The way to “win” the points & miles game is to acquire points cheaply (or for free) and to then use them towards outsized value. For example, you may be able to earn 60,000 points or more from a single credit card bonus. Then, if you find great sweet spot awards, you may be able to use those points for a thousand dollars or more value.
With Delta, however opportunities to get far outsized value are increasingly slim; we recently set our Reasonable Redemption Value for SkyMiles at only 1.1 cents each (not counting cardholder discounts).
Still, there are a few opportunities left to get good value for your SkyMiles. Here’s a round-up of some of the best uses.
Great Value Options
Delta Skymiles Flash Sales
Delta periodically runs SkyMiles sales, and often doesn’t even advertise them. When blogs like this one post about these sales, it’s worth running some searches yourself on Delta.com. Sometimes you can get extraordinary value from these deals…and now that Delta is offering cardholders 15% off award flights, even better deals should soon be available.
Here’s an example where Delta was offering one-way flights for as little as 2,000 miles:
This was a rare case where Delta miles were often worth more than 2 cents per mile. Even rarer was the situation where a domestic first class award netted nearly 4 cents per mile value (for the 7:35am flight, above). Here’s the calculated value per mile for each class of service from the above example:
- Basic Economy: 2.14
- Main Cabin: 2.3
- Comfort+: 2.1
- First: 3.7
US to Canada via WestJet for 12.5K – 17.5K one-way, economy
Delta prices most awards on WestJet at 12,500 – 17,500 miles one-way within the US and Canada, depending on how far out the flight is. WestJet has flights to Canada from Atlanta, Boston, Denver, JFK, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Orlando, San Diego, San Francisco, and more. Anytime the cash price is over $200 one-way, you’ll get good value from your miles, and anytime the cash price is over $300 one-way, you’ll get great value from your miles. I was easily able to dig up a few cases where one-way prices were over $300, especially to more remote parts of Canada.
Tip: Don’t trust Delta’s cash price for WestJet flights. I found an example where Delta wanted either 17,500 miles or $1,062 for a nonstop flight from JFK to Calgary! That would give you a theoretical value of 6 cents per Delta mile. Via Google Flights, though, I found that the exact same flight could be purchased through WestJet for only $271. When compared to the more reasonable price, the 17,500 mile award offers 1.5 cents per mile value. That’s still good for Delta miles, but not the insane value I first thought.
Flights that originate and end outside of the U.S. and Canada
Delta charges much less for most flights originating and ending outside of the U.S. and Canada. In each case where this works, at least one segment is flown by a partner airline, but often the bulk of the flying is on Delta itself. Below you’ll find a number of examples. For full details, see: Delta SkyMiles Business class deals aren’t dead. Here’s how to find them.
Unfortunately, the Delta credit card 15% discount applies only to itineraries flown entirely by Delta and so there is no additional discount for flights like those shown below.
Mexico to/from South Africa in business class for 110K
Example: Johannesburg to Mexico City
Mexico and South America to/from Europe in business class for 105K
Examples:
- Mexico City to London via Amsterdam on KLM
- Amsterdam to Mexico City via Paris on Air France
- Colombia to Paris on Air France
- Brazil to Paris on Air France
- Chile to Paris on Air France
Europe to/from Asia in business class for 80K
Examples:
- Prague to Seoul on Korean Air
- Paris to Seoul on Korean Air
- Seoul to Amsterdam on Korean Air
- Vienna to Taipei via China Airlines business class
Australia/New Zealand to/from Asia in business class for 65K
Examples:
- Seoul to Australia/NZ on Korean Air
- Taipei to Australia on China Air
- Mainland China to Australia/NZ on Korean Air
South Korea to/from Japan business class for 15K
Example: Seoul to Tokyo on Korean Air business class
Good Value Options
15% Off for Delta cardholders
Now that Delta offers a 15% award discount to Delta Gold, Platinum, and Reserve cardholders, you can get good (but not exciting) value on almost any flight.
Shown above you can see both the cash and award search results for a one-way flight from Detroit to Los Angeles. In the table below, I’ve calculated the value of using SkyMiles to book into each of the 3 cabin options both with and without the 15% discount:
| Main Cabin Cents Per Point |
Comfort+ Cents Per Point |
First Class Cents Per Point |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Without Discount | 1.2 | 1.2 | 1.1 |
| With 15% Discount | 1.4 | 1.4 | 1.3 |
As you can see above, the value of SkyMiles for a domestic flight often hovers around 1.0 – 1.2 cents per point, but with the 15% discount you’re more likely to get 1.2 – 1.4 cents per point value.
Fly within Europe for 10K economy or 20K/25K business
Delta offers fixed award prices when flying partner airlines within Europe. Economy appears to be fixed at 10K miles one-way whereas business class costs 20K within a country or 25K across countries. Whether or not this is a good deal depends upon cash rates at the time. Also note that you can often do much better with Virgin Atlantic miles. See: Air France & KLM across Europe for less.
Unfortunately, the Delta credit card 15% discount applies only to itineraries flown entirely by Delta and so there is no additional discount for flights like these.
Sky Club Premium Drinks
Delta Sky Clubs offer both complementary and premium alcohol options. The latter must be paid for with cash or with miles. When using miles to pay for premium drinks, you’ll get 1.5 cents per mile value. You can view a recent menu with prices here.
A cool bonus: you can tip the server with miles at the same rate! For example, you can give the server a $3 tip and it will cost you only 200 miles.
What did I miss?
Do you know of great uses for Delta miles not included above? Please comment below.
