Up to 70% bonus on Virgin Points until 7 July, here's whether it's worth buying

Got a trip you're a few points short of? Virgin Atlantic, via Virgin Red, are running another buy points promotion with up to 70% bonus when you buy or gift Virgin Points.

It runs from 4 June to 7 July 2026. If you've got a redemption lined up and you're just shy of the points, this is worth a look.

So what's the deal, how many bonus points do I get?

Between 4 June and 7 July 2026:

• Under 5,000 points: no bonus

• 5,000 – 39,000 points: 20% bonus

• 40,000 – 79,000 points: 40% bonus

• 80,000 – 124,000 points: 60% bonus

• 125,000 – 200,000 points: 70% bonus

If you've seen us cover one of these before, look closely, because the tiers aren't identical to last time. The headline 70% is still there, but two things have changed.

First, the annual purchase limit is back to its usual 200,000 points. Over the spring promotion Virgin temporarily bumped it to 300,000. This time they haven't. Buy the full 200,000 and the 70% gets you 140,000 on top, for 340,000 points in total.

Second, the middle tiers have crept up. To reach 40% you now need to buy 40,000 rather than 25,000, and 60% kicks in at 80,000 rather than 70,000.

None of this touches the top rate. It just means you have to buy a little more to climb each rung.

How much does it cost?

Pricing is unchanged: £15 per 1,000 points, so across the bonus tiers you're looking at:

• £75 = 5,000 + 1,000 bonus points (20%)

• £600 = 40,000 + 16,000 bonus points (40%)

• £1,200 = 80,000 + 48,000 bonus points (60%)

• £1,875 = 125,000 + 87,500 bonus points (70%)

• £3,000 = 200,000 + 140,000 bonus points (70%, the most you can buy)

Then there's a one-off £15 handling fee, added at checkout.

At the top tier, with the fee and the bonus factored in, you're paying roughly 0.89p per Virgin Point. That's the number to beat when you come to spend them.

How does this compare to previous offers?

We've now seen this 70% promotion several times across 2025 and into 2026, so the pattern is clear enough: miss one, and another tends to come round, so don't worry if you're not ready to buy anymore just yet, this sale will happen again.

Is buying Virgin Points right for you?

For most people, most of the time, no. But there's a version of this that makes sense, so here's the line.

Buying points works best when you're a specific amount short of a redemption you've already found, say topping up a few thousand to unlock a Maldives flight or an Upper Class seat (better still paired with a reward voucher).

Worth knowing, the points you buy aren't tied exclusively to Virgin Atlantic flights. They work across the whole Virgin Red network, and on Virgin Atlantic partner airlines that you can book through Flying Club too.

Buying points just to sit on them isn't something we'd recommend. Balances lose value when programmes change (Avios did exactly that in December), and tying up real money in points you've no plan for rarely ends well.

And the points only ever cover part of the bill. Back in April, Virgin put up the taxes and fees on reward flights and flattened them out, so you now pay the same cash element for a particular flight and cabin. So if you were to buy an Upper Class flight to New York, you're paying £720 in taxes and fees whether you book a saver fare for 29,000, or the most expensive for 350,000 Virgin Points. The old trick of pairing a rock-bottom points price with equally rock-bottom taxes is gone,.

A few quick rules

• If you wanted to use your Virgin Atlantic credit card to pay for this to earn 3 Virgin Points per £1 spent, this will only qualify for the regular 1.5 Virgin Points per £1 spent as you purchase the points from points.com and not Virgin Atlantic.

• You can buy or gift up to 200,000 points this calendar year, in multiples of 1,000

• Bonus points don't count towards that limit

• Bonuses will arrive with the points haul within 24 hours

• You've got 14 days to cancel, provided you haven't redeemed any of the points. Redeem even some of them and you lose the right to a refund on the lot

• You can't buy or gift points if your balance is zero. Transfer in some Tesco Clubcard or American Express Membership Rewards points first to get around it

• Check reward availability before buying if you're chasing a specific seat, because prices can move at any time

How do I buy these points?

1. Log in to your Virgin Atlantic Flying Club account

2. Go to "My Account"

3. On desktop, find "Buy Points, Gift Points, or Transfer Points" in the bottom left. On mobile, tap "More" in the bottom right and look in that menu

4. Choose how many points you want and see your bonus instantly

Is it worth it?

If you're sitting just short of a flight or an upgrade, this is a decent way to get over the line. We've done exactly that ourselves, topping up to reach a Maldives redemption when we were a few thousand points down.

You've got until 7 July to decide. No need to rush because no doubt there'll be another one along before long.

Sam

Points Well Made is a passion project from Sam and Helena. If you've enjoyed this and want to help us keep the lights on, please consider buying us a Ko-fi or subscribing monthly. You can also find us on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok for more of the same. Thanks for reading.