American Airlines is offering up to a 45% discount when buying AAdvantage miles —this equates to around 1.76 US cents per mile at the best-value tier.
These offers run almost monthly (see Offer history for details of past points value). The lowest price is usually offered in the middle of the year, followed by the end/start of the year.
Buying AAdvantage miles makes the most sense when topping up your balance for a specific Business or First Class redemption on American Airlines, a oneworld partner like Qantas or Qatar Airways, or Alaska Airlines.
The current AAdvantage purchase miles promotion
- Discount: 10% – 45% off (tiered)
- Valid until: 30 July
- Best-value redemptions: domestic Qantas Business Class, Fiji Airways Business to Fiji, Qantas/Cathay Pacific/Japan Airlines Business & First within/to/from Asia, and Qatar Business Class to Europe
- Book awards online: for AA, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Etihad, British Airways and some others—full list
- Book awards over the phone: for other partners, you can only book over the phone and may be charged a US$30-40 fee, but ask the phone agent to waive it if you weren’t able to book online
- Link: buy AAdvantage miles
This promotion yields the cheapest per mile price of ~1.76 US cents per mile when buying exactly 150,000 miles for US$2,636.97.
Note: AAdvantage miles expire after 18 months of inactivity in your account, so make sure to keep your account active by earning/redeeming miles regularly.
Why purchase AAdvantage miles?
- For oneworld partner redemptions: American Airlines is a member of the oneworld alliance, so you can redeem AAdvantage miles across any oneworld airline, including Qantas, Cathay Pacific, British Airways and Qatar Airways
- Very helpful award hold policy: with AA, it is possible to hold award bookings for up to five days (if booking more than two weeks from departure) or 24 hours (if booking closer), allowing you to pencil in plans and then confirm the ticket once you’ve bought or transferred the miles into your account. This policy makes it really easy to make risk-free redemption holds while you re-confirm total costs of making your booking and buying the points
- More generous point promotions than Qantas and Velocity: AAdvantage offers the option of purchasing miles outright at a fixed value, unlike Qantas Frequent Flyer and Velocity, where points purchases are both expensive and limited in the amount you can buy
The best value AAdvantage redemptions for Australian and NZ travellers
Here are some of the better-priced and more readily available awards for travellers from Australia and NZ:
| Example redemption | AAdvantage miles required | Cost (USD) with latest promotion at highest bonus tier* |
|---|---|---|
| Any Qantas domestic Business Class flight | 20000 | $352 |
| To New Zealand in Qantas Business Class | 25000 | $440 |
| To Fiji in Qantas or Fiji Airways Business Class | 30000 | $528 |
| To Asia in Qantas/Cathay Pacific/Japan Airlines Business Class | 40000 | $704 |
| To Asia in Qantas/Japan Airlines First Class | 60000 | $1056 |
| To the US in Qantas/AA Business Class | 80000 | $1408 |
| To Europe in oneworld/Etihad Business Class | 85000 | $1496 |
*All redemption prices are in USD, one-way, and do not include booking fees, taxes, and other charges
Factors to consider when purchasing AAdvantage miles
Just like any miles purchase deal, you’ll need to take into consideration the following factors:
- The cost of the miles required for your intended route
- The US$30-40 phone booking fee for some partners
- The USD:AUD exchange rate
- The taxes that come along with the booking, which are most easily confirmed by American over the phone
- The time taken to research award availability and make the booking
- AAdvantage accounts less than 30 days old are not permitted to buy or gift miles, so register for an account now so you can take advantage of future promotions
- AAdvantage usually lets you purchase or gift 100,000-150,000 miles (not including the bonus miles on offer) per year per account receiving the miles, so ensure you are buying into a deal when you have a redemption in mind or you think it’s a really good one
