For those new to the frequent flyer world, you may be wondering what/how/why Alaska Airlines is considered an incredible loyalty program.
Alaska Airlines' Mileage Plan stands as a beacon of value in the ever-evolving landscape of airline loyalty programs. Despite recent devaluations, Mileage Plan miles continue to be valuable, offering travelers a range of unique benefits and redemption opportunities. Alaska's partnership with a diverse array of airlines, both within and outside the Oneworld alliance, allows members access to a global network of destinations, at rates that beat the industry trend towards diminished value.
In this article, we will discuss how to earn Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles without flying, the expiration policy, sweet spot redemptions, the famous companion fare, and the program's award cancellation policies.
How To Earn Alaska Airlines Miles
Flying On Alaska Airlines And Partners
Compared to other frequent flyer programs, it's actually pretty easy to earn Alaska Airlines miles. Alaska generally uses a distance based system to determine the number of miles you'll earn on your flights, completely independent of how much you actually paid for it.
This makes Alaska Airlines one of the best loyalty programs for travelers looking to save money, since you can earn a lot of miles while trying to save money.
When flying on Alaska Airlines, you'll earn miles at the following rates, depending on the fare class you booked in.
When flying on Alaska Airlines partners, you'll earn miles at the following rates, depending on the fare class you booked in.
There's a lot of value to be garnered when flying Alaska Airlines, since you earn a lot of miles, even if the actual cash price of the ticket is low.
Credit Card Transfer Partners
Similar to American Airlines, Alaska Airline miles are hard to come by via transfer partners. The only transfer partner they have is Bilt, whereby points from Bilt are typically hard to come by anyways.
Bank of America, Alaska Airline's main credit card issuer, even has trouble getting access to Alaska as a transfer partner. This makes it harder to generate Alaska Airline miles from sign up bonuses, which (in theory) makes for better award pricing.
Buy Alaska Airlines Miles
Similar to all major airlines, you can buy Alaska Airline miles. Without any sales, buying Alaska Airline miles is an expensive endeavor that can put a serious dent in your wallet.
However, with miles sales, Alaska Airlines miles can seem pretty reasonable to purchase. Recently, they had an early 2024 sale where you could buy miles for just 1.72 cents each (when buying 40k+ miles). Not too bad all things considered, especially when looking at the types of redemptions you could get.
Spend On The Alaska Airlines Credit Card
The Alaska Airlines Visa® Credit Card is a pretty powerful credit card that rewards spending with Alaska miles. However, while I wouldn't generally spend my day to day expenses on this card (given the opportunity cost), some of the spending bonuses are actually quite powerful and useful. For instance:
- Spend $6,000 on the card per year to get the Alaska Airlines companion pass
- For every $10,000 you spend on the card in 2024, you get 4,000 EQM (up to 20,000 EQMs)
Furthermore, if you pay rent using the Alaska Airlines card via the Bilt portal, you'll get 3x miles (with a 3% rental transaction fee). This can be quite a good offer if you strategically use this with the other Alaska Airlines spending offers.
How To Earn Alaska Airlines Status
Compared to some programs out there, earning Alaska status is relatively straightforward. If you fly 20,000 miles in Alaska Main Cabins, you have MVP status.
Mileage earning will vary by the fare class you book and whether or not you're flying on an Alaska Airlines or partner flight.
Alaska Airlines status is useful because it gives you additional mileage earnings, free checked bags, access to upgrades, etc. Furthermore, even at the lowest tier, you also get Oneworld Ruby, which is useful when traveling on other Oneworld airlines.
What Are Alaska Airline's Partners?
As a part of the Oneworld alliance, Alaska has a global list of 13 airline partners that allow you to earn and redeem miles while enjoying your Mileage Plan elite status when flying on these airlines.
Alaska Airlines also has a list of other partners where you can purely earn and redeem Alaska miles on. You cannot get reciprocal status benefits on these airlines, but you can still earn an exciting amount of miles when flying on them and electing to earn Alaska miles:
- Aer Lingus
- Air Tahiti Nui
- Condor
- EL AL Israel Airlines
- Hainan Airlines
- Icelandair
- Korean Air
- LATAM Airlines
- Ravn Alaska
- Singapore Airlines
- STARLUX Airlines
Each program has a different earn rate. Click here to learn more about how many miles you'll earn when flying each airline!
Do Alaska Airlines Miles Expire?
Alaska Airline Mileage Plan miles do not expire, but if your account has been inactive for 2+ years, your account will be locked due to inactivity. Call Alaska customer support to verify your identity and to reactivate your account.
