When it comes to frequent flyer programs, it’s important to understand their two main functions.
The first is earning points by flying with the airline, using a co-branded credit card, transferring miles from a partner, or shopping/dining through specific portals. These points can be redeemed for a variety of rewards, including free flights, merchandise, upgrades, and lounge memberships. Airlines have made it more challenging to earn points through flying but offer significant bonuses for credit card sign-ups.
The second function is the possibility of earning status with the airline. The more you fly with one airline (or one of their alliance partners), the higher your status becomes. With higher status, you can enjoy perks such as free checked bags, upgrades, lounge access, and a dedicated service line. Additionally, the higher your status, the more points you’ll earn when you fly, making the two parts of the program interrelated.
While paying attention to the points-earning side of frequent flyer programs is important, getting status with an airline doesn’t make sense for most people.
I’ll see people wondering if they should make a mileage run to achieve status with an airline. A mileage run is a trip taken for the sole purpose of earning credits to reach the next level of status. Often, these trips are spent entirely on airplanes and in airports.
I understand when people ask why someone would do a trip like this. Is it worth paying for a flight to nowhere to earn status? But even more, does it even matter to try to earn status in the first place? Here’s why it doesn’t make sense for most travelers to worry about status and the rarer instances where they should bother chasing status.
Earning Status
The requirements to earn status vary with each airline. While the requirements used to depend on how many miles you flew with the airline, programs have now also added requirements of spending a certain amount of money for those flights for each category. Programs used to waive those spending requirements if you charged enough money on their co-brand credit cards, but even those workarounds have been severely reduced or even eliminated.
In other words, airlines want to reserve status for those who spend the most money. United took this a step further when it announced that in 2020, to earn status for 2021, the number of miles flown will no longer matter; instead, they’ll use the number of flight segments.
Here are the requirements and benefits for United MileagePlus for 2025:
To help decipher the jargon:
- PQF – Premier Qualifying Flights – Based on the number of flight segments flown, four of which need to be flown on United or United Express
- PQP – Premier Qualifying Points – Based on the base fare and carrier-imposed surcharge of flight purchases, along with seating purchases and paid upgrades
Status Benefits
The complete list of benefits is on the United website.
Having status does have its advantages, particularly at the higher Platinum and Premier 1K levels. Besides getting early access to upgrades, you also get Plus Points, which can be used to confirm upgrades, even to the Polaris class.
Getting to Platinum takes 36 flight segments and 12,000 Premier Qualifying Points or 15,000 PQP. That’s spending $12,000 or $15,000 on United tickets and fees for the year.
Silver status is more accessible to the regular traveler, as it only takes 12 segments (6 round-trip flights) and 4,000 PQP. However, you don’t get much more for that status than for having the United MileagePlus credit card. Access to Economy Plus seats at check-in is nice and worth something, but if you need to spend an extra $600 to reach status, does it make more sense to spend that on a flight you don’t need to take to get status or to use that $600 to pay for the upgraded seats as you need them.
If you’re wondering how often you’ll get upgraded as a Silver member, ask a Platinum member how frequently their upgrades clear. You’ll be two levels below them on the list.
Disadvantages of chasing status
What do you give up when trying to achieve a level of status with an airline? Flexibility, for starters. If you’re trying to get status with United, you’re not pursuing options from other airlines. You could end up paying more for tickets to reach the necessary number of segments. You could also be flying at worse times, suffering through added connections and flying to less convenient airports.
Of course, I’m just using United as an example, but the same could be said for any of the other airlines. American Airlines changed its AAdvantage program to one in which status is based on Loyalty Points. Instead of status being based on flight segments or the amount spent alone, American now counts points earned with a co-brand credit card, their dining program and shopping portal, and money spent on airfare toward earning status.
Since we don’t fly super often (obviously, it’s all relative. But figure one R/T flight every month or two) and have plenty of airline choices from Orlando, it’s pretty easy for us to not worry about status and just book the most convenient flight at a reasonable price. It’s an advantage of being disloyal.