- Be sure to get to the checkout page to see the full cost of your purchase including all USD fees and taxes
Offer history
The simplest way to track historical AAdvantage offers is with the US-cents-per-mile cost for the best offer tier for that period:
| Date | Cost per mile (US cents) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| July 2020 | 1.76 | |
| April-May 2020 | 1.84 | |
| March-April 2020 | 1.6 | Lowest |
| March 2020 | 1.86 | |
| February 2020 | 1.86 | |
| January 2020 | 1.78 | |
| December 2019 | 1.89 | |
| November 2019 | 2.01 | |
| October 2019 | 2.03 | |
| September 2019 | 2.08 | |
| August 2019 | 1.84 | |
| June-August 2019 | 1.73 | |
| May 2019 | 1.92 | |
| March-April 2019 | 1.92 | |
| February 2019 | 2.03 | |
| January 2019 | 2.10 | |
| December 2018 | 1.77 | |
| November 2018 | 1.92 | |
| September 2018 | 2.08 | |
| August 2018 | 1.84 | |
| June-August 2018 | 1.72 | |
| May 2018 | 2.08 | |
| March 2018 | 1.81 | |
| February 2018 | 2.02 | |
| January 2018 | 2.13 | |
| December 2017 | 1.77 | |
| November 2017 | 1.91 | |
| October 2017 | 2.10 | |
| September 2017 | 2.02 | |
| August 2017 | 1.83 | |
| June-July 2017 | 1.72 | |
| May 2017 | 1.77 | |
| March 2017 | 1.80 | |
| February 2017 | 2.24 | Highest |
| January 2017 | 2.13 | |
| December 2016 | 1.77 | |
| November 2016 | 1.90 | |
| September 2016 | 2.02 | |
| August 2016 | 2.00 | |
| June 2016 | 1.72 | |
| May 2016 | 1.89 | |
| March 2016 | 1.81 | |
| February 2016 | 2.02 | |
| January 2016 | 2.13 | |
| December 2015 | 1.81 | |
| November 2015 | 1.98 | |
| October 2015 | 2.10 | |
| August 2015 | 2.09 | |
| July 2015 | 2.00 | |
| May-June 2015 | 2.06 | |
| May 2015 | 2.09 | |
| April 2015 | 2.00 | |
| February 2015 | 2.07 | |
| January 2015 | 2.14 | |
| Average | 1.94 |
Why purchasing AAdvantage miles is easier than earning them
The most common way to acquire AAdvantage miles for Australian and NZ travellers outside of flights would be to either:
- purchase them (the purpose of this guide)
- earn them through hotel stays, car rental or the AAdvantage online shopping mall for purchases from US retailers
Marriott Bonvoy is also a points transfer partner.
Purchasing miles directly from American Airlines is usually the most cost-effective method if you have a specific flight you are targeting.
With most of these promotions I am usually quite risk-averse, and would only recommend purchasing miles for topping up an account or buying the full chunk of miles if you have a specific redemption in mind, but not to purchase speculatively. Your preferences may differ though!
Making your booking
Bookings using your miles can be made online if looking to fly American, British Airways, Qantas, Etihad or a few other airline partners.
If not, they’ll have to be made over the phone with the (usually excellent) call centre for the region, which happens to be in Fiji.
From Australia, you can contact them on (02) 9101 1948, selecting option 2 for award travel.
Be sure to check the taxes and fees that will be incurred with your booking as well. I find the easiest way to do this is simply to research availability online on the Qantas website and call AAdvantage to price up the booking.
Summing up
The appeal of AAdvantage has declined since their devaluation in March 2016, but Australia and New Zealand still do have some well-priced redemption opportunities available to use for cheaper premium cabin flights by buying miles and immediately redeeming them.
AAdvantage’s generous award hold policy makes the process much less risky, allowing you to hold an award, buy the miles and then call back to get it ticketed once they are added to your account.
Buying miles to redeem for flights in this way is still time-consuming, requiring you to research availability to death before you can book.
Whilst there aren’t many valuable deals for Economy travellers here, if you are keen for a Business or First Class bargain, you can still pick one up when buying AAdvantage miles.
You can purchase AAdvantage miles here.
Are you new to the purchasing points game?
If you’re new to the world of buying points/miles, we’ve written a full intro guide.
You can also access more comprehensive guides for buying points in each individual frequent flyer program below.
