Over the last several decades, airlines have banded together into air alliances and networks, allowing you to fly on one airline and redeem your points on another. Or, accumulate miles on two different airlines, then spend those miles for flights on a third.
This wasn’t always the case, though. Once upon a time, Air Mile programs allowed you to earn free flights but simultaneously kept you “hostage” to a single airline. If you split your flights between multiple providers, you never accumulated enough miles on any given one to make real progress toward those upgrades and free flights.
Now, thankfully with the creation of air alliances, travelers get rewarded for their mileage. Yet, navigating these alliances can get confusing. This is why our researchers at Skyscanner have put together this simple guide to navigating this lesser-understood part of travel.
An air alliance is a group of airlines who have a business partnership. When you earn miles on carriers within the alliance, you can spend those miles on any member airline. In theory…
In reality, restrictions and blackout dates apply. Also, each alliance has its own set of rules on the redemption of those miles. Make sure to “read the fine print” of your air mile network so that your plan works within the rules of any given group.
Air Alliances: The Big Three
There are three major air mile alliances: Star Alliance, Oneworld Alliance, and Skyteam. In addition, several of the smaller airlines have a variety of connections and partnerships with other outliers. These outliers let you spend miles as though they were in a network together.
Star Alliance: this is the largest and oldest of the alliances, with 25 member airlines as of January, 2019:
Aegean, Air Canada, Air India, Air New Zealand, ANA, Asiana, Austrian, AviancaTACA, Brussels, Copa, Croatia, EgyptAir, Ethiopian, EVA, LOT Polish, Lufthansa, Scandinavian, Shenzhen, Singapore, South African, SWISS, TAP Portugal, THAI, Turkish, and United.
Oneworld Alliance: the Pepsi to Star Alliance’s Coke, this is the second oldest with 14 members as of January, 2019:
Airberlin, American, British, Cathacy Pacific, Finnair, Iberia, JAL, LATAM, Malaysia Air, Qantas, Qatar, Royal Jordanian, S7 Air, and SriLankan.
SkyTeam Alliance: the third to form; some say this air alliance was founded in “self-defense” as the airlines, not part of the other two, bonded together. It has 20 member airlines as of January 2019:
Aeroflot, Aerolineas Argentinas, Aeromexico, Air Europa, Air France, Alitalia, China Air, China Eastern, China Southern, Czech, Delta, Garuda Indonesia, Kenya Air, KLM, Korean Air, Middle East Air, Sudia, TAROM, Vietnam Air, and Xiamen.
These airlines include Aer LIngus, Air Dolomiti, Air India, Air Malta, Air Tahiti Nui, Alaska, Bangkok, Condor, Hawaiian, Jet Airways, Luxair, and the various Virgin airlines.
Other Options
Several other airlines are not part of any given air alliance, but have a web of partnerships with one another. Some of those partnerships even extend into the Big Three for limited kinds of flights.
These relationships are complicated, so do your due diligence before making plans based on air miles with these airlines. Still, they can lead to big savings if you play your cards right.
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