
Examples of Spirit Airlines Awards Flights and Points Needed
To give you a better idea of how many points are needed to book a flight on Spirit, here are some examples for flights over the next few months:
| Route | Sample Date | Points Needed for Basic Fare | Lowest Cash Fare ($) | Value per Point |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Las Vegas (LAS) to Los Angeles (LAX) | September 27th | 3,000 | $20 | 0.67 cents |
| Dallas (DFW) to Houston (IAH) | October 22nd | 2,500 | $20 | 0.80 cents |
| New York-LaGuardia (LGA) to Atlanta (ATL) | October 8th | 2,500 | $20 | 0.80 cents |
| Detroit (DTW) to Chicago-O’Hare (ORD) | November 6th | 2,500 | $24 | 0.96 cents |
| Orlando (MCO) to New Orleans (MSY) | October 16th | 2,500 | $33 | 1.32 cents |
| Fort Lauderdale (FLL) to Seattle (SEA) via Las Vegas (LAS) | November 13th | 6,000 | $91 | 1.52 cents |
| Fort Lauderdale (FLL) to Lima (LIM) | December 4th | 10,000 | $165 | 1.65 cents |
| Detroit (DTW) to Cancun (CUN) | October 28th | 3,500 | $112 | 3.20 cents |
There’s a pretty significant spread in the value you can get from your Free Spirit points. In the examples above, you can receive as little as 0.67 cents per point and as high as 3.20 cents per point in value. You will quickly find that booking Spirit’s super low fares isn’t a great use of points. Instead, there’s a sweet spot for some of the more moderately priced flights. This is evident in the example of the flight from Detroit to Cancun in late October.
Does Spirit Airlines Have an Award Chart?
With no fixed award pricing, the answer to this question is no. No, you won’t find any award charts for the Free Spirit program. However, this isn’t all that uncommon with Delta, JetBlue, and Southwest all lacking award charts. Unsurprisingly, those three programs also utilize a dynamic pricing model for award travel.
Related: Does Delta Air Lines Have an Award Chart?
How Are Spirit Airlines Awards Priced?
By now, you probably already know how Spirit prices the airline’s award flights. Award flight pricing is, more or less, pegged to the cash fare. If a flight is available for $20, you would expect to need around 2,500 Free Spirit points to book that flight. If a flight is priced at $500, you would expect to need around 40,000 points.
As previously mentioned, some other underlying factors determine the number of points you need to book a flight with Spirit. If demand for a certain route is quite high or expected to be quite high, this will lead to more expensive award flights even if this isn’t reflected in the cash fare. Additionally, if a route is quite popular among Free Spirit members, you can expect to see higher award pricing.
Spirit Airlines Award Flight Sweet Spots
Since Spirit doesn’t have an award chart or fixed award pricing, there aren’t any true sweet spots. Nevertheless, there are still a few ways to maximize the value of your Free Spirit points.
Save Your Points for Pricier Flights
As an ultra-low-cost carrier, it’s not all that uncommon to find flights on Spirit available from just $20 one-way. At that price point, you will typically need just 2,500 points to book a flight. However, this isn’t a great use of points. While tempting, booking these super cheap flights using your Free Spirit points usually yields poor value. Instead, you will want to go for flights that are priced higher but require fewer points than you would have expected.
Spirit’s flights priced from around $80 to $150 require just 3,000 to 6,000 points. Saving your points for these slightly more expensive flights will yield far more value than if you were to book one of Spirit’s dirt-cheap flights. So, the first piece of advice is to pass up using points for fares you can book with a twenty-dollar bill and instead save your points for another time.
Booking During Sales
With award pricing closely tied to cash fares, it’s often a smart idea to wait for promotional periods in which Spirit cuts cash fares. Unfortuantely, there have been fewer and fewer instances of Spirit running sales as it looks to regain its financial footing.
Travel When Others Aren’t
Demand influences both cash fares and award pricing. So, you can often find cheaper award flights when demand on a certain route is low. This might mean traveling on a Tuesday instead of a Sunday or traveling during off-peak times of the year.
Tip: Pass on using points for Spirit’s dirt-cheap $20 fares as you won’t get a ton of value from your points compared to other more moderately priced flights.
Does Spirit Charge Fees on Award Flights?
Spirit, like most US carriers, doesn’t directly charge any fees on award tickets. Spirit is known for its fees and, unfortunately, booking with points instead of cash is not a way around these fees. If you book the most basic fare using points, you can expect to pay out of pocket for additional add-ons.
Spirit only recently did away with award ticket redemption fees. Up until August 14, 2024, Spirit did charge a close-in booking fee for award flights booked less than 28 days before departure. Thankfully, this fee has been dropped as part of the airline’s efforts to become more passenger-centric.
Buying Extras Like Seats and Bags
While not necessarily a fee on an award ticket, you will want to consider the cost of Spirit’s ancillaries or add-ons. Even if you book with points, you will likely need to cover the cost of additional services and amenities.
For example, if you book a Go fare (the airline’s most basic fare), you will have the option of paying for a checked bag. Checked bags are available starting at $50. The Go fare also prohibits carry-on bags. If you book the next fare up (Go Savvy), you will also have the option to purchase a carry-on.
You can book any of Spirit’s fare options using Free Spirit points but there is a major caveat. The airline has yet to roll out the ability to pay for each fare using just points. So, if you want to book Spirit’s best fare (Go Big), you will need to cover the cost of this upgrade using cash. Spirit does plan on introducing the option to book other fares using just points sometime in 2025.
You can see the full list of Spirit’s optional services and prices for each service by clicking this link.
Taxes and Fees
Though Spirit doesn’t charge fees on award tickets, you will still need to cover any government-imposed taxes and fees. On domestic flights, this is almost always just the security tax of $5.60 per flight. On international flights, you should anticipate additional taxes and fees.
For example, if you were to book a flight from the United States to Cancun (CUN), you would need to cover taxes and fees totaling $43.22. These taxes and fees are entirely unavoidable as they are imposed by national and local governments.
The Bottom Line
If you’ve been accumulating Free Spirit points on your Spirit Airlines flights, you’re likely eager to know how many points you need for a free flight. Despite its reputation for fees and fare bundles, Spirit Airlines’ Free Spirit frequent flyer program is surprisingly straightforward. While Spirit employs a dynamic pricing model, its award pricing closely mirrors the cash fare, making it relatively easy to calculate the number of points needed for an award ticket.
With a minimum redemption threshold of just 2,500 points, you can find excellent value on many Spirit flights. For the best value, save your points for higher-priced flights where the cost in points doesn’t rise proportionally with the cash fare. Flights priced around $80 to $150 tend to offer a much better return on your points compared to Spirit’s ultra-low $20 fares.
What’s your favorite way to redeem Free Spirit points?