I am wondering what the catch is here. Basically, if I spend $1470USD ($2200 AUD approx) I could buy enough points for a business class redemption from Melbourne to europe?! Would Ireland (Dublin) be classed as Europe?! Or would that be ultra long haul? I currently fly home once a year and am looking at ways to minimise the back pain i get from sitting down for too long. Can one book a leg of a flight in business class and the other leg economy or is that not allowed? if so, might this be a good way to balance redmption spend vs back pain!
Cheers
I hope that helps and happy travels!
I know that the maximum AAdvantage points you can buy excluding bonuses is at 150k per calendar year. I already purchase 150k and have been trying to add 60K via their website it seems to allow me to purchase more. I haven’t finalised but before you’ll get a prompt that you had exceeded the maximum points but the prompt is not coming up this time. Have anyone of you guys know if someone had purchased more than 150K in a calendar year and was successful?
Perhaps it’s a glitch in your case. Or sometimes—speaking generally about frequent flyer programs, not AAdvantage in particular—they will up the maximum for a particular promotion.
I would like to know if I can transfer AA points to SPG? Since I want to transfer SPG points to Japan Airlines FF, but I can’t seem to see the option on AA website. Also, has anyone flown from Melbourne – Chicago using Japan Airline Business class? I am quite interested in this airline for this route.
Thanks a lot,
Uyen Le
Unfortunately Qantas don’t fly to Vietnam so this is why you can’t book it online through AA. You can however call them on 0291011948 and connect onto Malaysian or Cathay Pacific from one of the Qantas hubs in SEA ie: BKK, SIN or HKG, of course this is subject to Availability of award seats.
To find partner award not visible on AA’s website I suggest using Qantas to search for seats or British Airways (you will need to set in a free account) search google for “AA award search British Airways” for more information.
AAdvantage current has Up to 115,000 bonus miles currently (22/03/2018), i’ve had a look at flights from MEL to CDG, however, through Asia, and the Middle East and unfortunately no luck in July-Aug.
Have looked up Qantas, Emirates, even Advantage with no luck and have been on the phone, has anyone recently had any luck
I have quite a broad question for you;
Am looking at a one way business flight from MEL- LAX in May and just wanting to work out what the best service is (regardless of stops or not) and secondly whether there are any good deals or hacks that you expect might appear again over the next few months that would be worth jumping on?
Have a nice tally of Qantas points, however feel there business service has dropped of late.
Keen to get your thoughts
Cheers Ed
I dont think its correct to say ETIHAD Business to Europe is good value for Australians
SYD-LON is 85,000 points – yes good. But if flying Etihad, you need to break in AUH, so its 80,000SYD-AUH then another 42,500 = 122,500 to London.
My last AA purchase in July (The best deal to date) cost me AU$5580 after taxes, commission & conversion etc for 250,00o points (150k purchase +100k bonus). So thats AU2.23c/mile.
That makes Etihad return to London AU$5469 which is close to a discounted cash purchase….
Whereas other if not Etihad, AA redeems SYD-LON Rtn at 170,000 points so this would be AU3794 to me. OK’ish….
Trying to get from MEL to NYC (Business) in November. I’m reluctant to buy any Miles without being confident I can actually get my flight. So when I had a look at the AA offer, and punched in flights for Nov they didn’t return much (Economy only on the way and nothing available for 1 week either side of my return leg). I rang the Sydney number as suggested and the lady had the same result but did suggest I try again in a few days.
What’s the best way to do this – I’m not too fused whether the discount is 40% or 50% etc but just want to secure a Business class (or better) better at a reasonably specific time.
I’d pay someone to help organise this for me!
Yes, as you definitely should be. There is no best way to do this, other than to keep looking and see if you can find reward flights for the dates you want to travel – using Qantas.com to look for classic award availability may be easier and should still line up with what AA has on offer – and then if you find them, book using points checking the taxes first.
We have a whole series on the basics of buying points / miles here which may help.
When you say you check availability on Qantas’s website then ring AA, do you search for reward flights or normal payed flights? Also to get the seat held, do you do that through Qantas or AA?
Can I buy these miles and use them to upgrade from economy to business on on a qantas flight SYD>LON?
Thanks
Thank you,
Tim
At the same sale period, return economy to Europe was under $1k!
