12 Best Ways To Redeem Delta SkyMiles for Max Value [2018]

BY 

Caroline Lupini

- May 30, 2017September 17, 2018

1. Use Points  / 
2. Use Airline Points

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Delta SkyMiles are often called “Sky Pesos” because of their seemingly low value on many redemptions, but there are actually a bunch of great reward options possible with SkyMiles!

Below I’ll share the best redemptions currently available to book award travel with the Delta frequent flyer program, so you don’t have to think of your miles as “Sky Pesos” anymore either.

(We’ve also written an article about the best ways to use 100,000 Delta SkyMiles if you’ve got a healthy balance and need some inspiration!)

Using Delta SkyMiles With Airline Partners

SkyMiles can be earned by signing up for various credit cards, including co-branded Delta credit cards offered by American Express.

You can search for award tickets on Delta.com and can easily redeem SkyMiles on flights with Delta Air Lines and partner carriers when using their search engine. Many airline partners (but not all) are available to search online. For some, you have to telephone Delta to confirm availability and book.

When you’re searching for availability, simply elect to view the price in miles to see how many miles it will cost to take the award flight.

Hot Tip: Look through all options because even when sorting by lowest price, cheaper options on partner airlines may be placed below Delta options, if, for instance, the partner flight miles are cheaper but taxes and charges are higher.

Delta is part of the Sky Team alliance, and they also partner with a few other airlines who are unaffiliated with an alliance. Virgin Altantic and Virgin Australia are particularly popular for awards through Delta’s partnership with them, as well as GOL in Brazil.

Bottom Line: These partnerships offer many options to redeem Delta SkyMiles for award tickets with a variety of carriers on flights all around the world.

American Express Delta SkyMiles Credit Cards

With the following cards, you can earn Delta SkyMiles directly with no transferring required. They also include great welcome bonus offers to help you quickly earn your first Delta award ticket!

CREDIT CARD	CARD INFO
Gold Delta SkyMiles® Credit Card from American Express	Limited Time Offer: Earn 60,000 bonus miles after you spend $3,000 in purchases within the first 4 months. Offer expires on 9/19/2018. Earn 2 miles on every dollar spent on purchases made directly with Delta Annual Fee: $0 introductory annual fee for the first year, then $95. Terms.
Platinum Delta SkyMiles® Credit Card from American Express	Limited Time Offer: Earn 70,000 bonus miles and 10,000 Medallion® Qualification Miles (MQMs) after you spend $3,000 in purchases on your new Card within your first 3 months. Offer expires on 9/19/2018. $195 Annual Fee. Terms.
Gold Delta SkyMiles® Business Credit Card from American Express	Earn 60,000 bonus miles after you spend $3,000 in purchases within the first 4 months. Annual Fee: $0 introductory annual fee for the first year, then $95. Terms.
Platinum Delta SkyMiles® Business Credit Card from American Express	Earn 70,000 bonus miles and 10,000 Medallion® Qualification Miles (MQMs) after you spend $3,000 in purchases on your new Card in your first 3 months. Annual Fee: $195. Terms.

American Express Membership Rewards Credit Cards

If you like earning Amex Membership Rewards, they can be transferred to Delta SkyMiles at a 1:1 ratio. These cards also include great welcome bonus offers.

Recommended Amex Personal Cards

AMEX CARD	BENEFITS & INFO
The Amex EveryDay® Credit Card	Earn 10,000 Membership Rewards® points after you use your new Card to make $1,000 in purchases in your first 3 months. 2x points at US supermarkets, on up to $6,000 per year in purchases (then 1x). Earn 20% extra points when you make 20 or more purchases with your Card in a billing period. 0% introductory APR for the first 15 months on purchases, then a variable APR of 14.74%-25.74%. 0% introductory APR for the first 15 months on balance transfers requested within 60 days of account opening, then a variable APR of 14.74%-25.74%. Terms. Annual Fee: $0
Premier Rewards Gold Card from American Express	Earn 25,000 points after you use your new Card to make $2,000 in purchases within the first 3 months. $100 Airline fee credit. 3x points for flights booked directly with airlines. 2X points at US restaurants, US gas stations, and at US supermarkets. Terms. Annual Fee: $0 for the first year, then $195
The Platinum Card® from American Express	Earn 60,000 Membership Rewards® points after you use your new Card to make $5,000 in purchases in your first 3 months. 5X Membership Rewards® points on flights booked directly with airlines or with American Express Travel. Access more than 1,200 airport lounges across 130 countries and counting, including the amazing Centurion® lounges. Up to $200 Uber Savings Annually. $200 Airline Fee Credit. Terms. Annual Fee: $550

If you’re a business owner, you can see a list of Amex’s business credit cards here.

