Do American Airlines Advantage Do miles ever expire? In the end yes, and it seems that that won’t change anytime soon.
American Airlines stands largely alone among the four largest U.S. airlines controlling about 80% of the U.S. market share in the airline industry.
AAdvantage miles expire after 24 months of inactivity.
Value verification: Are airline credit cards worth it?
While there are easy ways to keep your miles active, American’s policy is certainly stricter than what you’ll find at its major competitors. Frequent flyer miles never expire for Delta Sky Miles, United Mileage Plus and Southwest Quick Rewards members, for example.
Could the United States change its policy? In the airline industry, airlines frequently make policy changes to match their competitors. Look no further than the Wave of airlines raising baggage fees in early 2024, or the step towards which a long list of airlines worldwide have advanced dynamic prize price.
However, it appears that American is in no rush to change its stance on mileage expiration.
Read more: How to prevent your airline and hotel points and miles from expiring
The United States maintains its current maturity policy
Last month, on the company’s third-quarter earnings conference call, a Wall Street analyst asked U.S. CEO Robert Isom if the company had any plans to follow in the footsteps of its biggest competitors and move to a policy of “miles never expire.”
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“We are constantly looking for ways to better engage our customers, not only from a loyalty perspective, but also from a value perspective,” Isom responded, offering a fairly indirect answer to the question, but one that seemed to suggest that American is comfortable with its policy, as it is.
“While there may be some airlines that are doing something different, I know one thing: If you look at any type of evaluation of the value of a mile at American Airlines, compared to any other, you will see that they absolutely create more value for our customers,” he added. Isom.
How much are airline miles worth?
To be fair, Isom is right about the value of the American loyalty currency. Based on TPG November 2024 Points and Miles ratingsAAdvantage miles are worth approximately 1.6 cents per mile. It is currently the best of any U.S. airline, surpassing Delta SkyMiles (1.2 cents), United MileagePlus miles (1.35 cents), Southwest Rapid Rewards points (1.4 cents), Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles (1.4 cents) and JetBlue TrueBlue points (1.3 cents).
How to prevent AAdvantage miles from expiring
We should also note that while AAdvantage miles technically expire after 24 months of account inactivity, it’s incredibly easy to keep your miles active.
Earning or redeeming miles on a single flight will be enough. You can also keep your miles active without even leaving home by earning miles through AAdvantage e-procurement portal or another of American’s eligible shopping, travel or dining partners.
Plus, even if your miles expire, there are ways to restore up to half a million miles after the fact.
It’s also important to know that miles never expire for AAdvantage members who have a US credit card. co-branded credit card. That includes the Citi®/AAdvantage® Executive World Elite Mastercard® (see rates and fees), which carries a hefty annual fee of $595 but includes free access to American’s network Admirals clubs.
Read more: Citi/AAdvantage Executive World Elite Mastercard Review: Complimentary Admirals Club Membership
It’s not just American
Mileage expiration is much more common in international airline loyalty programs, including popular programs like Air France-KLM Flying Blue, Air Canada airplane, British Airways Executive Club and Emirates towards the sky – just to name a few. (Exact policies differ from carrier to carrier.)
Meanwhile, on the hotel front here in the US, multiple notable loyalty programs, including Marriott Bonvoy, Hilton Honors and Hyatt WorldThey stipulate that points expire after two consecutive years of inactivity.
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