Yay, it looks like it’s finally possible to redeem Alaska Mileage Plan miles for travel on Singapore Airlines, and the implementation is better than I was expecting.
In this post:
Slow Progress With The Alaska & Singapore Partnership
Back in August 2017, Alaska Airlines and Singapore Airlines announced a partnership, which would offer reciprocal mileage earning and redemption opportunities for members of both programs.
While I appreciate Alaska’s unique array of airline partners, I’ve been quite disappointed by the pace at which they’ve been rolling out the features of some of their recent partnerships.
The airlines launched reciprocal mileage earning as of September 2017. Also as of that time, it became possible to redeem Singapore KrisFlyer miles for travel on Alaska.
It has already been possible to redeem Singapore miles on Alaska
It was announced at the time that Alaska Mileage Plan redemptions for travel on Singapore Airlines would be launched at a later date, though up until now that hasn’t happened. Well, it looks like this is finally the time.
Redeem Alaska Miles On Singapore Airlines
Singapore Airlines awards are now showing up on Alaska Airlines’ website, and in the meantime the award charts have been posted as well:
How Many Alaska Miles Does It Take To Redeem On Singapore Airlines?
For flights between the US and Asia, Alaska Mileage Plan is charging 47,500 miles in economy or 100,000 miles in business class one-way, and there are no surcharges.
For flights within Southeast Asia, Alaska is charging 17,500 miles in economy or 25,000 miles in business class.
For flights between Southeast Asia and North Asia, Alaska is charging 22,500 miles in economy or 60,000 miles in business class.
Even first class awards are possible, though only within Asia. The cost just 35,000 miles one-way, and for that you could fly Beijing to Singapore to Hong Kong, for example. You can even have a stopover, so that’s a pretty incredible value.
As usual, Alaska Mileage Plan allows stopovers even on one-way awards, so you can always have a stopover on your one-way itinerary. Furthermore, positioning flights on Alaska Airlines are included to your long haul gateway.
It’s possible they’re still loading some availability, but as of now:
- Apparently premium economy awards aren’t possible (which is surprising)
- While first class awards are technically possible, I only see availability within Asia
- It’s not possible to redeem miles between the US and Europe (Singapore Airlines flies from New York to Frankfurt and from Houston to Manchester)
The Great News
What’s exciting here is that it’s actually possible to redeem Alaska miles for long haul business class awards on Singapore Airlines, and even for regional first class.
Historically Singapore Airlines has only made long haul economy award seats available to partner airlines, so it’s surprising to see that not be the case for Alaska. Of course I wouldn’t exactly call redemption rates a steal, but still, the fact that there’s any availability at all in long haul business class is very nice.
This Still Isn’t How I Would Redeem Alaska Miles
While this option is nice, for someone with access to US credit cards, this isn’t how I would redeem my valuable Alaska miles.
Singapore KrisFlyer is transfer partners with Amex Membership Rewards, Capital One, Chase Ultimate Rewards, and Citi ThankYou, so there are lots of easy ways to earn KrisFlyer miles. Their redemption rates are a bit lower, and you can also redeem for first class on eligible routes, so personally I’d rather use transferable points.
- 5x total points on travel purchased through Chase Travel
- 3x points on dining
- 2x points on travel purchases
- $95
- 3x points on Travel after the $300 Annual Travel Credit
- 3x points on Dining
- $300 Travel Credit
- $550
- 4x points at restaurants
- 4x points at U.S. supermarkets, on up to $25,000 in purchases annually
- 3x points on flights booked directly with airlines or through amextravel.com
- $250
- Earn 5x points on flights purchased directly from airlines or through Amex Travel (up to $500k/year)
- $200 Annual Uber Credit
- Amex Centurion Lounge Access
- $695
- Earn 3x Points on Airfare
- Earn 3x Points on Hotels
- Earn 3x Points at Restaurants
- $95
- Earn 2x miles on every purchase
- No Foreign Transaction Fees
- 10,000 bonus miles every account anniversary
- $395
- Earn unlimited 2X miles on every purchase, every day
- No Foreign Transaction Fees
- Global Entry/TSA Pre-Check Credit
- $95
Best Ways To Earn Alaska Airlines Miles
If you’re looking to earn Mileage Plan miles so that you can redeem on their great airline partners, consider the Alaska Airlines Visa® Credit Card (review) and Alaska Airlines Visa® Business card (review). These cards offer valuable long-term perks for Alaska frequent flyers, like a first checked bag free, savings on inflight purchases, and more.
See this post for everything you need to know on the best credit cards for earning Alaska miles.
Bottom Line
It seems like Alaska Mileage Plan is in the process of adding all Singapore Airlines award availability. So far awards are available in economy and business class between the US and Asia, and also within Asia. There are even some first-class awards within Asia.
If anyone comes across other regions that are also bookable, please let me know.
While redemption rates are steep, I’m impressed that Alaska has access to long haul business class award space at all.
Anyone plan to redeem Alaska miles on Singapore Airlines?
