The Extra Mile, Sept. 30: The Best (& Worst) Airports for Flight Prices, Excellent Amex Offer & More

🤔 Which Major US Hubs Are Best (& Worst) For Flight Prices?

Airline CEOs would have you believe that the only reason your flights are 20% to 30% more expensive this year is the cost of fuel. They have no choice but to raise fares on you and me.

To quote a former president, that is total malarkey. And we’ve got receipts to prove it.

And by receipts, I mean data – namely, data on average domestic airfare from the 25 busiest U.S. airports from the first half of 2026 that came out late last week.

The airports hit hardest with high fares tell the real story. Take a look?

Jet fuel north of $4 a gallon (when it was closer to $2 this time last year) doesn’t help: These fares are up 12.5%, on average, compared to the same time last year.

But it’s not costs like gassing up planes, covering gate fees, paying pilots that really drive airfare up or (hopefully) down. It’s competition. Consider this:

• There are four major Delta hubs in the top 10 here, and three of them (Detroit, Minneapolis, and especially Atlanta) are among the cheapest major airports in the country for airlines to operate from … yet they’ve got the priciest fares
• Ditto for American Airlines in Dallas-Fort Worth and Philadelphia, as well as United in San Francisco, Newark, and Houston.
• And yet there’s Chicago-O’Hare and Denver down near the bottom, despite the fact that they’re fairly expensive hubs for airlines to operate at. Why? There’s a ton of competition!

I also looked at which of these hubs saw the biggest increases from the same span in 2025. Surprise! It’s:

1. Detroit, which lost Spirit (RIP) in May, giving Delta an even tighter stranglehold on the airport, and…
2. Minneapolis, where Sun Country has been shrinking for the last year and change

This data, which comes from the federal government, isn’t perfect. It doesn’t reflect the fact that some airports (like those on either coast) feature longer flights that are often pricier. And to calculate the top 25 list you see above, it only considers passengers who depart – not connect through – each airport, so major hubs like Charlotte (CLT) and Washington, D.C.-Dulles (IAD) didn’t even make the chart.

So what’s the takeaway here? Besides take everything you hear from the airlines about why flights are expensive with a grain of salt?

Honestly, that might be it.

– Kyle Potter, executive editor

🤝 Deal of the Day: Melbourne, Australia from 25K SkyMiles RT!

Heat scale (out of 3): 🔥🔥🔥

Why we love it: Delta flights to Australia don’t get a lot cheaper than this!

Book for 50,000 SkyMiles roundtrip from more than 160 U.S. and Canadian airports – including for only 30,000 roundtrip (or just 25,500 with a SkyMiles credit card) from Los Angeles (LAX)! Best availability this October and November.

Sign up now to get all the details on this deal & don’t miss the next flight deal alert.

Already a member? Log in to see all your deals.

– Gunnar Olson, Thrifty Traveler Premium deal analyst

⏰ Last Call: 1:1 Chase-to-Hyatt Transfers End Today

If you’ve had the *chase sapphire preferred* since before June 15, today is your last day to send points to World of Hyatt at a 1:1 ratio.

Starting tomorrow, Oct. 1, that transfer ratio drops to 4:3. That means every 1,000 Chase points you transfer becomes just 750 Hyatt points. A property that costs 45,000 Hyatt points a night today will cost you 60,000 Chase points (if transferring them to Hyatt) tomorrow.

The *chase sapphire reserve* keeps 1:1 transfers … and that’s the bank’s not-so-subtle nudge toward its $795-a-year card.

So, should you dump your whole balance of Chase points into Hyatt today? Probably not.

Our team just crunched nearly 400,000 award nights at more than 1,200 Hyatt hotels and found the program’s painful spring devaluation has only gotten worse:

• More than 43% of award nights at top-tier Category 8 hotels now cost 55,000 points or more, up from 30% in May.
• Luxury nights that maxed out at 45,000 points earlier this year can now run 75,000. After the 4:3 cut, that’s 100,000 Chase points for a single night.
• Award availability, the supposed payoff for higher prices, has barely budged.

And once Chase points become Hyatt points, they’re stuck there. You can’t move them back into your Chase account. That’s why moving points before you have a trip booked is usually a gamble.

That said, if you’ve got a specific Hyatt stay in mind over the next year, transferring points today can certainly make sense.

That’s especially true if you tend to book Hyatt Place, Hyatt House, or Hyatt Regency stays, where many nights actually got cheaper this year.

For years, Hyatt was the no-brainer home for Chase points. For Sapphire Preferred cardholders, starting tomorrow, the math gets fuzzier.

Read our full story on the Chase-Hyatt transfer change here.

– Nick Serati, Thrifty Traveler co-founder

📖 Gettin’ Booksy: Abhishek is Going on Safari!

Welcome to Gettin’ Booksy, a celebration of our favorite feeling: Booking something awesome! Book something lately? Let us know at [email protected] to be featured in an upcoming edition of the Extra Mile!

What Did Abhishek Book?

Thrifty Traveler Premium+ Hotel Alert subscribers were alerted to wide-open award space to book the all-inclusive Leopard Sands Kruger Park safari lodge in South Africa.

