Best-Of Awards 2026 Methodologies

Best Award Travel Search Tool

How we picked the companies to evaluate:

NerdWallet’s travel experts selected tools based on their knowledge of the publicly available award search tools. To qualify, the tool must be capable of searching for airline award space at a minimum of 180 days from the day of the search and include results for the major transferable credit card currencies. Finalists included PointsYeah, Roame, Seats.aero, and Point.me.

How we chose the winner:

NerdWallet travel experts tested the capabilities of each tool and rated them with a score of 0 to 5. The following factors were considered:

• Number of airlines and/or hotels accessible with the tool.
• Ease of use — for example, whether the tool had an intuitive flow and whether we noticed any bugs or unexpected results.
• Live search capabilities.
• Features on free vs. membership versions.
• Real-time alerts when award space is found.
• Explorer tool quality for less-defined award searches to broader geographic areas.
• Inclusion of credit card transfer bonuses.
• Instructions for transferring and redeeming airline miles.

How we verified our data:

We independently spot-checked data collected to ensure accuracy.


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