(Tip of the hat to @laikin8)
It seems to have been fixed, but the number of miles required have gone up from, 35k for first to 75k from Singapore to Shanghai/Beijing. SQ must have wised up to it.
Yeah, it seems that they've removed the SIN stopover, not just for within Southeast Asia but between Southeast Asia and North Asia. Luckily, you can still do a stopover for Southeast Asia to USA and reverse, but that's definitely not as useful and not a particularly great use of miles.
I'm glad I got in when the getting was good, but it is unfortunate they removed this.
I tried many cities and it seems to be fixed after all
It seems like no more stopover allowed on one way ticket using AS.
I am unable to book multi-city tickets on SQ. It was still fine yesterday. Anyone facing the same issue?
@Nicholas - I was looking to book PVG-SIN-HKG for 2 in June 20 for my wife and I in First but no First available on A380, only the "normal" first seats. And the bigger issue. Only 1 seat available. We could do like you did, book 1 F and 1 J. Possibly hope for one more F seat to open up... But I think we'll be happy with 2 "secured" A380 J seats.
The partnership is not as good as stated, as there is some blocking going on.
For example, SIN-HKG in F may have saver award space on Krisflyer (on the 77w and, more rarely, on the A380) but Mileage Plan shows nothing avalaible.
SIN-PEK is easier to find saver award space in F. There is plenty on the 77w and some on the A380, but Mileage Plan doesn't show any on the A380.
And it prices PEK-SIN-HKG on SQ, but PVG-SIN-HKG not, only on JL.
@Ray Liu - I was able to book two tickets yesterday. One for my wife in F and one for myself in J. It may have just been the case that availability disappeared when you were looking.
PVG-SIN / SIN-HKG was 35,000 + $62 in F and 25,000 + $62 in J (flights currently operated by the new A380 on those routes so my wife will get to enjoy the new suites).
You can do SIN-Australia and NZ including the old suites SIN-AKL for 90k miles.
Oh well, that perfectly justified why AA will terminate partnership with Alaska Airlines.
We will continue to offer global connectivity for our guests through our oneworld partners.
They should add Asia-Australia redemption option, that seemed to be a wasted opportunity.
Right now it is only possible to redeem Alaska miles for Asia-Australia on Cathay, and I only see CX HKG-Aus J availability once per few months (via BA.com)
Hi Lucky,
I tried to book award flights using AS for SQ flights, though available space was found but could not book after submitting credit card info. I called Alaska right away seems right now no one has successfully able to book any flights with SQ through AS.
I like how Australia once again doesn't seem to get a partner to Asia - it seems to be a Cathay monopoloy, and with the lack of award seats - it'll never change.
LAX-SIN-HND : 80k
If someone plans to go around North and Southeast Asia, it can be an option.
TPE and Greater china are included in Southeast Asia, so only for Japan and Korea.
It may also effective for Singaporean to plan two trip to United States and Japan/Korea.
Checked from JFK, I saw interesting route.
JFK-FRA-SIN-HND/NRT : 80k
If funny guy prepare one-way ticket for HND/NRT - United States, he or she can plan simple round the world trip.
I tried making a HAN-SIN-BOM booking (which should price out at 25k using the award chart for 'Asia' to 'India and South Asia,') but both the online portal and the phone agent see a price of 65k one way.
Makes no sense why this would happen.
@Christian Its extremely difficult to ever get that redemption for one person let alone two.
Never thought I'd see the day where SQ made its First Class awards bookable with partner miles. Just got the HKG => SIN => PEK flight (with HKG => SIN in Business 'cause there were no First awards on my dates) award for 35k miles; unbelievable value
It’s a shame that they haven’t included redemptions on the two transatlantic routes, especially with AS dropping AA as a partner. Maybe that can be revisited between AS and SQ after next March?
Just used 200k AS for 2 RT with CX biz from JFK-HKG-BKK, 4 days stopover in HKG. Don't even have to look for availability. I called Alaska twice and both times the agent offered to look for availability. There's a $25/tix partner booking fee but very easy.
So it's not possible to redeem AS miles to fly SQ from SE Asia/North Asia to Indian subcontinent/Middle East and Europe?
Just a heads up to anyone considering purchasing Alaska miles be careful. I bought some more the other day when an award I wanted was available. I bought the miles and they took 3 days to post instead of instantly as they have done the last 3 years I have been buying Alaska miles.
Of course the ticket was gone once the miles posted....last time for me.
@Kalboz
What tjp74 said. It's also 70K for CX FC with AS mile, which is pretty common knowledge. CX J/F is by far by favorite redemption with AS mileage plan now that EK is dead.
If my understanding is correct, SQ will be merging SilkAir into SQ within the next year, which would further expand the Southeast Asia destinations.
@Mike, you could always book AS miles for partner flights without origin or destination being in the US. The only rule was that for partner flights, all flights have to be on the same metal (e.g. you can't mix CX and JL for intra-asia)
To me the big news is that you can use Alaska miles within Asia that doesn't require a start or stop to be USA..........that is a welcome change and in the future could prove to be quite useful........but not educated on how those Asia flights compare to Singapores own award chart......
