All the bargains, tips on nailing discounts and all your Virgin Australia flight sales questions answered.
The award-winning Australian airline known for its excellent cabin crew is also known for slinging some stellar bargains. Virgin Australia flight sales usually bring cheap fares to South Pacific destinations that Jetstar doesn’t fly to, like Vanuatu and Samoa, along with deals on its dozens of domestic routes.
Latest Virgin Australia flight sales
How to find the best Virgin Australia sales
Virgin’s annual sales
There’s a few times a year where Virgin just about always hosts a sale:
- EOFY (late June/early July)
- Black Friday (late November, the date varies slightly each year)
- Boxing Day (26 December)
Virgin’s weekly sales
Every Thursday, Virgin Australia hosts a ‘Happy Hour’ sale where flights are discounted from 4pm until 11pm. Generally, these sales aren’t as good as Virgin’s other sales, especially the Black Friday and Boxing Day deals, but they definitely are less than the regular ticket prices.
Early bird flight sales
It’s not quite an “always-on” offer, but in between peak sale times like Black Friday and Boxing Day Virgin Australia quite often has an early-bird deal on flights.
If you book a fare a few months in advance, you can save on your flight.
Regular Virgin sales to keep an eye out for
While Virgin doesn’t offer anything nearly as hot as Jetstar’s famous “Return for free” sales, it does frequently offer deals to the South Pacific that are up to 30% off regular prices. An example of this is the recent Love Islands sale, where flights started at $429 return.
What’s considered a good Virgin deal?
Virgin’s prices tend to not be as hot as budget carriers like Jetstar or newcomer Bonza, but they are less than Qantas for sure. Generally, we’re pretty happy with Jetstar fares that fall into these brackets:
– Domestic flights: $55-69 each way
– International flights: $400 return
Usually, Virgin advertises its domestic flights as one-way fares, and its international routes as return.
How often does Virgin do sales?
Weekly! As mentioned above, Every Thursday, Virgin Australia hosts its ‘Happy Hour’ sale from 4pm to 11pm.
It also holds other regular sales throughout the year, but they’re not on set days and could happen at anytime. But we’ll write up about as many as we can, as soon as can on our deals page and share details on our Instagram and Twitter accounts.
What day is best to buy Virgin flights?
The best day of the week to buy of the week to buy a Virgin Australia flight is usually a Thursday, as that’s when the airline holds its Happy Hour sale. It’s a short sale, but you can usually snatch a deal.
If you’re looking for the best day of the week to fly rather than buy, we looked at various routes on various dates to see when the cheapest flights were available. Here’s what we found:
Virgin flights between Sydney and Melbourne: Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays
Virgin flights between Perth and Melbourne: All days are about the same price
Virgin flights between Brisbane and Sydney: Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays
Is Virgin Australia cheaper than other airlines?
Well… No. To be completely frank, Jetstar and Bonza both generally offer better lower-priced fares than Virgin Australia. However, Virgin does have a frequent flyer program which could be a big enough perk for some to pay the extra price.
To properly compare Virgin to other airlines, we’ve had a look at how flight prices compare. We’ve used a route that’s available across all the airlines we’re looking at: Melbourne to Gold Coast.
We checked a few different dates to see how much each airline. We’ve also found some data from Kayak, which shows the average price of flights on the route.
Most flights between Melbourne and the Gold Coast were $100 each way.
Virgin flight sales vs Jetstar flight sales
Looking at the same set of dates as Virgin, Jetstar flights are just $71 compared to the $100 that Virgin is charging for the Melbourne-Gold Coast route. That’s 29% less. So, unless you’re a loyal Velocity frequent flyer, you may be better off flying Jetstar if you’re just after the lowest price.
Virgin flight sales vs Qantas flight sales
Qantas flights between Melbourne and the Coast do tend to be the most expensive, and at 55% more than Virgin’s fares they cost $155. Qantas does let you check a bag, but even if adding on the cost of that to a Virgin fare, it does cost more. (Qantas will give you food on drink onboard, though.)
Virgin flight sales vs Rex flight sales
While not quite as high as Qantas’s fares, Rex does come in at 19% more than Virgin’s However, Rex does allow you go check a bag for free. Virgin charges you for a bag, but that extra fee does bring it in line with the Rex prices.
That said, unless you’re wanting the Velocity points, just book whichever flight time is more convenient for you.
Virgin flight sales vs Bonza flight sales
Cheaper than any other airline offering the route, Bonza fares between Melbourne and the Gold Coast are just $69. That’s 31% less than Virgin’s fares.
The catch? Flights on Bonza are still pretty limited. There’s just the one flight per day between the cities and it’s in the evening, which may not be ideal for everyone.
