A couple of days ago, Emirates Skywards put a notice on its mileage calculator noting that changes would be coming to reward redemption rates for Classic Rewards and Upgrade Rewards on May 21, 2025. There’s literally no additional information about what those changes will be, so we don’t yet know whether this will be a devaluation or perhaps a reduction in the number of miles required for those rewards. However, based on past precedent, it seems like the smart money is on Emirates devaluing once again, moving to charge even more miles for their rewards than before.
Emirates likely to continue its trend of making award redemptions more expensive
One Mile at a Time digs into the many reasons to assume that Emirates probably isn’t going to make reward redemptions a better deal any time soon. The short version of this story is that Emirates has continuously devalued its rewards in recent years and also made deliberate moves to reduce access to awards on Emirates when booking through their partner airlines. We’ve seen redemption rates skyrocket through partners like Air Canada Aeroplan, availability for first class become restricted to Emirates elite members when booking through Emirates, the reduction of transfer ratios from transferable currency systems, and surcharges that have made redeeming miles very unattractive. I’m disappointed by this trend as I’ve been fortunate enough to fly Emirates First Class a number of times, both on awards and paid tickets. I would certainly love to be able to redeem my miles to experience it again, but I just haven’t been interested over the last several years due to the number of miles required and the high cost of surcharges. It’s doubtful that we’ll see a positive change coming on May 21st, so if you have Emirates Skyward Miles, you might want to consider using them sooner rather than later. I don’t necessarily expect that partner redemptions will be affected by this change, but with so little information available, it’s hard to say.
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Well drat, I’m trying to get an upgrade for my September flight at the gate, here’s hoping upgrades don’t become too expensive for me to be able to afford it.
Emirates is overrated, with mosty the same First Cass product as 20 years ago, and the awards are complete ripoff. Hard pass.
I presume you mean 2026, but hard to predict anything other than a devaluation.