Marriott-SPG Credit Cards

You can also earn Marriott points and transfer those to Delta SkyMiles at a transfer rate of 3:1. For every 60,000 Marriott points that you transfer, you’ll receive an extra 5,000 Delta SkyMiles bonus.

For more details, you can read our article on transferring Marriott points to partners.

Both Chase Marriott Rewards and Amex Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) cards now earn Marriott points. With two banks offering different versions of the credit cards, you can pick the one best suited to you or your business.

SPG-MARRIOTT CARDS	CARD BENEFITS & INFO
Starwood Preferred Guest® Credit Card from American Express	Earn 75,000 bonus points after you make $3,000 in purchases in your first 3 months. Earn 6 points for each dollar of eligible purchases at participating SPG® and Marriott Rewards® hotels and 2 points on all other eligible purchases. Terms. $0 introductory annual fee for the first year, then $95.
Starwood Preferred Guest® Business Credit Card from American Express	Earn 100,000 bonus points after you make $5,000 in purchases on the Card within your first 3 months of Card Membership. Offer ends 10/31/2018. Earn 6 points for each dollar of eligible purchases at over 6,500 participating SPG® and Marriott Rewards® hotels across 110 countries worldwide. Free Boingo Wi-Fi & Free Wi-Fi at SPG participating hotels. Terms. $0 introductory annual fee for the first year, then $95.
Marriott Rewards® Premier Plus Credit Card	Earn 75,000 Bonus Points after you spend $3,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening. Free Night Award (valued up to 35,000 points) every year after account anniversary. Earn 6 points per $1 spent at participating Marriott Rewards & SPG hotels. Annual Fee: $95

The 12 Best Ways To Use Your Delta SkyMiles

Since Delta doesn’t publish an official award chart anymore, it can be tough to determine the lowest price available for a given flight you want to book.

I recommend using the award chart listed above as a general reference, but it may not be completely accurate because it is not published by Delta (especially as Delta continues making changes to their pricing models).

Hot Tip: When you search for award availability on Delta.com, you should select the 5-week flexible award option to improve your chances of finding a low-level award, especially if you have flexibility in your award travel.

From a 5-week search, drill down to specific dates to verify availability since the calendar is not perfect. Some days may not show the cheapest option on the calendar. Even if you don’t have flexibility, finding the lowest price will at least tell you how much of a premium you’ll be paying to fly on your ideal date, and might lead you to investigate booking with other airlines instead.

Delta has recently begun imposing much higher prices on most awards booked with 21 days of travel. Delta has also raised lowest award prices on partners compared to travel on Delta.

In this post, I’ll quote the SkyMiles amount that’s generally accepted as the lowest level mileage price that Delta currently charges. If you randomly search on any given day, you may see significantly higher prices.

When you search on specific dates, make sure to sort by Price from the drop-down menu since that’s not the default sort option.

Once you have earned enough Delta SkyMiles, follow the suggestions below to make sure you’re using your SkyMiles for the best redemptions possible!

1. Delta One-Way Awards Within the U.S. for as Low as 5,000 Miles

In the not-so-recent past, Delta did not offer award travel on one-way flights. Until January 2015, Delta SkyMiles were redeemable only for round-trip tickets, which made SkyMiles significantly less valuable than they are now.

Thankfully, Delta SkyMiles joined the rest of the industry by granting great award redemptions on both one-way and round-trip flights. Cheers to that!

While Delta says on its frequent flyer page that one-way flights in the U.S., Alaska, and Canada start at 10,000 SkyMiles, it is actually possible to find flights as low as 5,000 miles one-way on select routes like San Francisco to Seattle.

Sometimes, these are announced as limited-time flash sales, other times, they pop up when cash ticket prices are cheap.

These low-cost flights can be a great deal, especially last minute when Delta flight prices tend to be higher. However, if you’re searching a month out on this route, you will probably see one-way prices around $89, making the redemption only mediocre.

