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Qatar Airways has launched an “early access” offer to its 2025 Black Friday sale for departures from the United States in which its offering savings of up to 30% on select routes.
That’s the good news.
The less good news is that the airline has made the sale ridiculously complicated by publishing separate terms and conditions for premium cabin bookings, for Economy Class bookings for 1+ passengers, and for Economy Class bookings for 2 – 6 passengers, and by restricting the savings to select routes which vary based on the cabin of travel, the number of people traveling and a customer’s departure point.
This is a mess, but I’ll do my best to summarise the sale as best I can (bear with me!)
Key terms
- Booking period: November 18 – 19, 2025
- Travel period:
- Premium cabin bookings: November 18, 2025 – October 31, 2026
- Economy Class bookings for 1+ passengers: November 18, 2025 – October 31, 2026
- Economy Class bookings for 2-6 passengers: January 01, 2026 – October 31, 2026
- Blackout Period:
- Outbound: November 20 – 22, 2025; December 13 – 23, 2025
- Inbound: November 29 – 30, 2025; January 01 – 10, 2026
- Must use promo code EARLYBF when booking.
- Savings:
- Up to 15% on base fare in Economy Class will apply to booking class: Q
- Up to 25% on base fare in Economy Class will apply to booking class: T
- Up to 30% on base fare in Economy Class will apply to booking class: O*
- Up to 15% on base fare in Business Class will apply to booking class: R
- Up to 25% on base fare in Business Class will apply to booking classes: P
- Minimum stay: four days or first Sunday
- Maximum stay:
- Premium cabin bookings: 4 months
- Economy Class bookings for 1+ passengers: 4 months
- Economy Class bookings for 2-6 passengers: 4 months
- Valid only on round trip flight itineraries.
- This offer cannot be combined with publicly available promotional fares.
- Savings apply only when all flights on the booking are of the same booking class.
- Savings apply on base fare only. The discount is deducted from the ‘fare per passenger’ amount visible in the ‘payment summary’ after flight selection. Any other taxes, service fees, or standard market charges will be payable and displayed at the time of booking and are not subject to any discount.
- Offer valid on flights marketed or operated by Qatar Airways (QR) only.
*Only applies to bookings for 2-6 passengers.
Full terms and conditions can be found on the sale page and I encourage you to read these very carefully before attempting to book a trip.
Valid routes
Oh, where to start?!
Because this sale has been designed by a person lacking in intelligence and one who is devoid of common sense, this is ridiculously complicated.
In fact, it’s so complicated that I would only make things worse by replicating the information on the sale page.
What you need to know, however, is that the routes on which these deals are valid will vary depending on your starting point and depending on how many people there are in your booking, so make sure you check the terms before attempting to price up a trip.
As an example, here’s what your options are if you’re departing out of Los Angeles:
Premium cabin booking for one or more (1+) passengers:
Almaty (ALA), Ahmedabad (AMD), Bahrain (BAH), Kolkata (CCU), Colombo (CMB), Kochi (COK), Cape Town (CPT), Delhi (DEL), Doha (DOH), Entebbe (EBB), Islamabad (ISB), Kilimanjaro (JRO), Kuwait City (KWI), Lagos (LOS)
Economy class booking for one or more (1+) passengers:
Abuja (ABV), Addis Ababa (ADD), Beirut (BEY), Bengaluru (BLR), Mumbai (BOM), Calicut (CCJ), Kolkata (CCU), Colombo (CMB), Entebbe (EBB), Phuket (HKT), Hyderabad (HYD), Johannesburg (JNB), Kilimanjaro (JRO), Lusaka (LUN), Chennai (MAA), Muscat (MCT), Male (MLE), Nagpur (NAG), Nairobi (NBO), Port Harcourt (PHC), Tashkent (TAS), Thiruvananthapuram (TRV)
Economy class booking for two to six (2-6) passengers:
Addis Ababa (ADD), Kolkata (CCU), Phuket (HKT), Johannesburg (JNB), Kilimanjaro (JRO), Lusaka (LUN), Muscat (MCT), Port Harcourt (PHC), Thiruvananthapuram (TRV)
See what I mean when I call this sale unnecessarily complicated?
Quick thoughts
This is probably the worst designed airline sale I’ve ever come across and some of it makes absolutely no sense to me.
Why, for example, can’t I get a discount on LAX – Doha – Male if I’m booking for 2 to 6 people but I can if I’m booking for 1 person or 7+ people?
Why can’t I get a discount for travel between 18 November and 31 December 2025 if I’m booking Economy Class for 2 to 6 people but I can if I’m booking for 1 person or 7+ people?
This is ridiculous! What am I missing?
Anyway …
I haven’t had the energy to check just how good or bad this sale is or if there are any particularly amazing fares out there (I think I’d lose the will to live!), but because the sale talks about discounts of “up to 30%”, don’t assume that all bookings on which the 30% deal is valid will actually offer you a 30% discount – you’ll probably have to search around to find the very best deals.
Make sure you get an even better deal out of whatever trips you book by using a credit card that gives you a good return on your travel spending and, preferably, one that also comes with good travel protections (just in case!)
The Platinum Card® from American Express offers 5 points/dollar on up to $500,000 of spending made directly with airlines or flights booked through Amex Travel (1 point/dollar thereafter – terms apply) and the refreshed Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card earns a very respectful 4 points/dollar for flights booked directly with an airline, so with both of these cards offering excellent trip delay, interruption, and cancellation protections, they would be my go-to choices for booking flights in this sale
I should also add that the American Express® Green Card earns 3 points/dollar for just about all travel spending, but because it doesn’t offer the same level of protection as the Platinum Card or the Sapphire Reserve, I don’t think it’s as good an option as the more premium cards.
Note: All information about the American Express® Green Card has been collected independently by Traveling For Miles. The American Express® Green Card is not currently available through Traveling For Miles.
Bottom line
Qatar Airways has opened up an early access offer to its USA Black Friday sale in which it’s offering savings of up to 30% on select bookings for the next two days.
If you’re interested in making a booking in this sale be aware that the terms and conditions may give you a headache as you try to navigate the maze that they create, but there may be a few good deals out there and finding one may ease the pain just a little bit.
