Well here’s a change that many American AAdvantage loyalists won’t be happy about…
In this post:
American makes major change to basic economy fares
As flagged by JonNYC, American Airlines seems to have just changed its policy on basic economy tickets. There’s no announcement, but if you go to American’s page about basic economy, you’ll now see the following:
Basic Economy fare tickets bought on or after 12:00 a.m. CT on December 17, 2025 will not earn AAdvantage miles or Loyalty Points. For Basic Economy fare tickets bought on or before 11:59 p.m. CT on December 16, 2025, visit the AAdvantage Earn page for the airline marketing your flight for details on the AAdvantage miles and Loyalty Points you’ll earn.
For context, up until now, American has awarded 2x AAdvantage miles and Loyalty Points on basic economy fares, compared to 5x AAdvantage miles and Loyalty Points on regular economy fares. So up until now, the earnings rate on basic economy was reduced by 60%, but now it has been reduced by 100%!
What’s American’s motive with basic economy changes?
Basic economy has become an incredibly valuable tool for airlines to both expand their customer base, and extract as much revenue out of passengers as possible. The goal with basic economy is twofold:
- To go after a different customer base that might have historically booked ultra low cost carriers, in order to fill seats
- To make the fare type punitive, in order to get people to buy up to a more expensive non-basic economy fare
It remains to be seen if American’s management is right, but I suspect the logic here is that American thinks it can get those who are engaged in AAdvantage to pay more to avoid basic economy. It’s interesting to see how the other two of the “big three” carriers approach this.
Delta also doesn’t award any miles or status qualification on basic economy fares, while United awards limited miles and status qualification on basic economy fares. That being said, for non-engaged flyers, United has by far the most punitive basic economy fares among the three carriers, since you’re not allowed a carry-on.
Obviously I’m not happy to see mileage and status qualification cut on any kinds of fares. That being said, I’m not sure American management is wrong with what it’s doing here. Will the increase in revenue from AAdvantage members buying up to more expensive fares exceed the lost business from those who are no longer loyal to American?
I suppose American isn’t really in a position right now to lose customers, though the airline definitely is in a position to try to improve yields.
Bottom line
American has quietly eliminated all mileage earning and status qualification on basic economy fares, for tickets booked as of December 17, 2025. Historically, the airline has offered both AAdvantage miles and Loyalty Points on these fares, so that represents quite a strategy shift. With this change, American is now more closely aligned with Delta than United on this front.
What do you make of American’s basic economy change?
The reality is, Economy Minus on AA was a bit too good to be true if you were an AA elite - you got all the same perks, with the only “cost” being 60% fewer loyalty points and AAdvantage shinplasters. If anything, it actively encouraged elites to book Economy Minus. Which you could easily earn back through regular spending if you really wanted to. Frankly surprised it took them this long to shut it down.
One has to wonder if this might have to be aligned with the imminent demise of Spirit. Clock is ticking for those of us that credit flights like these to Alaska.
Not clear to me...Will this affect crediting flights to other airlines? (Alaska, BA, etc.)
It looks like these aren’t the only AAdvantage updates coming down the pike (https://www.aa.com/i18n/aadvantage-program/aadvantage-program-updates.jsp)
This is exceedingly stupid, even for AA management. American was drawing people from ULCC's by offering the same fare with advantages like a frequent flier program. Now they take away that one compelling advantage?
@Christian - I suppose AA still has the advantage of a more comfortable coach seats compared to Spirit ot Frontier. That is why as a 6'3" male, if the price between the basic fares for Frontier, Spirit, and AA are the same, I will still choose AA despite this change (though realistically, I will likely buy up to a regular economy fare).
Let’s just hope everyone else doesn’t start going down the same road.
How AAbsurd.