How Alaska Airlines Prices Award Flights
In March 2024, Alaska Airlines instated a new award chart that sought to simplify the world of award redemptions. Realistically, this was a sugarcoated devaluation that diminished the value of Mileage Plan miles by about 20%+ across the board. Currently, Alaska uses a dynamic award pricing system where award flights will begin at a certain price based on where you depart.
There are now just a total of three charts used for partner awards (below):
Includes travel from US to Americas and within Americas. Americas include North America, Caribbean Islands, Central America and South America
Includes travel from US to EMEA and within EMEA. EMEA includes Europe, Middle East and Africa
Includes travel from US to Asia Pacific, within Asia Pacific and between Asia Pacific–Europe, Middle East, Africa. Asia Pacific includes SE Asia, Indian Subcontinent, South Pacific, Japan/Korea.
For flights flying on Alaska Airlines metal, an Alaska Airlines award chart is used:
One-way award pricing for Alaska Airlines operated flights using Alaska Airlines miles
Alaska Airlines Sweet Spots
Alaska Airlines still has some nice sweet spot redemptions in its arsenal. The program definitely seems to value short haul award trips vs long haul ones. You can accelerate your searches using Roame and SkyView, which will allow you to quickly search for Alaska results alongside other airline programs.
Seattle <> Tokyo (HND/NRT) In Business Class For 60k Miles
The new Alaska award chart clocks in partner business bookings to/from Asia/US starting at just 60,000 miles for flights flying 3,001-5,000 miles. Unfortunately, SFO/LAX to Japan clocks in just over 5,000 miles, but Seattle just squeaks in under that threshold. This means you can still get some fantastic pricing with Alaska Airlines partner business class bookings to Japan via Seattle.
Northeast US <> British Isles + Europe In Business Class (Some Routes) For 45k Miles
For partner flights flying anywhere between 1,501–3,500 miles, business class seats cost just 45,000 Alaska miles each way. There are several transatlantic flights to/from several Northeast US airports that just squeeze by that threshold:
- BOS <> MAD: 3,410 miles
- BOS <> LHR: 3,265 miles
- BOS <> DUB: 2,993 miles
- JFK <> LHR: 3,451 miles
- JFK <> DUB: 3,179 miles
BOS <> MAD just squeezes in under 3,500 miles, so it's awesome to see that it's just 45k miles one way!
US <> Iceland & Europe Via Business Class For 35k Miles
Icelandair "business class" is actually just US domestic first class / premium economy on international airlines—the seats are just larger and comfier (supposedly). They do not go lie flat into beds. In a good move, Alaska prices these flights as "premium economy," which means that they only charge 35,000 miles for premium economy flights flying 3,501–5,000 miles.
For instance, a flight from Boston to Iceland to Madrid on Icelandair business class would cost just 35,000 miles (even with a stopover in Iceland).
Intra-North America Short Haul Economy Flights
For short-haul flights traveling within North America, you can get pretty good value out of your Alaska miles again:
- 701–1,400 miles: 5,000 miles
- 1,401–2,100 miles: 10,000 miles
- All distances for Mexico, Central America and Caribbean: 10,000 miles
Notably, these are all "starting at" prices, meaning these are the lowest possible fares you'll see for these routes. However, for what it's worth, knowing these are the lowest prices can give you a gauge on whether or not it makes sense to deploy your miles when necessary.
Alaska Airlines Stopover Policy
Alaska has an incredible stopover program where you can easily book a free stopover on an award ticket. Pricing for stopover tickets is based on the beginning and final ticket destination & the cumulative distance traveled. So that means if you fly from A to B to C, the price will be determined by the total distance flown and where you begin A and end C (see the award charts above).
To book Alaska Airlines stopovers, you'll need to navigate to the site and select "All search options" and then select "Multi-city" on the next screen.
Cancellation and Change Policies
Similar to other US domestic airlines, Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan has liberalized its cancellation and change policies, particularly for award tickets. Most award tickets can now be canceled and miles reinstated without a fee, provided it's done before departure. This means you can cancel an award ticket (in theory) just 1 minute before departure.
Cancellations can be processed easily online, with little to no difficulty.
Notably, partner awards will incur a nonrefundable $12.50 fee. However, for the flexibility, $12.50 is a small price to pay (just look at how much Air Canada charges!)
Conclusion
Even after its devaluation in 2024, Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan is still one of the best frequent flyer programs out there. There are still some great redemption opportunities out there, not to mention the general flexibility of Alaska Airlines award bookings. Notably, given how easy it is to accrue Alaska miles by flying, it can make for some fantastic redemptions in the future.
