United Airlines' loyalty program with a mix of dynamic and traditional pricing, plus access to the full Star Alliance partner network. The Excursionist Perk – a free connecting flight on multi-city bookings – is one of the most unique benefits in any airline program.
These cards earn transferable points that can be converted to United MileagePlus.
Our Valuation
1.6 cents per point(CAD)
1.2 cents per point (USD)
A mix of dynamic and saver pricing across the Star Alliance network. The Excursionist Perk – a free connecting flight on multi-city itineraries – is uniquely valuable and not offered by any other major program.
Last updated: February 6, 2026
MileagePlus is the loyalty program of United Airlines, one of the US “Big 3 airlines” and a founding member of Star Alliance, the world’s largest airline alliance.
United miles can be used to book not only its own flights, but also flights with its Star Alliance and non-alliance partners.
In this guide, we’ll cover everything there is to know about United MileagePlus, including how to optimize your earning and redeeming within the program.
However, note that opportunities to earn United miles are mostly catered towards members based in the US. Other than organic flying, members based in Canada don’t have as many options to earn as much United miles, unless they venture into the US credit card market too.
Chase currently issues four personal and two business co-branded United MileagePlus credit cards:
Remember that when applying for United MileagePlus credit cards, you must abide by the Chase 5/24 rule, which means that you must have opened at most five new personal credit cards in the past 24 months across all US banks. If you exceed the limit, you’ll automatically be declined.
You also won’t be eligible for the signup bonus if you currently hold the United card you'd like to apply for, or if you’ve already received a signup bonus on that card within the past 24 months.
How many United miles you get and how long the transfer takes depend on where you’re transferring your points from.
Chase officially states that transfers can take up to seven business days, but in practice, transfers tend to complete instantly.
Bilt Rewards points can then be transferred to United MileagePlus miles at a rate of 1:1, and transfers complete instantly.
Points can be transferred at a rate of 3 Bonvoy points = 1 United mile, but you’ll get a bonus of 10,000 United miles for every 60,000 Bonvoy points you transfer. Thus, if you transfer 60,000 Bonvoy points, you’ll be getting a total of 30,000 United miles, with an effective rate of 2 Bonvoy points = 1 United mile.
Note that transfers tend to take at least three days.
The amount of miles you’ll earn will depend on your fare class, flight distance, MileagePlus loyalty status, and which airline you’re flying with.
On United flights, you’ll earn miles based on the fare you paid and your MileagePlus status.
All members earn 5x United miles per dollar spent on base fare plus carrier-imposed surcharges, excluding government-imposed taxes and surcharges.
MileagePlus members with higher status will earn additional miles with the following multipliers on base fare and carrier-imposed surcharges:
Therefore, if you’re a Premier Silver member, and your fare comes out to $800, you’ll earn 5,600 miles for that flight, while as a Premier 1K member, you’ll earn 8,800 miles on the same flight.
You won’t earn miles on tickets where the fares are unpublished or "opaque" – for example, when you buy flights from a website like Priceline or Hotwire, and the airline's identification is omitted until you've already purchased the ticket.
Star Alliance
Non-Alliance Partners
However, if your ticket was purchased from United and the ticket number starts with 016, the miles you’ll earn will be based on the earning rates of United flights, despite being operated by another airline.
For one, you can earn miles by booking with the following accommodation partners:
You can also earn up to 5 miles per dollar spent through United MileagePlus X, an app that awards miles for shopping, dining, and gift card purchases.
Lastly, United has plenty of partnerships with other businesses that offer bonus miles. A list of ongoing offers can be found on the United website.
For example, you can receive miles for completing surveys, buying flowers, finalizing a mortgage, or even buying or leasing a Jaguar vehicle.
A maximum of 175,000 miles can be purchased per account per calendar year, so if your timing is right, you could buy 87,500 miles for $3,292.19 with tax, and you’d get a bonus 87,500 miles, for a total of 175,000 miles. This yields an effective acquisition price of 1.88 cents per mile.