Since Delta’s prices are variable, it always makes sense to compare award prices to cash prices for flights.

When considering transferring your American Express Membership Rewards points to Delta, there is something else you need to think about: American Express charges a fee to transfer Membership Rewards to any U.S.-based program, including Delta SkyMiles.

The fee is quite small: only 0.06 cents per point up to a maximum of $99. If Delta has award availability on a flight you want, this fee shouldn’t be enough to stop you from transferring your miles and booking the ticket, but it’s something to be aware of nonetheless.

Hot Tip:  Bring The Platinum Card® from American Express for complimentary access or the Gold Delta Skymiles® Credit Card from American Express for discounted access to the Delta Sky Club to make your travels a little sweeter!

2. Virgin Atlantic to London in Upper Class for 85,000 Miles Each Way

Many people rave about Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class (basically, their business class) experience, especially on the ground at London Heathrow. For flights across the Atlantic Ocean, you can really get the full experience of their lie-flat seats and great food.

There are a few different programs that will grant you access to book Delta airlines award travel on Virgin Atlantic. One of the best redemptions available is to use Delta SkyMiles.

Tickets from the U.S. to London are available on both Delta and Virgin Atlantic, but you generally won’t find low-level availability for Delta’s own flights. Rather, you should look to fly on Virgin Atlantic.

When you do your search on Delta.com, look for VS in the corner of the box displaying the flight details. The VS indicates it’s a flight on Virgin Atlantic.

Your lowest fare from any major U.S. city to London one-way in economy class is 35,000 SkyMiles or 85,000 miles in Upper Class. That’s a round-trip flight for as low as 70,000 SkyMiles, even from the West Coast!

You can connect onward to anywhere else in Europe, provided there’s availability with either Virgin Atlantic or another Delta partner. Virgin Atlantic flies nonstop from Atlanta, Detroit, New York, San Francisco, and a handful of other U.S. cities. Get the greatest value out of the Upper Class experience by flying from the West Coast, since your flight time will be 10.5 hours instead of 7 from the East Coast.

It’s even better to fly Virgin Atlantic back to the U.S. from Europe because you’ll have access to the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse during your stay at London Heathrow. I haven’t yet had the pleasure to visit, but I’ve heard wonderful things from others who have! You’ll only want to book Europe to the U.S. as part of a round-trip flight starting in the U.S. because Delta sneakily adds a huge cash surcharge for awards originating in Europe.

The number of Delta airlines frequent flyer miles you’ll need to redeem your ticket is the same regardless of flight time.

Need help booking? Check out our step-by-step guide to booking Virgin Atlantic Upper Class!

Hot Tip: Grab a Global Entry account before making your journey to enjoy quickly passing through customs when you come back to the U.S. You can get the $100 fee reimbursed with numerous cards, including The Platinum Card® from American Express.

3. Virgin Australia to the South Pacific Islands From 55,000 in Economy Each Way

Ticket prices to Australia, New Zealand, and the South Pacific are high as a general rule. On the low end of the spectrum, you’ll pay at least $4,500 in business class or $900 in economy class per ticket. Considering the relatively high flight prices, Australia, New Zealand, and the South Pacific are great places to visit using miles if you can find availability.

You can fly from the U.S. to Australia and New Zealand on Delta’s partner, Virgin Australia. If you want to fly to the South Pacific Islands of Rarotonga, Figi, Tonga, or others, it may be easier to call Delta Reservations at (800) 221-1212 to have them look for award space.

It’s great that Delta charges the same price to fly to these South Pacific Islands as Australia and New Zealand! Paid fares to the islands are generally more than those to Australia and New Zealand, so booking to the South Pacific Islands is a way to push the value of your miles even further.

Most routes from the U.S. will fly through Australia on the way to the smaller islands but unfortunately, Delta does not permit a stopover.

Virgin Australia tickets from the U.S. to Australia, New Zealand, and Oceania/South Pacific Islands one-way in economy class are 55,000 SkyMiles, while business class is 115,000 SkyMiles.

We generally would not recommend spending 115,000 Delta miles to fly business class, as there are a handful of other airlines that offer much more economical awards to Australia and the South Pacific.

If you want to fly Virgin Australia in business class, flights within Australia and the South Pacific are much more reasonable at 40,000 SkyMiles each way.

