Delta Medallion Status Can Now Be Earned on Delta Vacations

Updated: January 9, 2024, 8:33am CST

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How to Earn Status on Delta Vacation Packages
Final Thoughts

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The ringing in of the new year has brought with it a new way of earning Delta Medallion elite status.

As of January 1, 2024, Delta SkyMiles members can earn status and even more bonus miles when booking a Delta Vacation package.

Here’s how you can climb through the ranks of Delta’s SkyMiles loyalty program by booking your next trip.

How to Earn Status on Delta Vacation Packages

Some might say that having airline status isn’t as exclusive as it used to be, but we still think it’s worth having. So, when a major carrier like Delta Air Lines opens up another avenue to earning status, it gets our attention.

From now on, all Delta SkyMiles members can earn 1 Medallion Qualification Dollar (MQD) per $1 spent on the total cost of a Delta Vacation package. Previously, you could only earn MQDs on the flight portion of these packages.

Delta Plane at Sunrise DTW — A glorious sunrise over a Delta jet. Image Credit: Christine Krzyszton

Each SkyMiles member will earn MQDs for the flight part of the trip based on Exception Fares.

If there are several SkyMiles members in the booking, only the main passenger will receive the bonus MQDs on the non-flight part of the package (including hotel, cars, and activities). The MQDs awarded for non-flight components will equal the total price of the trip minus the total of all flight MQDs awarded.

Hot Tip:

In addition to spending money on flying or Delta Vacations, credit cards can help you soar through the SkyMiles Medallion status levels. For example, select Delta credit cards earn 1 MQD for every $10 or $20 spent. Plus, beginning on February 1, 2024, some cards will offer a bonus of 2,500 MQDs — that’s halfway to earning Silver status!

Earn Even More Bonus Miles on Vacation Packages

Delta is also increasing the number of bonus miles you’ll earn when booking one of the airline’s package vacations.

Each person on the booking can now earn up to a maximum of 10,000 bonus miles.

The breakdown of the bonuses looks like this:

Bookings up to $4,999 = 1,000 bonus miles per passenger
Bookings of $5,000 to $9,999 = 5,000 bonus miles per passenger (up from 2,000)
Bookings of $10,000+ = 10,000 bonus miles per passenger (up from 5,000)

Bottom Line:

Earning Delta Medallion status can seem like a complicated and sometimes costly process, but it’s actually gotten easier in 2024. You can now earn MQDs on all portions of Delta Vacation packages, and select credit cards will offer an MQD boost beginning on February 1, 2024.

Final Thoughts

If you were planning on flying Delta on a trip this year, it might be worth considering booking as a Delta Vacation package to make the most of the recently-introduced bonus MQD earning ability.