Etihad Guest’s New 2023 Award Charts

Etihad’s frequent flyer program has overhauled its award charts. We now know what the new award charts look like, and there’s both good and bad news.

While some award flights on partner airlines have increased in cost by as much as 124%, other redemption costs have actually decreased by up to 54%.

These changes to Etihad’s award charts were initially foreshadowed last month, but Etihad Guest did not previously reveal what the new award charts would look like.

The new Etihad Guest award charts come into effect from 9 March 2023. Meanwhile, Etihad is currently in the process of completing a huge system upgrade and won’t be able to take any new bookings until this is completed on around 10 March.

Many “sweet spots” are now dead

Fortunately, the changes aren’t quite as bad as they could have been. And with a single award chart that now applies to redemptions on all partner airlines, the Etihad Guest program certainly has become a lot simpler.

It will also soon be possible to redeem Etihad Guest miles for Virgin Australia and American Airlines flights on Etihad’s website, which is a welcome improvement. This previously required a phone call. Etihad Guest members will still need to call, though, to redeem miles on other partner airlines.

The bad news is that most of the excellent “sweet spots” in Etihad Guest’s old award charts have been eliminated with this change. For example, mid-length Virgin Australia domestic flights like Sydney-Cairns used to be excellent value at just 6,900 Etihad Guest miles in Economy, or 13,800 miles for Business Class. This flight now costs 15,000 miles for Economy or 30,000 miles for Business.

Most redemptions on Air Serbia, American Airlines, Oman Air, Royal Air Maroc and Brussels Airlines also now require significantly more Etihad Guest miles.

The new Etihad Airways award chart

Previously, Etihad didn’t really have fixed-price award zones for GuestSeat redemptions on the airline’s own flights. Now, as per the Etihad Guest website, awards will be priced according to the below award chart:

It is not exactly clear what Etihad Guest means by “a premium redemption fare will be applied based on demand and availability”.

Etihad will continue to make all seats on its own flights available to book as OpenSeat awards. These are (sometimes much) more expensive than GuestSeat awards, but are much more widely available.

The new Etihad Guest award chart for partner airline redemptions

Rather than a unique award chart for every individual partner airline, Etihad Guest now just has a single award chart that covers all partners. This is basically the same as the previous award chart that applied to redemptions on EL AL, one of Etihad’s newest partner airlines.

Here’s the new chart:

You can use Great Circle Mapper to calculate the distance of any route.

Some examples of old vs new Etihad Guest award pricing

While some award flights have actually become cheaper, Etihad has unfortunately adjusted many redemptions in an “upwards” direction…

Here are some examples of Etihad Guest redemption costs (excluding taxes & charges) before and after the March 2023 award chart changes:

Airline	Route	Cabin Class	Previous Miles Required	New Miles Required
Air Canada	Vancouver-Calgary	Economy	5,000	6,000 (+20%)
Air Canada	Brisbane-Vancouver	Business	170,000	140,000 (-21%)
Air Europa	Madrid-Panama City	Economy	48,000	67,000 (+40%)
Air New Zealand	Auckland-Christchurch	Economy	13,000	6,000 (-54%)
Air New Zealand	Sydney-Queenstown	Economy	13,000	15,000 (+15%)
Air New Zealand	Auckland-Tokyo	Business	210,000	120,000 (-43%)
All Nippon Airways	Sydney-Tokyo	Business	54,000	100,000 (+85%)
Air Serbia	Belgrade-London	Business	14,834	30,000 (+102%)
Air Serbia	Belgrade-New York	Business	64,082	100,000 (+56%)
American Airlines	Sydney-Los Angeles	Business	62,500	140,000 (+124%)
Asiana	Sydney-Seoul	Economy	35,000	67,000 (+91%)
Brussels Airlines	Brussels-Copenhagen	Business	9,000	10,000 (+11%)
Brussels Airlines	Brussels-New York	Business	44,000	80,000 (+82%)
Garuda Indonesia	Melbourne-Denpasar	Business	42,000	60,000 (+43%)
Gulf Air	Singapore-Bahrain	Business	94,000	80,000 (-15%)
Hainan Airlines	Sanya-Shenzhen	Economy	3,500	6,000 (+71%)
Korean Air	Brisbane-Seoul	Business	75,000	100,000 (+33%)
Malaysia Airlines	Kuala Lumpur-Bangkok	Business	14,000	20,000 (+43%)
Malaysia Airlines	Perth-Kuala Lumpur	Business	40,000	60,000 (+50%)
Oman Air	Muscat-Doha	Economy	3,000	6,000 (+100%)
Oman Air	Muscat-Kuala Lumpur	First	72,000	107,000 (+49%)
Royal Air Maroc	Casablanca-Montreal	Business	44,000	80,000 (+82%)
SriLankan Airlines	Colombo-Kuala Lumpur	Business	22,000	40,000 (+82%)
Virgin Australia	Sydney-Melbourne	Business	13,800	10,000 (-27%)
Virgin Australia	Sydney-Queenstown	Economy	6,900	15,000 (+117%)
Virgin Australia	Melbourne-Perth	Business	21,800	45,000 (+106%)
Virgin Australia	Brisbane-Denpasar	Business	33,800	60,000 (+78%)