Fees run around $200, but this is still an excellent redemption value!

You can search for Virgin Australia award availability on Delta’s website. For more complicated itineraries, especially around the South Pacific, you may need to book through Delta Reservations at (800) 221-1212.

Hot Tip: Don’t pay extra foreign transaction fees during your international trip. Take credit cards with no foreign transaction fees like the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card or Gold Delta SkyMiles® Credit Card from American Express.

4. Book Air France Business Class in Advance for 75,000 Miles Each Way

Air France business class space is only released to Air France Flying Blue Members 305 days ahead of time, but the same space is generally released to Delta SkyMiles members 331 days before departure date.

If you want to fly Air France to Europe in business class, booking with Delta between 306-331 days in advance is even better than booking directly with the operating carrier (Air France). This is highly unusual, as most airlines offer better availability to their own members than the members of partners.

Even if Paris isn’t your final destination, you can connect onward to most other areas of Europe and beyond.

Flights from the U.S. to Europe in economy can be booked for as low as 32,500 SkyMiles one-way, while one-way in business class will cost 75,000 SkyMiles.

5. Aerolineas Argentina and GOL to Patagonia for 100,000 Miles in Business Class Each Way

In 2012, Aerolineas Argentina joined Sky Team alliance and GOL joined Delta as a non-alliance partner. There are limited flights directly from the U.S. (only New York or Miami), but the options within South America are numerous. Since LATAM is one of the only other airlines dominating the region, SkyMiles are very valuable for flights within South America on Aerolineas Argentina and GOL.

Patagonia is a very popular destination, especially for those inclined to spend time in the great outdoors. You can fly to El Calafete in economy for 35,000 SkyMiles one-way, or 100,000 SkyMiles in business class.

This flight has a layover in Buenos Aires, so if you don’t want to go all the way to Patagonia, you can fly to Buenos Aires for the same number of SkyMiles.

If you want to see more of South America while you’re there, you can book economy flights within the region for 12,500 Delta frequent flyer miles between any 2 cities.

Hot Tip: Visit the Delta Sky Club in O’Hare before leaving! You can gain access by purchasing a day pass, a membership through Delta Sky Club, or owning The Platinum Card® from American Express. Members of the Gold Delta SkyMiles® Credit Card from American Express get access for only $29/visit.

7. AeroMexico to Mexico City and Madrid from 82,500 Miles in Economy Round-Trip

Delta’s partnership with AeroMexico is one of the few that has been relatively unaffected by several recent devaluations in the Delta frequent flyer program.

You can fly to Mexico, or (if you’re really feeling adventurous!) do a multi-city tour to Mexico and then to Europe. Mexico City has great award availability on flights to London, Paris, and Madrid.

When the option is available, choose to view the 5-week flexible dates calendar in your search. This will help you find the lowest SkyMiles award ticket prices.

You’ll need to book your flight to Mexico, then to Europe, and finally back to the U.S. through Delta’s advanced multi-city search option. Multi-city will only let you search specific dates, and you may end up on a different airline than AeroMexico on your way back from Europe to the U.S. (e.g., Delta, Aeroflot, etc.)

If you were to put together a multi-city itinerary like this, you would pay:

• New York to Mexico City one-way in economy class for 20,000 SkyMiles, or in business class for 35,000 SkyMiles.

• New York to Mexico City to Madrid to New York in economy class for 90,000 SkyMiles, or in business class for 170,000 SkyMiles.

Hot Tip: When putting together a multi-city itinerary with Delta, it makes sense to search both the entire itinerary as a multi-city search and each segment individually. In some cases, the price may be better booking one way vs. the other.

8. Fly Chinese Airlines in Business Class for 85,000 Miles Each Way

Many of the Chinese airlines are praised for their business-class products. When using your Delta SkyMiles, you have the ability to book China Airlines (based in Taipei), China Eastern and Shanghai Airlines (based in Shanghai), China Southern (based in Guangzhou), and Xiamen Airlines (based in Xiamen), in business class for only 85,000 SkyMiles in each direction, or you can book economy class for only 35,000 SkyMiles.

China Airlines is generally thought to offer the best airline experience.

