AA vs. Atmos: Which elite status game should I play?

American Airlines AAdvantage and Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards have a lot in common. Both are rewards programs for U.S.-based oneworld airlines. Both offer extremely valuable reedable miles. Both make it easy to earn elite status without flying. And elite status with either program offers benefits when flying the other airline.

Personally, it doesn’t make sense for me to chase status with either program. I don’t fly either one often enough to care much about their elite benefits. On the other hand, as a business owner (Frequent Miler is my business), I pay a lot in quarterly taxes, and I usually pay by credit card. That gives me the ability to chase elite status and other big-spend perks on a whim. In this case, the specific whim I have in mind is to earn oneworld Emerald status, primarily through credit card spend. That will give me access to oneworld first-class lounges when flying economy or business class. To earn oneworld Emerald status, I would need to earn Platinum Pro status with AA or Platinum status with Alaska Atmos. Let’s run the numbers and see which would be best…

American Airlines AAdvantage

With AA, most activities that earn redeemable miles also earn the same number of Loyalty Points (LPs) towards elite status. One major exception is with credit card spend. With AA credit cards, you earn only 1 Loyalty Point per dollar, even if your spend is within a bonus category where you earn two or more redeemable miles per dollar.

My goal is to earn oneworld Emerald Status, which comes with AA Platinum Pro status. Platinum Pro status requires earning 125,000 Loyalty Points within the status qualification period (March through February). Along the way, there are a few opportunities to accelerate status earnings from non-flight activities:

• At 15,000 Loyalty Points, it’s possible to pick 1,000 Loyalty Points as a Milestone Reward.
• At 60,000 Loyalty Points, you get a 20% Loyalty Point bonus with select partners for 6 months.
• At 100,000 Loyalty Points, you get a 30% Loyalty Point bonus with select partners for 6 months.

I currently have the AAdvantage® AviatorTM Silver World Elite MasterCard® issued by Barclays. Now that AA has selected Citibank as its sole card issuer, I don’t know how long I’ll have this card and its benefits, but for now, I get the following relevant perks:

• Earn up to 15,000 bonus Loyalty Points per status qualification period: Earn 5K bonus points at $20K spend, $40K spend, and $50K spend.
• Earn 1 Loyalty Point per dollar.
• As a bonus, after $20K membership year spend, I’ll earn a $99 + tax domestic companion certificate for up to 2 companions.

Here is how I may earn 125,000 Loyalty Points, primarily through spend:

• Assume that I’ll earn 15,000 Loyalty Points from AAdvantage eShopping, Simply Miles, and AAdvantage Hotel bookings
• I’ll earn 1,000 Loyalty Points as my 15,000 LP Milestone Reward
• I’ll spend a total of $94,000 on the Aviator Silver card:
  • I’ll earn 94,000 Loyalty Points plus:
  • 15,000 bonus Loyalty Points from big spend
• With a 1.75% fee for paying taxes with a credit card, $94,000 spend will cost $1,616 (I’d pay $92,384 in taxes plus $1,616 in fees)
• I’d earn 94,000 redeemable miles from that spend. Let’s conservatively estimate that I value those AA miles at 1 cent each, totaling $940 in value. Another way of saying this is that I’d be willing to buy 94,000 miles for $940.
• Net cost to purchase AA Platinum Pro and oneworld Emerald Status: $1,616 – $940 = $676

I’m not willing to assign dollar values to the $99 companion ticket or to any of the Milestone Rewards that I’d earn since I’m unlikely to use them. My net cost, then, to buy Platinum Pro status and oneworld Emerald Status is $676.

$676 would be a reasonable price to pay if I expected to get good use from the elite benefits. But, realistically, I probably won’t. Domestically, I usually fly Delta. Internationally, I typically use miles to fly business class, where elite status, or the lack of it, doesn’t make much difference.

Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards

With Atmos, there are three significant ways in which I expect to earn Status Points: I’ll earn one Status Point for every two dollars of eligible spend with my Atmos Rewards Summit Visa Infinite Card, the card will give me an automatic annual boost of 10,000 Status Points, and I’ll earn Status Points from flights booked using Atmos miles.

My goal is to earn oneworld Emerald Status, which comes with Atmos Platinum status. Starting in 2026, Platinum status will require earning 85,000 Status Points within the status qualification period (January through December).

Here is how I may earn 85,000 Loyalty Points next year:

• 10,000 Status Points from simply having the Atmos Summit card
• Assume that I’ll earn 20,000 Status Points from award flights booked with Atmos points
• I’ll spend a total of $110,000 on my card to earn 55,000 Status Points
• The $110K of spending will lead to other valuable perks:
  • I’ll earn 110,000 redeemable points from that spend
  • I’ll earn a 100K global companion award fare after $60K cardmember year spend.
  • I’ll select to earn points from various Milestone Rewards (the following levels and rewards are based on 2025 Milestone Rewards. This assumes that the 2026 options will be similar):
    • 30,000 Status Points: 2,500 bonus points
    • 55,000 Status Points: 5,000 bonus points
    • 85,000 Status Points: 15,000 bonus points
  • Total redeemable points earned: 110K + 22,500 = 132,500 + Global companion award
  • Let’s conservatively estimate that I value those Atmos points at 1 cent each ($1,325), and that I value the 100K Global Companion Award even more conservatively at $400.
  • The total value of the rewards earned for the spend, then, comes to $1,325 + $400 = $1,725.

• With a 1.75% fee for paying taxes with a credit card, $110,000 of spend will cost $1,892 (I’d pay $108,110 in taxes plus $1,892 in fees)
• Net cost to purchase Atmos Platinum and oneworld Emerald Status: $1,892 – $1725 = $167

$167 is a cheap price to pay for high-level elite status. I doubt I’ll use many of the perks that this status would offer, but it’s nice to have them just in case.

Conclusion

The path to oneworld Emerald status will require more credit card spend with Atmos than with AAdvantage, but the rewards will be greater, too. The net result is that it makes more sense for me to play this game with Atmos than with AA. This, of course, is based on many simplifying assumptions which may not prove to be accurate in the long run. Additionally, this conclusion does NOT mean that the same result applies to you.

Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.