Unfortunately, United imposes a dynamic award chart for flight redemptions on its own flights and its partners’ flights. This means that the number of miles required for an award can vary depending on factors, such as the route, date, season, and availability.
For United-operated flights, a dynamic award chart also means that the price in miles may be tied to the actual cost of a flight in cash and that every available seat can be booked with miles. However, the last few seats on a plane belonging to the highest fare classes may not be worth the exorbitant number of miles.
On a slightly positive note, with MileagePlus, fuel surcharges are baked into the miles required for redemption, resulting in less cash out-of-pocket for taxes and fees.
To redeem your miles for flights, simply log into your MileagePlus account on either United.com or through the app and select “Book with miles.”
Alternatively, you can book an award ticket over the phone for an extra $25 fee or for free if you’re a Premier Platinum or Premier 1K member.
To upgrade your flight with miles at the time of booking, select “Advanced search” when looking for flight options. From there, select “Upgrades, certificate, and promotion codes” and choose “MileagePlus Upgrade Awards (MUA)”.
You’ll then have the option to pay for your ticket with cash and then use your miles to upgrade to a better seat.
A one-way upgrade from economy to business class from Los Angeles to Newark (EWR) only costs an extra 20,000 miles, but its hefty $250 service fee is something you should consider. You’ll be charged this amount at the time of booking and will then be waitlisted according to your United status. If you’re not successful with your upgrade, you’ll get a refund.
If you wish to upgrade your United or Star Alliance flight after booking, you’ll have to do so online, or you may have to call United in some cases.
Not all Star Alliance partner flights are eligible to be upgraded, and when applicable, it’s only for a one-cabin upgrade and only for one non-stop flight.
With all flight upgrades, the amount of miles required depends on the route, as well as the original cabin booked.
You can search to see if your flight is upgradable with miles by using United’s Upgrade Awards search tool.
Through their respective United travel booking portals, you can redeem miles for hotel stays, car rentals, and cruises.
If you’re into shopping, you redeem your United miles for a wide variety of merchandise and gift cards through its shopping portal.
There are also MileagePlus experiences that you can bid on with your miles. These experiences include sporting events, concerts, and vacation packages.
While the redemption possibilities above make your miles more flexible, you should proceed with caution, as you’re certainly getting less value for your miles compared to flight rewards.
Longer domestic flights can also be reasonably priced. A flight of nearly six hours in duration from San Francisco to Boston can be booked for 12,900 miles plus $5.60 in fees.
Since United seems to price award flights based on region rather than distance, there are also great deals to be found when flying within the same region.
For example, in Africa, you can fly Johannesburg (JNB) to Cairo (CAI) for only 35,000 miles in economy class on either Egyptair or Ethiopian Airlines, or from Cape Town (CPT) to Casablanca (CMN) for as little as 22,000 miles in economy class with the same airlines.
While there are some great deals to be found, you should make it a habit to compare the price in miles with the price in cash. With dynamic pricing, when it’s cheap to redeem United miles for a ticket, then the cash price might not be too expensive either.
To be eligible for the Excursionist Perk, you must meet the following conditions:
How Does the United Excursionist Perk Work?
Read moreBasically, if you are flying a round-trip or open-jaw anywhere internationally with United miles, you can add another flight within the region you’re going to, which will not cost you any additional miles.
Let’s look at an example flying from Chicago to Europe.
You can fly Chicago (ORD) to London (LHR), then London (LHR) to Paris (CDG), and finally return from Paris (CDG) back to Chicago (ORD).
If you search using the multi-city tool on United.com, you’ll find that the London (LHR) to Paris (CDG) portion of the trip will come out to 0 miles plus taxes and fees.
Now let’s look at a slightly more advanced example. By following the Excursionist Perk rules, your “free” flight must start and end in a different region from your original flight, but your original flight doesn’t have to connect or link up with your “free” flight.