The award chart has posted https://www.alaskaair.com/content/mileage-plan/use-miles/award-charts
100k miles one way for J is a joke. At your valuation of 1.8 cents/mile, that's $1800 one way. If you were to buy miles at 2 cents which you consistently promote, that's would make it an even worse deal. Considering you can fly LAX-SIN for ~$3500 round trip in J AND earn a ton of miles along the way, this is a hard pass.
@Ben - How do you get 2 saver award seats in suites either direction JFK-SIN? I've tried numerous times to the end of schedule and always come up empty.
Lucky,
Any idea if Silkair will be included down the road? Looking at a redemption US to MLE and only see Singapore's nighttime flight. THX
YAY! SQ also allows Australia to Asia (BKK, MNL, PVG and so on) for 30K/65K.
I am very happy as this redemption rate is eaxactly or cose to the redemption rates on JL, CX, QF but with no silly surcharges and a stopover option.
FANTASTIC
Very interesting! This is a great deal in SE Asia and Asia, overall.
Me thinks, 'should I get that Alaska Airlines card finally?'... decisions, decisions...
There's a direct flight from MCO to SFO that my wife and I can avail of using the partner GC, too.
“ What’s exciting here is that it’s actually possible to redeem Alaska miles for long haul business class awards on Singapore Airlines, and even for regional first class. Historically Singapore Airlines has only made long haul economy award seats available to partner airlines, so it’s surprising to see that not be the case for Alaska.”
Unless I’m misunderstanding the point you are making you can already do this with Miles & More, I’ve done it...
“ What’s exciting here is that it’s actually possible to redeem Alaska miles for long haul business class awards on Singapore Airlines, and even for regional first class. Historically Singapore Airlines has only made long haul economy award seats available to partner airlines, so it’s surprising to see that not be the case for Alaska.”
Unless I’m misunderstanding the point you are making you can already do this with Miles & More, I’ve done it for family a few times over the last couple of years. I book them from Europe to Australia via Singapore on SQ in Business Class and it’s 195,000 points. I’ve also booked regional First on SQ (SIN-HKG) through M&M. Regardless this is great news as I’d prefer to use Alaska as Miles & More take a lot longer to earn!
@Kalboz
it's really only 30k/35k/50k alaska miles for US to Asia on CX. it's on Alaska website. How? Find the availability on ba.com and you call on alaska. It's also only 60 to 65k one way business on JAL.
https://www.alaskaair.com/content/mileage-plan/use-miles/award-charts
5. Request your Partner Award reservation on Cathay Pacific by calling Alaska Airlines Reservations at 1-800-252-7522 (TTY: Dial 711 for Relay Services) 5:00 a.m. - Midnight (PT), daily.
@Mike
there was never such a restriction in general flying. A few partners have slight variations of restrictions like such, like EK, but flying JL, CX intra asia has been the norm for years. AY intra EU also possible since last year.
Wasn't there a alaska award redemption rule that you can only do partner airline redemption that either departs of arrives in US ? Has it changed ? Otherwise how can you use Alaska miles to book intra-asia award ticket ?
@- says "you can redeem for CX at 30k/35k/50k for econ/prem econ/business one way between US and most of Asia."
Really? How?
Just burnt 95KX4 for our return to the US BKK-SIN-LAX for a total of 380K miles!
There are some pretty interesting options.
It lets you go SIN-FRA-JFK
first class for 130k miles.
I think these actual 'steal's shall be not openly discussed here, because they will soon be ending these deals.
Many of us knows that AS have some extreme niche redemptions, which are more like tricks.
SQ is a better airline than CX or JL, and at 100k the rate is only slightly higher than in SQ's own program, which is 95k. So this seems fair to me for SQ.
These rates are pretty bad, considering you can redeem for CX at 30k/35k/50k for econ/prem econ/business one way between US and most of Asia. I hope that also doesn't mean an imminent devaluation is coming for CX/JL redemptions...
PEK-SIN-HKG in F @ 35k is a steal and widely available.
6h and 4h flights in Singapore F with stopover in SIN.
Since China is considered south Asia, you can go PEK-SIN-DPS (stopover in SIN) in J for 25k. This is a great deal.
Only sweet spot for this is within Asia on biz.
25k with a stopover in SIN is not bad.
e.g. HKG-SIN-BKK in biz is 25k.
Is redemption between North America and Australia possible?
100k for a one-way business award from SFO-SIN??
Charging 100,000 miles one way to Asia is disgusting.
??!?
wow, what an awesome development! Thought the chance I would be able to redeem on SQ is somewhere between finding a girlfriend or seeing a comet, but glad that I was wrong! AS actually now coems on top of most major airlines, now that is a rare sight. Now let's find the longest intra-SEA route to use the 25k redemptions on!
but IT IS impossible to add a lap child to an international award ticket apparently *facepalm*