I realize that everyone’s situation is different, and for some people, chasing status makes sense.
Who should pay attention to status?
The only people who should look to achieve status are frequent flyers who tend to fly a single airline at their home airport. This could be because you’re a hub captive passenger and have no choice as to which airline is the best for you.
For example, if you live near Atlanta, you will likely depend on Delta for much of your flying. The same goes for Denver residents with United, and those who live in Charlotte being tied to American. Going for status may make sense if you’re a frequent flyer from those cities. After all, there are a whole bunch of people at your home airport in the same position as you are being tied to a single airline and getting a higher level of status will give you a better chance of scoring an upgrade. If not, at least you can secure a better seat when you reserve your ticket instead of waiting until check-in. If I had no alternatives and had to fly 20 times a year with an airline, I’d want to try and make sure my trips with them are as comfortable as possible. Paying $600 for a flight to reach a status level would make sense because I’d save almost $1000 alone on fees for seat upgrades.
Another reason is if there’s a flight you take often that’s not tied to the main airline at the airport. If you live in Charlotte but need to fly to Newark, you could take American Airlines, but you’d be fighting against all of the other people with American status. It might be better to focus on United instead because there’d be fewer people with United status in Charlotte.
If you’re a frequent flyer but not a hub captive, I’d question whether sticking with only one airline to chase status is worthwhile. Having the flexibility to choose the best schedule and fare without being tied to a single airline is worth a great deal in my book. For me, that’s better than getting an occasional upgrade to first class and a free checked bag.
Final Thoughts
For someone like me who travels only occasionally, airline status holds little value. Nowadays, airlines have made it increasingly difficult for anyone other than their highest revenue customers to reach the top tiers of a program. Even for those with status, securing upgrades on popular routes can still be a challenge.
To be frank, if you’re not flying with an airline frequently enough to achieve status, then is it worth it? For those aspiring to be a Platinum Diamond Executive member, it’s important to realize that it may not be all it’s hyped up to be. Unless you’re constantly traveling, it may be more practical to purchase the most suitable ticket and occasionally splurge on an upgrade for a little bit of luxury. This approach is undoubtedly more cost-effective than spending $1,500 on a ticket to Singapore and back just to accumulate a few extra miles and reach the next level of a program.
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9 comments
I fly about as often as you do, based on your description, and yet the real value I find from having mid-tier status (e.g., I have American Platinum and the equivalent United Gold, am based in Northern Virginia/DC) is the soft treatment — I get protected first when things go sideways and have priority to standby for earlier flights if I finish what I’m doing and want to get home earlier.
Also, your suggestion that a Charlotte residence with frequent need to be in Newark be loyal to United over American — to be sure that person wouldn’t be competing with Charlotte-based American loyalists, but wouldn’t they be competing with Newark-based United loyalists going back home?
I added that part in because I’ve seen comments about how having low-tier status in a non-hub city can be more advantageous than having high-tier status in a hub. Maybe it wasn’t the best example of a city pair but you got the idea I was going for.
I’m a Charlotte-based flyer and a United loyalist. I agree with Joe’s assessment that having low-tier status in a non-hub city can be more advantageous than high-tier in a hub. Having progressed up through the UA tiers from sheer volume of travel, even back as a Silver, my upgrades out of Charlotte were better than 50% and I always got Economy Plus except maybe once or twice in recovery from a flight cancelations/misconnect. Commonly even non-revs and buddy passes make it into First on UA out of CLT. Newark is probably the hardest upgrade but even as a Gold I would have pretty good success. Dulles has always been an upgrade.. I don’t recall sitting in the back except once. Chicago and Denver even Silvers make it at least half the time.
On American as a Platinum, it’s want first/buy first to most major cities.