Let’s say you want to fly from Cape Town, South Africa to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia with United miles. This would normally cost you 35,000 miles for the cheapest ticket in economy class.
Now, if you were to add a short-haul US flight, say from Los Angeles to San Francisco before and after your intra-Africa flight for 5,900 miles apiece, then your intra-Africa flight would be priced at 0 miles.
Your total journey, with the two extra flights included, would come out to 11,800 miles for the three one-way flights instead of 35,000 miles for the intra-Africa flight alone.
There’s plenty of potential with this trick, especially for positioning flights that you can use to complement your other award redemptions.
However, remember that you must use the flights on the ticket in sequence, or else the subsequent flights might be cancelled.
You can also leverage this tool to search for low-priced awards on Star Alliance partner airlines, otherwise called “saver awards”. These seats are generally bookable via other Star Alliance loyalty programs as well.
You can then compare the cost of these saver awards between United MileagePlus and other programs like Aeroplan, which doesn’t charge dynamic prices for partner awards.
Partner Fuel Surcharges: When booking award flights on United partner airlines, be aware that surcharge policies vary significantly. Lufthansa Group carriers (Lufthansa, Swiss, Austrian) typically impose substantial fuel surcharges on award tickets. ANA, on the other hand, does not charge fuel surcharges on partner awards. Always check the total cost before confirming a partner booking.
After that, you’ll have to reach a specific threshold of flight segments, also known as Premier Qualifying Flights (PQF), and earn a specific number of Premier Qualifying Points (PQP). If you reach a high enough PQP, you won’t need the PQFs above the minimum of four United segments required.
PQPs are earned based on the base fare and carrier-imposed surcharges of your flight purchase, and they include seat purchases and paid upgrades.
You can also earn PQPs by spending on co-branded United credit cards. You’ll earn 25 PQP for every $500 in card spend. You can earn anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 PQPs per calendar year, depending on the card.
Here are the requirements for every status level:
United MileagePlus Premier tiers come with corresponding benefits that scale up as you reach higher status tiers. You can find all the benefits detailed on United's website.
As a Premier Silver member, you'll be eligible for complimentary upgrades, access to Economy Plus seats for you and a companion during check-in, and a complimentary checked bag.
With Premier Gold and above, you’ll also become a Star Alliance Gold member, which unlocks additional benefits when you fly with any Star Alliance partner airline. Among the most lucrative benefits are access to Star Alliance airport lounges and additional baggage allowance.
If you’re a Premier Platinum or 1K member, you’ll also have access to United’s PlusPoints. You’ll receive 40 PlusPoints when you reach Premier Platinum, and 280 PlusPoint when you reach Premier 1K.
You can then earn more PlusPoints if you continue to earn more Premier qualifying points. Every 3,000 PQP beyond 18,000 will earn you 20 more PlusPoints.
PlusPoints can be used to upgrade seats at the following costs:
There are also some ways you can fast-track to a higher United MileagePlus status tier without having to earn PQF or PQP.
If you’re a Marriott Bonvoy Titanium or Ambassador Elite member, you’ll be automatically eligible for United Premier Silver status as part of the preferred partnership between Marriott and United.
You can claim your Premier Silver status by registering on the United website.
United also allows status matches from other airline loyalty programs. The full list of programs and terms can be found on United’s website.
Earning miles in the MileagePlus program can easily be done through signing up for United’s co-branded Chase credit cards in the US, and by crediting your normal flight activity to your United MileagePlus account.
When you have United miles, there’s certainly value to be found, especially if you’re able to take advantage of some of the sweet spots, including the Excursionist Perk.
First-year value
$336
Monthly fee: $15.99
• Earn 1,250 points per month upon spending $750 per month for 12 months
Earning rates
Key perks
Monthly fee: $15.99
• Earn 1,250 points per month upon spending $750 per month for 12 months
Earning rates
Key perks