I am currently researching and planning for a (1st) family holiday overseas to Hawaii. The AA scheme looks attractive. I jumped on AA site and wanted to check out Business Class for dates in June 2017 but says not available. Should I take this as gospel? The business class comes up until the month of March 2017 then after that nothing. Can I buy miles from this site and use them to book QANTAS flights to Hawaii? Appreciate your time.
First of all, award seat availability is getting more and more limited. It’s hard to find for us commoners not in the industry, unless we’re extremely flexible and/or are extremely passionate (ie. follows FlyerTalk threads and/or subscribes to ExpertFlyer…)
When return business class tickets from Oz to Europe can be had for ~$5000 when on sale, compared to US$3434 + taxes (in the table above), I know which I would rather. I lock down my dates of travel, wait for sales and have the flight I want, and collect points + status credits. No working around dates with reward availability, routing availability…
Just my 2c worth. But do tell me if my reasoning is flawed.
You won’t find availability for all American partners on the AA website – Qantas are on there, but Cathay are not, for example. So you can research availability by using Qantas.com, or the British Airways website if you become a member there. Cathay and Qatar both show up on the BA website, for example.
Have a read of the beginners guide to buying miles for more.
And no, Qantas Points can’t be transferred to any other currency,
I was just wondering. With my AA account am I able to purchase a ticket for someone else in their name using my points (they do not have an AA account) or does it need to be in my name?
Thank-you,
Zac
Cheers,
Zac
I have booked a number of partner awards with and AA – in every case it has waived the phone booking fee for Partner Awards that can’t be booked online such as Etihad. Their agents are generally very well trained and helpful (another big plus) and in every case they have waived the fee without me even having to ask.
Thanks if you can help
I have contacted American direct, via social media and via other blogs and NOTHING has been done by the web team.
Availability looks fantastic on the website, but 95% is false.
If you ring they will find the odd BA flight with heavy surcharges, as Sophie mentioned.
I asked them is it incompetence or fraud?
I checked the AA website which showed good availability to London so went ahead and bought the miles for a First class redemption. Every time I go and book the flights showing as available, the site tells me the flights I’m selecting are not available anymore. Still trying to get my money back. How are you supposed to know that their site in showing ghost seats?
Anyone has had the same problem?
Some suggestions…
Have you tried calling back and seeing if a different agent can book them? Also worth calling a different call centre as well, i.e. call the US via Skype or similar if you were calling the Australian number before (or vice versa).
Can you find business availability instead?
If you need help with looking for alternative options if the above doesn’t work, shoot me a message via the Help function at the bottom corner of your browser/device window.
You’ll know this now, but for others I’d always worth calling to make sure the seats are definitely bookable before buying.
You are not alone.
I have contacted them multiple times and it’s still the same!
I’m new to purchasing miles so apologies if the question is rather stupid, I’m looking to take advantage of the AAdvantage point bonus when buying miles and would like to book a return flight from HKG to LAX. However I would prefer to fly AA’s oneworld partner Cathay instead, could anyone please tell me how I would redeem this flight online? As Cathay does not show up as an option when booking on AA’s website.
Thanks!
Another question: how soon can one reasonably expect to find business class seats? I ask because I’m currently waiting to hear if I’m to be posted to the U.S. for work. If I am, my employer will be giving me cash for business class flights for all three of us at full price – but I book myself and can keep the difference. As you can imagine, my wife and I are keen to save as much as possible!
If I get the posting, I’ll most likely have two to three months warning of a move. So, if there’s an offer to buy points, is it realistic to think we can buy the necessary points and get three business class trips to the states at such short notice?
Thanks. And love the blog and your new email course – very eye opening!
2-3 months booking ahead is tricky. You’ll probably find this is the toughest time to book award seats. But – you if you can wait until last minute, you might be able to find some availability. It’s a tricky conundrum though given your situation. I’d probably suggest that if you know you can use the points for other trips back home it won’t be too risky to buy them – worst case scenario you can try and redeem them for a trip in a year’s time if you want to come back to visit family/friends, if you can’t find availability. It wouldn’t be ideal though, of course.
I’d also suggest draughting in an award point booking service to help you find seats for your trip either way to give you the best shot at using them.