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I have had 40k DL miles for years from a signup bonus and no longer have the DL Amex card. The only interaction I ever have with DL is access to their lounge via my KLM business class tickets. Could I use my DL miles towards drinks? If so, do I simply provide my DL member # for payment? I think I’m being dense….!
I’ve found with both Delta and Jetblue, domestically, that the more expensive the cash price of the ticket is, the worse value you get with points. For example, a $100 ticket would could maybe get you 1.3 cpp (without the 15% discount) whereas a $1,000 ticket would be closer to 1.1 cpp. Typically you see that on the same flight you’ll get more cpp in economy than comfort+. Similarly, the cpp for first class is always lower.
Westjet flights showing 12.5k miles for me on delta. ATL<->YYC
This is what caught my eye as well
It was historically 12.5k. If it has recently changed, it would be a notable and completely unsurprising devaluation that I haven’t seen reported
It’s no longer fixed. It’s now pricing at either 12.5, 15 or 17.5.
That’s bizarre. Last night, when I was looking, everything was pricing at 17.5 from YYC (including ATL). Now, it’s between 12.5, 15 or 17.5. Thanks for letting us know, we’ll fix it.
12.5k is for flights over 30 days from date of booking. DL has various penalties for its own flights and partners that range from 7 to 60 days from date of booking. The penalties on its own flights are primarily for up to 21 days and can get scrambled if the cash prices are particularly high or low. Partners are more fixed and go up to 60 for some partners. Take a look at something like SEA-LAX right now, within 7 days it is 19.5k, 8-14 it is 13.6k except the high-price day, 15-21 it is 11k except the high-priced days, over 21 domestic flights bounce around without the same fixed rules.
Yep, that’s exactly what it looks like. 17.5K is <21days, 15K is <56 days and 12.5K is 56 days+.
You’re pretty good at this…you should think about doing a blog sometime 🙂
I saw another blog recently (I forget which one) that had a recent menu showing that the price is skyclubs for wine/liquor purchases is now 1c per skymile?
They used to be worth 2 cents and then went down to 1.5 cents during the pandemic. Unless there’s been another change in the last couple of months, it’s still 1.5.
I saw the same 1c pp noted in a review of the new JFK Delta One Lounge. Sure enough I’ve seen pics of the drink menu there and they were priced at 1 cpp. I just went through the LAX SkyClub last week and it was still 1.5, so perhaps this is just for D1 lounges as they open, but knowing DL it’s probably just a matter of time.
Interesting. Hopefully it doesn’t make the jump from Delta One to SkyClubs, but I agree, it’s probably just a matter of time.
That must have been what I saw. Definitely was a menu showing only 1cpp
Greg, here’s a question for you using Delta miles on Intra-European flights on partners. With respect to using AAdvantage miles or United miles, I have found that I can book and cancel award flights on their respective partners with their respective miles at will up until flight departure and I get all the miles back into my account without any penalty fee or loss of miles.
Does Delta work the same way? I ask because I seem to recall that they follow the penalty proscriptions of their partner air carriers, but I am not sure.
At least with respect to United miles and AAdvantage miles and their partners, this is one reason I favor using these miles over perhaps cheaper partner miles (BA for instance vs. AAdvantage) because the European partner miles/programs do still have onerous cancellation penalties on their award flights.
Would love to know if you have an answer vis a vis Delta miles.
Thanks!
SO glad I took advantage of the MEX to SYD for 95K Delta One when I did. Thanks again Greg!
This is useful information. I have Delta miles that have been idle for a while since I always find better deals on other carriers. At least this tells me where to look for the best chances for a decent return on the miles,
Great article!! Thanks.
Did they remove option to apply RUC/GUC online? I see space available then in check out no way to apply RUC/GUC. Agent via text says must be done via agent.
My wife just applied a GUC this morning during check-out
Thanks for updating this Greg!
Now maybe your people can contact Nick’s people about the existence of sweet spots in domestic travel redemptions? 🙂
I fly to Toronto a lot from the East Coast.
I usually get good value from my Delta sky miles for these flights. Usually 1.5 cents/point or more. Depending on when I book the flights. Plus the added bonus of it being flexible/changeable. These prices fluctuate up and down daily.
I have also found that Delta jacks up prices of the Westjet flight they are offering. It’s usually easily booked directly through WestJet for much cheaper. If you want to pay cash…
You misses exchanging for pesos at 1.5 miles per peso
The 4 cents/mile on FC isn’t that rare given that Delta (at least the few times I’ve looked) is charging 2-3x the price vs UA and AA. ($4,000+ for one round trip ticket to Mexico vs. $1,800 on their competitors). I don’t live in a “hub” captive city. Given that I’d never pay $4,000 for a ticket I could get elsewhere for half that, it does tend to skew the results when calculating the value of SkyPesos. Plus the fact that there are never any flash sales from our airport (ALB).
While I do think that DL outperforms the other US carriers (timeliness, planes and crew, baggage handling), I can’t imagine why anyone not in a hub would choose them. They are always so much most costly than other options. Personally, I live in ATL and rarely have choices. It think this piece is especially useful for us. But I do envy those of you with lots of choices.
Can still get Asia to Europe for 90K in business on Air France.
We’ll see what happens as soon as people can actually fly that route.
Thoughts on Delta First to Hawaii? 50-60K one way usually from East Coast. Seems a good deal, wonder your thoughts
That’s a good deal if you can get on a flight with lie flat seats.
That’s a good deal regardless, IMO. When I looked (this was like 7 years ago) DL wanted 270,000 EACH WAY for each ticket. AA had it for around 60k I believe (lie flats from DFW to OGG), but that pricing is gone now (AA charges more for lie flats now).