Looking to fly for free with American Airlines? If you have a stash of American Airlines AAdvantage miles, you can turn around and redeem them for free American Airlines flights.
American Airlines is one of the largest global airlines and a founding member of the Oneworld alliance, which makes it easy to use American miles to book through partner airlines, including Alaska Airlines, British Airways and Japan Airlines.
On its own, American flies to 350 destinations in more than 50 countries — and through Oneworld, passengers can fly to over 1,000 destinations worldwide. One of the best things about the airline is how easy it is to earn AAdvantage frequent flyer miles. If you’re not a member, you can sign up for American’s frequent flyer program, called AAdvantage.Here are 29 ways to earn AAdvantage miles with the airline (even some pretty obscure ones) so you can maximize mileage-earning opportunities. (Psst: You can figure out how many American miles you need to earn for your next trip with our Points Planning Tool).1. Earn credit card welcome bonuses
Credit card welcome bonuses offer one of the best ways to jump-start mileage earning. American Airlines is pretty good about offering high sign-up bonuses on its co-branded credit cards, with recent offers ranging from 10,000 to 75,000 miles.
American Airlines credit cards are issued by two banks: Citibank and Barclays. Current offers are as follows:In addition to the above, American Airlines also has three other cards that are no longer accepting new applicants: AAdvantage® Aviator® World Elite Silver Mastercard®, AAdvantage® Aviator® Blue Mastercard® and the Citi® / AAdvantage® Gold World Elite™ Mastercard®.
There is one business card that is still accepting new applicants: The CitiBusiness® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® Mastercard® (annual fee: $0 intro for the first year, then $99), which has the following welcome offer: Earn 75,000 American Airlines AAdvantage® bonus miles after spending $4,000 in purchases within the first 4 months of account opening.
The AAdvantage® Aviator® World Elite Business Mastercard® (annual fee: $95) is not accepting new applicants.American Airlines credit cards allow you to not only earn AAdvantage miles each time you swipe your card but also to earn additional miles for spending in specific categories.
All of the above-mentioned credit cards earn 2 miles per $1 on American Airlines purchases, except for the Citi® / AAdvantage® Executive World Elite Mastercard®, which earns 4 miles per $1 on American Airlines purchases and 10 miles per $1 on eligible hotels and car rentals booked through American Airlines.
In addition, these cards earn 2 miles per $1 in the following categories:
CitiBusiness® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® Mastercard®: Gas stations and restaurants.
American Airlines AAdvantage® MileUp®: Grocery stores.
CitiBusiness® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® Mastercard®: Cable, satellite, telecommunications, car rental and gas stations.
AAdvantage® Aviator® World Elite Business Mastercard®: Office supply stores, telecom and car rental merchants.
If you want a credit card with no annual fee that earns extra points at grocery stores, consider the American Airlines AAdvantage® MileUp®.If you’d rather earn the bonus points at office supply stores or on communication expenses, consider either the AAdvantage® Aviator® World Elite Business Mastercard® or the CitiBusiness® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® Mastercard®, as they offer extra points in those categories.
Many people pay their phone bill using their bank account, which usually earns no rewards points. However, if you put a $100 monthly phone bill on a card that earns bonus points, that’s an extra 2,400 AAdvantage miles per year.
Although it may seem like a relatively small number of miles, they add up quickly. An extra 2,400 miles are worth about $40, but that can be the difference between having enough miles for an award ticket or being slightly short on miles and needing to top-up your account through a miles purchase (which can be rather expensive).
Get into the habit of thinking strategically about which credit cards you use for purchases.3. Transfer points from Marriott Bonvoy to American Airlines
While American Airlines is not a transfer partner of any bank’s transferrable points program (e.g. Chase Ultimate Rewards®, American Express Membership Rewards, Capital One Miles), you can transfer points at a decent ratio from Marriott to American Airlines.
Marriott Bonvoy points convert to American Airlines miles at a 3:1 ratio. So if you transfer 60,000 Marriott points to American Airlines, you’ll have 20,000 AAdvantage miles. Although Marriott offers a 5,000-point bonus on transfers of 60,000 points to certain airlines, American Airlines is no longer on the list of included airlines.
You’ll want to consider the the dollar value of each program’s points or miles before doing a transfer. American miles are worth 1.7 cents each, so 20,000 American miles are valued at $340. Marriott points are worth 0.8 cent each, so 60,000 Marriott points are valued at $480. When comparing the valuations, 60,000 Marriott points are worth more than 20,000 American Airlines miles, which is something to be mindful of when considering a transfer.
However, the actual value you get out of airline miles can vary depending on how you use them. If those 20,000 American Airlines miles can be redeemed toward a first class international flight, you’ll likely get way more than a $340 value out of them. In an instance like that, if you’re a few miles short of an AAdvantage award ticket and have some extra Marriott points, a points transfer may make sense4. Earn American Airline AAdvantage miles by flying
Ahh, the old-school way of earning frequent flyer miles. Even though earning miles by flying is one of the easiest ways to get them, so many people miss out because they simply forget to add their frequent flyer number to their reservation. To make sure this doesn’t happen, start by registering for an AAdvantage account.
After registering, you’ll receive an AAdvantage number. Be sure to include this frequent flyer number on all of your American Airlines reservations, including upcoming flights you’ve already booked. Miles can be earned on flights with American Airlines, Oneworld and partner airlines.
On American Airlines
You earn AAdvantage miles by flying with American Airlines. The number of miles earned depends on the price of your ticket and your elite status level: