Another day, another step back for United MileagePlus. United Airlines announced a trio of negative changes today that further erode the value of its MileagePlus loyalty program. Let’s take a look.
A Trio Of United MileagePlus Devaluations
United sent out an email to Premier members this morning outlining upcoming changes to the MileagePlus program. The news is mostly bad for savvy travelers.
Instant Upgrades For MileagePlus Elites On Y/B/M Fares Ends On August 21, 2025
United Airlines is eliminating a long-time perk whereby MileagePlus Premier members traveling on a Y or B fare (and 1K and Global Services members traveling on an M fares) could receive an instant space-available upgrade at the time of booking. Upgrade space required the “PN” fare bucket for 1K and Global Services members and the “PZ” fare bucket for lower-tier Premier members to be available in order to confirm.
Corporate travelers and government travelers will be particularly impacted, since those fares often book in Y or B class. Passengers who book Premium Plus (premium economy) tickets with domestic connections will also be hurt, since those segments book into B class.
No More Award Chart (Fixed Pricing) For MielagePlus Upgrade Awards
United will pull its award charts for upgrades using your miles on November 24, 2025.
Instead, upgrade pricing will depend on the date, time, and availability on your chosen flight.
It is not clear how pricing will change or whether a co-pay will still be required. I expect every flight will be upgradable, but at a cost closely correlated to the cash price, valuing miles at one cent or less each, making it a very poor deal…you’re better off using a cash-back card than any co-branded Chase-United card.
Elimination Of Excursionist Perk
The odd but often valuable “Excursionist Perk,” is going away for tickets issued on or after August 21, 2025.
United has a complicated quirk that replaced free stopovers in 2016 that it calls an “Excursionist Perk”
Here’s how United describes it:
The Excursionist Perk is a free one-way award within select multi-city itineraries. Members who book an itinerary with three or more one-way awards will be eligible to receive one of those one-way awards for free, if it meets all of these conditions:
- The Excursionist Perk cannot be in the MileagePlus defined region where your travel originates. (For example, if your journey begins in North America, you will only receive the Excursionist Perk if travel is within a region outside of North America.)
- Travel must end in the same MileagePlus defined region where travel originates.
- The origin and destination of the Excursionist Perk is within a single MileagePlus defined region.
- The cabin of service and award type of the free one-way award is the same or lower than the one-way award preceding it.
- If two or more one-way awards qualify for this benefit, only the first occurrence will be free.
Here’s an example United provides:
The trick is the free Excursionist Perk does not have to be in any particular region, just in one region…
So theoretically, you could book a ticket from New York to Lisbon in business class for 88K miles, then an “Excursionist Perk” for no extra miles from Dakar (DSS) to Johannesburg (JNB), a ticket that costs 35K in economy class or 90K in business class, then a return to the same region as origin, so if you could book an award from Africa to the USA on United…or if you were flying home via another carrier or program, you could just add on a domestic flight within the USA (the region you started in) to get the intra-Africa segment for free.
That means you could add a 10K domestic US segment to make the 90K segment within Africa free.
That goes away…and it does not appear anything will replace it.
CONCLUSION
As far as I can see, this is all bad news…yet another dismantling of what was once a great program by Richard Nunn, the ex-Comcast VP who now leads MileagePlus. I detest what has happened to MileagePlus under his tenure. Taking away upgrade award charts and the Excursionist Perk is arbitrary and punitive. Eliminating instant upgrades may not hurt me since I don’t buy full fare tickets, but it was a nice perk when connecting on a premium economy ticket (since the domestic economy segment book into B class, meaning an instant upgrade).
What do you make of these latest changes to MileagePlus?
There was another devaluation last week which was a little more subtle.
For transatlantic flights, JN (standard) award prices have depended on what cash business fare was available, and generally have been as follows:
P Fare – 155K miles
Z Fare – 175K miles
D Fare – 245K miles
C Fare – 295K miles
J Fare – 395K miles
Then, in July 2024 (or thereabouts), the price of a P or Z fare went from 155K to 200K miles, but the others remained the same.
Now, I’m seeing flights where a P fare is available, but the price in miles is around 335K one-way. Conversely, I saw a flight where a C fare was available but the price in miles was less…
We are seeing the full Delta SkyMilesification of MileagePlus. It’s very sad and totally counterproductive at a time when they are investing in the credit card portfolio to drive additional revenue.
Just had a great flight with United in economy on the 767 IAH AMS. Plenty of leg room. Well at the least enough. Amazing crew. They even gave me a leftover meal in the rear galley mid flight. Is it unpleasant boarding in group 5 35 minutes after boarding has begun sure ? Spending $22 on a club sandwich in the terminal instead of an Airport lounge no big deal either. The freedom from bondage with American is liberating. It’s like a tough divorce I can’t spend my 80k miles and $850 flight credit with American soon enough. Good riddance. I’m runnin with the Star alliance now.
here’s how I would think through your experience if it were mine and let it guide my future buying decisions:
Most us carriers will seem lux compared with aa. But I would think hard about which miles to earn, when it guides paying for a flight with something other than native program miles, and which airline with which to travel.
Also, I will point out that while your ua flight may have been better than on most aa flights you’ve been on, I wouldn’t consider your experience to be standard on ua whether in y, pe, or j. It’s usually worse than that, on average.
If it were me flying from IAH to AMS wanting a non-stop, spending my own money, I’d choose kl over ua every time. Where to credit (not that it may matter as much for Y)? FB. Earn more FB miles with transferrable currency with chase, amex, etc.
Of course you may have other considerations, but as US programs deliver less and less (esp to those with status in those programs eg lower buy-up prices if you DONT have status), I push on crediting any miles to those US-based programs.
Another reason why United will lose more of my business. I’ll probably pull the trigger on canceling my United card too. Quite unfortunate the changes that drive away the most loyal customers.
STOP OVERPAYING FOR A MID PRODUCT!!!!!!!!!!!! Book away. United Elite status is not worth chasing. Book cash FC or BC fares on foreign flag carries for way less. Domestically just book whoever has best Domestic First class Cash fare
@Matthew, beyond writing this article, do you ever say to UA directly your opinions?
If you do, does UA say anything?
wonder if UA is going to follow DL and allow an option of booking domestic connections to O tickets in domestic F?
May be one reason for removing instant upgrades
I don’t think it’s accurate to pin this on Richard Nunn. The decimation of MileagePlus is a Scott Kirby project and has taken place under Kirby’s leadership. Nunn is there to distract and deflect.
Scott Kirby markets himself as a visionary and an innovator and a great leader. All that is debatable. But it’s time to tell it like it is about who he most certainly is: a corporate slasher of loyalty and value.
This is Scott Kirby’s United and Scott Kirby’s MileagePlus.
The head of the Mileage Plus once said the loyalty progrm he most admires is Mariott Bonvoy. Kind of says it all.
To be accurate, government Y fares are actually YC in terms of price and not straight Y. Where they have contract fares between cities, you can see the one way prices here. But I think YC is treated like Y in terms of upgrades.
https://www.gsa.gov/travel/plan-a-trip/transportation-airfare-rates-pov-rates-etc/airfare-rates-city-pair-program
The lost of the excursionist perk is sad. It’s the worse thing since SkyMiles became SkyPesos. I burned all of my United miles recently to 800 miles but was planning on maybe growing it again. I think not. It will grow just by chance now as a free agent.
another thought I had
Could UA be preparing to sell domestic F under the O A R fares instead of P Z D C J?
Loss of a fixed mile upgrade chart is worrying.
Feels right out of the Delta playbook.
My engagement with Delta Amex cards has plummeted since their devaluation.
United be warned.