You can now book Singapore Airlines award tickets with Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan

This is an update to news that goes back over two years where we detailed the news of a partnership between Alaska Airlines and Singapore Airlines (Read that post here). At the time the partnership allowed members of both airline’s programs earn miles on each others flights. Fast forward to October 2019 and you can finally redeem Mileage Plan miles for flights on Singapore Airlines. The news is great since Alaska Airlines seems to have negotiated something great with Singapore Airlines as they have great access to award seats that isn’t even seen with SQ’s Star Alliance partners.

This new development with their partnership does see Alaska Airlines members being able to redeem on Singapore Airlines’ flights out of the U.S. to Singapore and from Singapore to Asia, Europe, Africa, Australia, New Zealand and more.

Here is the Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan award chart for Singapore Airlines flights from the U.S. to Asia.

View Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan Award charts here

This is the most relevant chart for us Canadians as Alaska doesn’t publish a specific Singapore Airlines chart from Canada since Singapore Airlines doesn’t serve Canada.  You can however search (and have combined awards) from Alaska’s Canadian gateways to the U.S. and fly on Singapore Airlines:

Example out of Vancouver to get the Singapore the main leg on SQ
Example of Calgary to Singapore

There does appear to be lots of availability on SQ from their U.S. gateways.  Here is just one example of business class from LAX to SIN:

All reports so far show that Alaska Airlines has virtually the same access to seats that Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer members do. Some people apparently also found the odd first class seats for redemption but those all seem to be gone now! But it is something to keep in mind.

Also, what you’ll want to be aware of is that on a miles to miles basis Singapore’s own KrisFlyer program does charge less mile than Alaska for many of these redemptions. This is something you’ll want to keep in mind if you are converting hotel points (ie Marriott Bonvoy) to either of these programs for a redemption on Singapore. If you are, you’ll of course get more value from the KrisFlyer program. This does not take into account your existing balances, earning potential from other sources and so on. What I mean by this is if you earn a decent amount of Mileage Plan miles from various sources it is probably better to convert less points from a hotel program to Mileage Plan then to convert a larger amount to KrisFlyer where you may have no previous balance at all. Just food for thought!

For us Canadians the best way to earn Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles outside of actual flights with them and their partners is the Alaska Airlines World Elite® Mastercard® from mbna. The card comes with a welcome bonus of 30,000 Mileage Plan miles and a host of other benefits. Another great way is with Marriott Bonvoy since the points transfer 3:1 to Alaska which means you can utilize the Marriott Bonvoy American Express Card and the American Express Cobalt Card to earn even more Mileage Plan miles. If you are also lucky enough to still hold a Diners Club Mastercard you can also convert to Mileage Plan with that card.

What do you all think of this great development? Has anyone booked any flights with SQ yet using your Mileage Plan miles? Let us know in the comments below!


Title image via Singapore Airlines