How’d They Book It?

Because Leopard Sands Kruger Park recently became an Autograph Collection Hotel, it’s now bookable with Marriott Bonvoy points. So Abhishek booked it for 96,000 points per night for a stay next May!

What Makes it So Awesome?

This safari lodge is fully all-inclusive. That means all the food, drinks, and even the game drives into Kruger Park are all included. Normally, this lodge is $1,000 a night, so using fewer than 100,000 Marriott points a night is a steal! (Plus, every room has a private plunge pool, as you can see in the picture above.)

From Abhishek:

I booked the Leopard Sands Kruger Park deal last week, and I just wanted to say thank you! This will be my very first safari, and I’m so excited. I’m booked for next May and already counting down the days! Really appreciate the great deal and all the work you do to make these trips possible 🙂

I’m incredibly jealous of this booking. This should be an incredible trip!

– Gunnar Olson, flight deal analyst and travel reporter

🛂 Online Passport Applications … For All?

Two years ago – almost to the day, actually – the federal government finally rolled out what we had all been waiting for: online passport renewals. It’s seriously impressive – I got my new passport in the mail 13 days after hitting the “submit” button online.

Next up, apparently? Giving even first-time applicants the same option.

That comes straight from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who announced online passport applications would begin “next year.” It’s part of the new government-run, AI-powered America.gov site that the Trump administration is touting.

While renewing a passport is a breeze, applying outright remains a bit of a hassle. There are in-person appointments, paperwork, and an annoying network of third-party services promising to help you with it … for even more fees.

A handful of countries, including Singapore, Finland, New Zealand, Ireland, and the U.K., have managed to bring the whole process online. Now, apparently, it’s our turn.

Read the full story!

– Kyle Potter, executive editor

↔️ Transfer Up to 30K SkyMiles for ‘Free’ With a New Amex Offer

Transferring Delta SkyMiles to another member is usually one of the worst deals in the points world. When readers ask us about it, we almost always tell them to steer clear due to the high cost.

But for the next couple of months … things are looking up.

A new, first-of-its-kind Amex Offer gives you up to $330 back on SkyMiles transfer fees. That’s exactly enough to cover a 30,000-mile transfer to a friend, partner, or anyone else with a SkyMiles account.

This offer expires Nov. 14, 2026, so you’ve got plenty of time to put it to use.

Delta normally charges 1 cent per mile plus a $30 processing fee for these transfers. On 30,000 miles, that works out to $330, which is the full amount of the statement credit. Put another way, a transfer that usually doesn’t make sense now costs nothing.

Like all Amex Offers, this one’s targeted – and so far we’re only seeing it on Amex’s co-branded Delta SkyMiles cards, like the Delta SkyMiles Gold and Platinum. Having said that, it’s still worth checking every Amex card you hold, including business cards.

So why would you want to do this? Say you’re looking at this crazy SkyMiles deal to Australia, but you’d really like to bring a friend and keep your flights on the same itinerary. Well, you could transfer your SkyMiles to the other person and have them complete the booking.

The terms state that cardholders must “transfer their eligible Delta miles to another established Delta SkyMiles account,” but there’s a decent chance this offer will work in the other direction – transferring your friend’s SkyMiles to your account and paying the fee with your card.

This could be helpful if you’re the only one with a SkyMiles credit card and want to take advantage of Delta’s TakeOff 15 benefit for discounted award pricing. But it’s probably worth doing a smaller test transfer first in case it doesn’t trigger the credit.

How to transfer SkyMiles:

1. Go to Delta’s transfer miles page and log in.
2. Enter the recipient’s SkyMiles number, first and last name, email, and how many miles you want to send (up to 30,000 per recipient, per transaction).
3. Add the transfer to your cart, review it, and check out.
4. Pay with the Delta card that has the offer added – and be sure to add the offer before you pay, or you won’t get the credit.
5. Miles generally post within 24 to 48 hours.

A few more rules to know, beyond that:

• Each account can receive up to 300,000 SkyMiles and send up to 150,000 SkyMiles per calendar year.
• You can send to up to four recipients per transaction, but every new transaction adds another $30 fee.
• The receiving account must be at least 10 days old and have earned at least one mile, so a brand-new account won’t work.

This deal is about as good as it gets for a program that has always made sharing miles painfully expensive. If you see the offer and have been meaning to pool SkyMiles with someone, add it soon. Amex Offers like this can (and do) disappear before their listed expiration date.

Check out our story for full details!

– Jackson Newman, senior editor

✈️ Other Travel Tidbits

• ✈️ Chase may be adding Qantas and Cathay Pacific as 1:1 Ultimate Rewards transfer partners, according to a rumor. (Doctor of Credit)
• 🏨 Hilton co-branded cardholders can earn 10,000 bonus points on a single stay of three or more nights if they book by Nov. 9 and stay by Jan. 3. (Hilton)
• 🎟️ Alaska Airlines is giving Atmos Rewards members a code for 20% off a flight if they join the early access waitlist for its new debit card by Oct. 31. (Alaska Airlines)