I fly weekly and am at about 150 segments YTD, with 10 more in the next 7 days alone. I’m bound to hit status once or twice just out of dumb luck. But these days First Class or premium seats (and really the base airfare) are so cheap – and I can plan most of my travel about 4 weeks out – I just buy the seat I want to end up with. Not going to go spend more money to get the next rung of status to have a better shot at scoring upgrades, when I could spend the money I would have spent chasing status on just buying the dang upgrade.
It was hilarious this week to watch some of the travel bloggers/”thought leaders” self-immolate over American doing away with physical Executive Platinum cards and bag tags because now how are they going to feel special? Sorry, but I laugh when I see someone with a veritable ring of color samples attached to their bag. I myself went and got a couple of low tier status tags (like United Silver) and slap one on my bag when I’m paying to sit in First, so I can make sure everyone walking by sees it and gets mildly annoyed their top tier behind is going to the narrower seats. I had someone on Delta last year pitch a fit and ask me rather nastily how the heck (to borrow a line from Fargo, but he didn’t use heck if you know what I mean) I was sitting up there. I said it’s very simple: I clicked the seat I wanted to sit on and I typed in my credit card number. Did I do something wrong?
The only status that I did do a little extra spend to get was with Spirit as their Gold status truly does have value to me. Free carry-on, free checked bag, free seat assignment into the exit row, one free itinerary change per reservation (this has been a Godsend), and they have a telephone number that actually gets answered within 60-90 seconds by a real person. And the free drink and snack on board doesn’t hurt. I was fine spending an extra couple hundred bucks to round off that one because I’ve probably realized $1000 in savings so far this year.
I did snag Diamond Plus Asiana status a few years ago, and I keep the luggage tag on because it: is pretty unique so I always know my bag; matters a little in a status-focused country like Korea. 🙂
To me, status only matters if you fly a lot. If you fly a lot, you’ll get status. The value of status is minor for me. It’s slightly earlier boarding to get overhead space and free checked luggage, which I rarely use except if I purposely check a bag in order to get the 20 minute guarantee. There are certain airports that have a good chance of getting the guarantee (PHL, DEN) and certain airports that the guarantee is rarely met (SFO, SEA, JFK)
Just moved to Atlanta from AA hub, going to stick with those guys though as although delta has non-stops where o need to travel for work, those flights are usually more expensive so technically, I’m saving my company money by buying cheaper flights on AA but connecting through either CLT or DFW. It helps that ATL had BA and QR flying out so i use them for my overseas trips but overall, delta also has pretty bad points value so no thanks
Another scenario. My goal to earn transferrable credit card points to all the airlines left out American, since other transferrable rewards have higher spend categories than what Bilt (American’s only US-based credit card points transfer partner) offers. So I would do my dining out, online shopping, home electric service, and occasionally hotel stays (usually Capital One Travel does better because of the 300 travel credit) through American Aadvantage. Well, last year when American converted to Loyalty Points, I unexpectedly ended up with Advantage Gold elite status this year even though I do not travel often (but American, JetBlue, and Spirit tend to be the lowest fares out of Houston to where I do travel). I doubt that will happen next year since there are no more rotting 500 mile upgrades to convert to Loyalty Points, and no more Northeast Alliance which had allowed me to credit JetBlue flights to American Aadvantage, and American raised next years Gold threshold to 40k from 30k. Though I have converted my Marriott Bonvoy to earn Advantage Miles instead of Marriott points, but with my infrequent travel doubt that will do the trick.
As a United Million Miler and living in Miami, I really get the benefit when flying internationally from having status. I get to use the lounges for free (with an economy ticket — not basic economy (who even does that?!)), free bags, preferential seating, preferential boarding, etc on ALL of United’s partners like Lufthansa, Avianca, Copa, etc. Having been through the ranks of being a nobody on airlines, once you get these perks, the economics of flying others start to really diminish. Like Miami is an American Airlines hub but they don’t status match, so it makes more sense for me to just fly a United partner or a ULC like Spirit (actually, Spirit status matches and am gold on them… so when I go to specific cities where Spirit flies, I’ll head to Fort Lauderdale to do it (tri-rail is $7.50 round trip)).