Or – just enjoy the fact that your employer will pay for your travel and get the exact dates, routing and airline you’re after – and minimise the stress. You’ll have enough going on as it is moving overseas, monitoring flight options you might just want to park and give a miss. Your call!
Thanks for your reply – I really appreciate you taking the time out to answer my question. I had thought about buying the points and keeping them if they can’t be used – but they’re not cheap and if I can’t use them for this purpose, then I’m out of pocket at a time I least can afford to be. I thought I might hit the call centre as soon as I have a decision on the job and see what they can organise and/or call in the experts before I buy the points and see where that gets me. If that fails… oh well, then I go to plan B and pay full fare – it’s not a bad situation to be in! You’re definitely right that I’ll have enough to worry about without adding the stress of monitoring flights constantly.
Thanks again.
I’m new to this so I just wonder a couple things.
1.Do I book my ticket with my AA miles through the AA website (we are traveling from Australia-Europe)?
2.How long are the points valid?
Milage expiry – none, but you need to have some activity in your account once per year, from memory.
Just a quick question – how can I book CX biz award flights with AA miles? I tried using AA website but was only shown AA biz award flights..
Thanks!
Ah, I assume you mean Emirates Syd-Bkk? No, American won’t let you use points on Emirates even if it is a Qantas codeshare.
Thanks
Govale
The main thing is not to buy outside of a promotion and to have a use in mind for the miles as you can only buy limited amounts!
Cheers.
Forgive the newby question but when it comes to redeeming AAdvantage miles, do you actually get to choose which partner airline you get to fly with? Ie. You aren’t just spotted in on whatever codes are it’s running in that region.
Thanks also for all the info you provide on this site. It really is a great resource.
You certainly do choose what airline you want to fly – if they have points seat availability, you can book it. Nothing to do with American codeshares.
I didnt even realise Alaska Airlines had their own points special recently. They seem to have the best deal at the moment as they have AA/QF/EY/BA/CX partnerships.
If someone purchases points on AA can they transfer that to their Alaska Airlines account ?
I checked out Etihad awards booking and I almost got a heart attack when I read how many miles are required for a return trip to Europe from Melb. From memory it came to about 700K miles. If these award flights are available on Etihad then I can double check that AA’s customer centre in Sydney right ? In theory it should come to 120K miles with AA through Etihad.
Your tip on another post about Nexus was fantastic.
thanks
AA and Alaska programs can’t be linked, you buy points in one of those programs and you have to redeem them there. They share some partner airlines though, that’s about the extent of the linkage in terms of redemptions.
Etihad redemptions with AA are not at the 700k mark – I am guessing you saw the high level Etihad Guest pricing on their website? You do need to be aware that with Etihad redemptions with AA from AU to Europe for example AA will make you pay for AU-Abu Dhabi and Abu-Dhabi Europe as two separate awards which costs a bit more. If they are available with Etihad at the LOW level (so not the 700k mark) then they should be available through AA. So it will be more than 120k unfortunately.
And yes, you can double check using their Australian phone number and get them to help with research.
Thanks for your great posts.
Just with checking availability on Qantas.com, there seems to be very little available for first class award travel, actually for all classes of travel to the U.S. Is this usually the case for travel to the U.S.? I’m looking at tickets for Syd to DFW (San Antonio actually) in Sept 2015.
Am I better off ringing AA australian call centre and find what’s available or logging onto AAdvantage and checking there?
Thanks
There are some tricks to get around this such as booking using BA or Qantas points, waiting, cancelling, then rebooking on AA at 330 days prior to travel, but it’s not easy for a number of reasons. Otherwise you just have to keep looking and hoping someone else cancels their ticket and it comes back into inventory and is available to book again.
Given it is less than 330 days out before I want to travel and take advantage of these bonus miles, should I check through AA? Or availability is the same as what’s on Qantas?
Thanks again!
Certain carriers incur different charges, and I’m not sure on Etihad and AA. Just give them a call to confirm.
Thanks for the tip, I’ll ring and ask.
had the opportunity to go J or F next month out of HKG the good woman said no lets sit together as we always do in business class!.