How to Buy & Redeem Alaska Airlines Miles
Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles are a valuable currency. You can redeem Alaska Airlines miles to fly with around 25 different airlines including Oneworld member airlines and some niche partners like Aer Lingus, Icelandair, Starlux, Korean Air and Condor.
Award tickets can be excellent value, particularly on short-haul and premium cabin redemptions. There are also no fuel surcharges when booking award tickets with most partner airlines – instead, you’ll just pay a USD12.50 partner award fee.
Although it’s not that easy to earn Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles in Australia, you can buy Alaska Airlines miles in bulk, directly from the airline. Alaska Airlines even offers regular promotional deals on buying miles.
Buying Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles
You can buy Alaska Airlines miles on the Alaska Airlines website.
Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles start at USD29.56 per thousand, excluding any discounts or bonus miles. This price includes the U.S. federal excise tax. The price incrementally becomes slightly cheaper as you buy more miles and there is a purchase limit of 100,000 miles per transaction (excluding bonus miles).
There is an annual purchase limit of 150,000 miles per member (excluding bonus miles). This limit is waived for Mileage Plan members with MVP, MVP Gold or MVP Gold 75k status.
Promotions with bonus miles and discounts
Every few months, Alaska Airlines typically runs promotions with up to a 60% bonus when buying Mileage Plan miles. The highest bonus we’ve recently was 70% in June 2025.
However, these offers are targeted and can vary between accounts. Your offer may be for a different amount of bonus miles, e.g. up to 40% bonus. It is also possible that, if the address listed on your account is outside of the USA, you might not be eligible for all the offers.
These offers also may not be available to new Mileage Plan members. So, if you’re not already a member, sign up now to avoid missing out on the next promotion!
Past offers on buying Alaska Airlines miles
The best ever offer we’ve seen on Alaska miles was a bonus of up to 70% in March 2024.
Here is a list of the most recent past deals:
Offer | Minimum purchase for best bonus/discount | Promotion period |
---|---|---|
40-60% bonus miles | 40,000 miles | 18 November – 23 December 2024 |
40-60% bonus miles | 40,000 miles | 4-31 October 2024 |
40-60% bonus miles | 40,000 miles | 13-18 September 2024 |
40-60% bonus miles | 40,000 miles | 10 July – 15 August 2024 |
30-50% bonus miles | 30,000 miles | 12 – 26 June 2024 |
40-60% bonus miles | 40,000 miles | 11 April – 23 May 2024 |
40-70% bonus miles | 40,000 miles | 8 March – 15 March 2024 |
Redeeming Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles
You can redeem Alaska Airlines miles on around 25 partner airlines. This includes all of the Oneworld member airlines:
You can also use Mileage Plan to book award flights on the following non-Oneworld partner airlines:
- Aer Lingus
- Air Tahiti Nui
- Condor
- Hainan Airlines
- Icelandair
- Korean Air
- LATAM Airlines
- Porter Airlines
- Singapore Airlines
- STARLUX Airlines
Award flight pricing
For travel on Alaska Airlines itself, Mileage Plan uses dynamic award pricing. Redemptions on partner airlines are priced according to the partner airline award charts that take into account the region and distance you’re flying. That said, Alaska does sometimes use dynamic pricing for partner awards on Qatar Airways, Icelandair and Air Tahiti Nui.
For example, this is the partner airline award chart for travel to, from or within Australia in 2025:
Mileage Plan’s extensive list of partners and relatively low redemption costs make this a competitive program. Award flights are especially great value on routes under 1,500 miles including Sydney-Auckland and Brisbane-Queenstown.
For a while last year, Qantas awards are temporarily unavailable to book through Mileage Plan. This issue is now resolved.
With Mileage Plan, there are no fuel or carrier surcharges except when redeeming miles for Hainan Airlines, Icelandair or British Airways flights.
How to book award flights with Mileage Plan miles
Most Mileage Plan awards can be booked on the Alaska Airlines website. If you can’t book online, you can call Alaska Airlines on on +1 (800) 252 7522. The Alaska Airlines call centre is open from 5am to midnight, California time. (It is closed during the evening in Australia.)
You can discuss the Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan program on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum:
Want to learn more about buying points for cheap premium cabin flights?
Australian Frequent Flyer offers a comprehensive training program which includes an entire course on buying points for discounted premium travel! This course covers 8 frequent flyer programs in detail, including Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan. View course →
Community Comments
Loading new replies...
Join the full discussion at the →