All of these airlines can be searched on Delta.com for award availability. However, results for China Eastern and China Southern frequently display award availability that isn’t there (it will have an error if you try to purchase) and connecting itineraries often incorrectly price each segment additively rather than as a single one-way. Calling Delta won’t help with availability, though sometimes can fix incorrect pricing. Using another SkyTeam program like Air France KLM Flying Blue or Korean Air Skypass is a backup to booking these airlines.

With China Airlines and Xiamen Airlines, you usually won’t encounter these pricing and ticketing problems.

9. Fly From Japan to Australia or New Zealand in Business Class for 65,000 Miles

If you want to tack on an extra destination to your trip, flying from Japan to Australia or New Zealand with Korean Air in business class is a great way to experience a taste of luxury for fewer miles.

Overall, you’ll end up with about 13 hours of flight time, plus a layover in Korean Air’s Seoul-Incheon hub with a great lounge to visit. It is possible to work in a longer layover and have time to head out into Seoul for a day of sightseeing as well.

10. Travel to Europe or India on Jet Airways

You now can redeem Delta SkyMiles for flights on Jet Airways. While many won’t think of Jet Airways when they think of luxury, Jet Airways does offer a fully flat seat in business class that isn’t half-bad (I tried it!).

Additionally, this new partnership will allow you to fly much more extensively throughout India, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia on the same award ticket.

Jet Airways currently only operates 1 flight from North America, which is Toronto (YYZ) to Amsterdam (AMS).

Economy class redemptions start at 35,000 SkyMiles and business class redemptions start at 85,000 SkyMiles for the Toronto to Amsterdam leg. All the way to India, the one-way price is a reasonable 40,000 SkyMiles in economy, but very high at 120,000 SkyMiles in business class.

11. Add a Side Trip to Vietnam for 40,000 Miles in Business Class

Vietnam Airlines is part of SkyTeam, which means you have the option to redeem your Delta SkyMiles for flights to and within Vietnam.

You can add on a trip to Vietnam, one of this year’s hottest destinations, from Japan for only 22,500 miles in economy or 40,000 miles in business class on Vietnam Airlines.

12. Head to One of the Most Beautiful Pacific Islands for 115,000 Miles in Business Class

Availability might not be the easiest to find, but if you can get it, you surely won’t regret using your Delta SkyMiles to get to Palau.

Palau is one of the most beautiful Pacific Islands, and you’ll save a boatload of money by redeeming miles for your flights. Economy class redemptions from the U.S. start at 55,000 miles and business class redemptions start at 115,000 miles.

There’s a good chance you’ll end up flying Korean Air to Palau, and their business class will ensure that you hit the ground running!

List of Sky Team Alliance Delta Airline Partners

Delta frequent flyer partners include Sky Team and non-alliance partners. Sky Team partners include:

Non-Alliance Delta Airline Partners

Non-alliance partners are some other great Delta partner airlines that aren’t a part of other alliances.

Using Your Delta SkyMiles: The Delta Award Chart

Delta currently has a revenue-based award program, but they still have a somewhat zone-based award program for flight redemptions.

Strangely, the Delta award chart was removed at the beginning of 2015, so it is sometimes a challenge to determine which destinations are in what zone as well as the prices to various zones.

Though overall Delta still has a zone-based program, some flight options don’t quite fit this mold, which makes it very difficult to make sure you are getting a good deal for your flights.

As a general rule, Delta sticks pretty close to their old award chart for flights on Delta. For partner airline flights, the prices have increased across the board. Some regions such as South Asia have seen big increases on all business class awards. I’ve included the old award chart with some generally accepted updates below as a reference:

Booking Delta Award Flights

If you’re interested in how to actually make award travel redemptions with Delta Air Lines, we have a few articles to explain the process:

• How to Book Delta First Class
• Delta One Suites Are Now Bookable on A350
• Best Ways To Book Delta One (Business Class) Using Points [Step-By-Step]

In Conclusion

This article outlines what we believe to be the best ways to redeem your Delta frequent flyer miles for flights once you’ve earned enough of them.

Bottom Line: You can fly cheaply within the U.S., put together great multi-city itineraries, fly in world-class international premium cabins, and fly to far-flung and remote islands in the South Pacific.

When you use your Delta SkyMiles in these ways and compare the pricing offered to the lowest cash price available, you can be confident that your SkyMiles aren’t “Sky Pesos” after all.

Also useful might be to take a look at Delta’s baggage rules so that you can avoid paying any extra fees. Happy redeeming!

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