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Home » Delta Air Lines » Bewildering Upgrade Pricing On Delta Air Lines
Delta Air LinesUpgrades

Bewildering Upgrade Pricing On Delta Air Lines

Matthew Klint Posted onSeptember 27, 2024September 27, 2024 18 Comments

a man and woman in an airplane

A passenger wonders why he received a “crazy” upgrade offer to business class on an upcoming trip. The answer is quite simple: supply and demand.

Delta Air Lines Upgrade Pricing: There Is Not Necessarily Correlation Between Distance, Product, And Price

A Delta flyer on Reddit wonders why his “upgrade” pricing was so crazy. On the Delta app, he was offered:

  • $599 or 59,500 miles to upgrade from economy class to Delta One business class from Seoul Incheon (ICN) to Atlanta (ATL)
    • The 7,152-mile flight is 13 hours, 30 minutes long and operated by an Airbus A350-900 that includes suites with lie-flat beds and closing doors
  • $1299 or 129,900 miles to upgrade from economy class to first class from Atlanta to Miami (MIA)
    • The 594-mile flight is 2 hours and is operated by a Boeing 757-200 with recliner chairs

screens screenshot of a flight ticket

While that may seem bewildering to an occasional flyer, there’s nothing confusing or crazy about it all.

Without even looking at how full the flights are, it becomes clear: the Seoul to Atlanta flight had many unsold seats in the business class cabin that would have remained empty or gone to standby customers. Meanwhile, the Atlanat to Miami was nearly full in the front cabin and Delta was hoping to sell it to someone who was not price sensitive and may have just needed one of the last seats.

There is no correlation between the price of an upgrade and the distance or aircraft type of the flight. We may not fully understand the algorithm, but an upgrade on each flight is dynamically priced according to a number of factors and the result will be cases like this: the sort of upgrade costs that seem crazy.

An upgrade on a flight 6x as long with a lie-flat bed? Sure, it’s a no-brainer. But as Delta looks to maximize revenue, it’s also apparent that it charges what it can for an upgrade and it will charge a lot more for the last premium cabin seat on a short-haul flight than it might for a suite on a longhaul flight that would otherwise go empty.

Ultimately, this is a reminder to keep an eye on the Delta app or delta.com for upgrade pricing…there are still good deals to be had (sadly, not when paying with SkyMiles though…).

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About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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18 Comments

  1. Anthony Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 10:53 am

    “Sadly, when not using SkyMiles though…”

    Although the cash value of the redemption is about 1 cent, I would argue that 59,990 miles to upgrade from ATL to ICN *is* a great deal. Would similar upgrade options be available for 60,000 miles in the American or United programs?

  2. Jan Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 12:03 pm

    IIRC That’s an upgrade from Premium Select, but still.

    I’ve had a $375 offer from ATL-AMS on an A350 before (from PS)

    And most recently, a pair of $749 and $999 offers from ATL to Ireland/UK. But I took neither because I had an empty row in Economy to myself, flight is too short and 767’s are tight and crappy. On the ATL-DUB they upgraded me at the gate for D1 anyway.

    Tip – If aspiring for a relatively cheap D1 upgrade, check app everyday, literally every day, and if you feel it might be wort it, book it ASAP, it can go to $2700 in the next day.

    • Jan Reply
      September 27, 2024 at 12:07 pm

      I partially lied; on the ATL-DUB the main cabin and PS was packed full, while D1 was IIRC relatively empty, so I was able to snag an operational upgrade,

  3. Willem Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 12:11 pm

    When are you gonna write about Eric Adams and Turkish Airlines? THAT would generate clicks!

    • Antwerp Reply
      September 27, 2024 at 12:46 pm

      I agree. But in the context of he got caught doing what most every politician is doing. And SCOTUS.

      • Matthew Klint Reply
        September 27, 2024 at 2:29 pm

        Coming soon…

    • GUWonder Reply
      September 28, 2024 at 2:57 am

      Airlines kiss up to the rich and powerful and those whom they believe to be powerful or on the way to being powerful. Global phenomenon — whether we are speaking of high-income countries with little/less corruption or lower-income countries with lots of corruption. And NYC has a history of crooked politicians, including the semi-demented Giuliani.

  4. Alec Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 12:12 pm

    What I’ve been doing is searching cheapest class flight, booking that flight in economy (assuming economy is priced similarly to other flights). Then looking at the upgrade offer post booking. Been finding great rates of ~$170 upgrade JFK>SAN

    • GUWonder Reply
      September 28, 2024 at 2:59 am

      An approach that also works with conditionally refundable economy class award tickets.

  5. Santastico Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 1:09 pm

    Interesting. This never happened to me on international flights with Delta but I have family in Brazil and they always score huge upgrades from economy to business class for around $500 on Emirates, LATAM and Lufthansa. By the time they go to check in for their flights these offers show up and it is usually a non brainer. Delta for some reason has way too many non revenue flying on Delta One. I have seen many people that suddenly get into Delta One and they all know the FAs and chat for a long time. I have never seen an empty seat on Delta One international flights.

    • Jan Reply
      September 27, 2024 at 4:47 pm

      It happens a lot more, I think still more expensive than AF/LK which shows up to me at $600-800 on onlinc check-in, like I said earlier, sub-$1k on DL app happens quite a bit. I’m just not willing to pay that on TATL. Now, on OP post, I will take that 100%

  6. Sam Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 6:18 pm

    Fwiw – $599 is insanely low and on UA the upgrade offers are almost always over 1k usd, even for shorter TATL routes. I am 1k with them and have never seen a long haul upgrade under 872 USD. Any reason behind why UA is always so much pricier @Matthew Klint??

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      September 28, 2024 at 5:54 am

      Not sure, but those Delta prices are tremendous…I’ve heard $399 for LAX-AKL which makes me tempted to give it a try just to see if I receive such an upgrade offer.

  7. Salcha Reply
    September 27, 2024 at 8:43 pm

    Have mercy

  8. legalalien Reply
    September 28, 2024 at 12:36 pm

    I wonder what the uptake rate on that ATL-MIA offer is. My guess is, it’s effectively zero: any “price-insensitive” passenger willing to plop $1,300 to upgrade to domestic first on a 3 hour flight would have paid for a first class ticket to begin with. Any edge cases (e.g., F was full, but now a seat has freed up) are not worth the space taken up by the “offer”.

  9. David Adams Reply
    September 28, 2024 at 12:39 pm

    I was recently quoted $17,000 to UPGRADE from comfort plus to Delto One, from Atlanta to Athens, Greece. For JUST 1 WAY OF THE TRIP.

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      September 28, 2024 at 2:58 pm

      If your first name was Eric, you could have just flown Turkish via Istanbul at no charge! 😉

  10. Dee Reply
    October 8, 2024 at 4:57 pm

    My usual offer to FC from Atl to Jax -less than an hour flight is $499!! Nuts

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