How to Book American AAdvantage Award Tickets

American AAdvantage miles can be used for award travel on American Airlines and on 25 domestic and international partners. The number of miles and the fees required for an award ticket will depend on which airline you choose to fly. This guide will walk you through the process of finding and booking an award ticket.

Compare Award Prices

In many cases travel on flights operated by American Airlines will be require fewer miles, especially in business or first class. However, the quality of the service and overall experience may be better on some partners, such as Etihad or Cathay Pacific. There may also be more direct flights with some partners, such as Alaska Airlines. Some partners, such as British Airways, may offer more award availability in general. Finally, there may be different taxes and fees. All of these factors may justify redeeming more miles for a partner award.

Compare award prices from American AAdvantage and other programs.

Estimate Taxes, Fees, and Surcharges

Because the same award space is generally available to all partners, consider the possible fees and surcharges that will apply before you redeem your miles. If you have miles with both American Airlines and British Airways, for example, they probably have different award prices for the same ticket. But they will also have different fees. I recommend that you familiarize yourself for these fees before you begin searching for award availability.

Learn more about taxes, fees, and surcharges when booking through:

• American AAdvantage
• British Airways Executive Club (coming soon)
• Alaska Mileage Plan

Review the Award Routing Rules

One last thing before you start searching: make sure you are familiar with the American AAdvantage routing rules. You may get lucky and find results on your first try, searching from your origin to your destination. In many cases, however, it’s easier to find the flights you want if you break up your search and look one leg at a time. For example, if you want to travel from the U.S. to Europe, create a list of all the gateway airports in each region. (Gateway airports are international departure and arrival points. They may be big hubs like New York or smaller cities like Austin.)

The logic here is that when you submit a search the airline’s computers will consider all possible connecting points and then look to see if there is award space on all segments of your journey. But computers take shortcuts and sometimes miss things. If you do the work yourself you will be more certain that you have exhausted every option. So if you live in Dallas you might look for flights to Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and even Miami. Then from each of those cities you might look for flights to London, Paris, Madrid, and so on. (Don’t forget to look for flights from Dallas to each of these European cities, too!)

As you find routes with availability, you can piece together an entire trip. You can visit an airline’s website, the oneworld Alliance website, or OpenFlights.org to get more information about which airlines serve which cities.

However, there are specific rules about how many connections American AAdvantage will allow and where you can make them. These are the routing rules you should try to understand before you start finding flights that may not be permitted.

Learn more about the American AAdvantage routing rules.

Find Award Availability

There are three primary locations where you might search for award space on American Airlines and its partners: AA.com, BritishAirways.com, and Qantas.com. In addition, you might find it useful to use AlaskaAir.com, Etihad.com, and ExpertFlyer.com for some purposes. ExpertFlyer is a paid service; the rest are free to use.

Find Award Space Using American Airlines

Award space for these airlines should be visible on the American Airlines website:

• airberlin
• American Airlines
• British Airways
• Finnair
• Royal Jordanian Airlines
• Qantas
• Alaska Airlines
• Hawaiian Airlines (excluding travel between the mainland U.S. and Hawaii)

Learn more about how to find award space using the American Airlines website.

That’s a short list, and unfortunately award space for most of American’s partners is not displayed on the American Airlines website at all. This does not mean that award space is not available. Instead, you must call an agent to book these flights; it may even be possible to request a waiver for the additional fee for manual reservations.

Language	Phone Number	Hours
English	(800) 433-7300	Daily – 24 hours
Spanish	(800) 633-3711	Daily – 24 hours
Mandarin Chinese	(800) 492-8095	Daily – 7 AM to midnight (CT)
Japanese	(800) 237-0027	Daily – 6 AM to midnight (CT)

An agent can also help you find award space, but it may be easier to search for award space on another website first, especially if booking premium cabin awards that are more scarce. In general the same award space is made available to all partners — if another partner displays it on their website, then American’s agents should be able to pull it up.

Be sure to record the exact date and flight number. Although you could just provide the agent with dates and cities, their computer may not search all possible options. If you have a specific flight in mind, provide the agent with specific information.

Find Award Space Using British Airways and Qantas

British Airways offers one of the most comprehensive tools for finding award space on other oneworld Alliance members. However, it does not display award space on Alaska, which may limit your ability to find connecting flights within the United States. Award space for these airlines should be visible on the British Airways website, and you can then call American Airlines to book:

• airberlin
• American Airlines
• British Airways
• Cathay Pacific
• Dragonair
• Finnair
• Iberia
• Japan Airlines
• LAN Airlines
• Malaysia Airlines
• Qantas Airways
• Qatar Airways
• S7 Airlines
• SriLankan Airlines
• TAM Airlines

The Qantas website is a good backup to British Airways, and it does include award space on Alaska Airlines. However, it misses a few other oneworld airlines and sometimes prioritizes its own partners, like Emirates, that are not partners with American Airlines or British Airways. This sometimes adds lots of extraneous results that are difficult to filter out.

Learn more about how to find award space using the British Airways and Qantas websites.

Find Award Space with Alaska Airlines

Alaska Airlines and American Airlines share many of the same partners, and in some cases one offers a better search tool than the other. One system may do a better job of finding the same award space, or it may offer a better way of displaying results. That really depends on the kind of award you’re looking for and your preferences. Consider using the Alaska Airlines website to find award space on these airlines:

• American Airlines
• Alaska Airlines
• British Airways
• Fiji Airways
• Qantas

In particular, Fiji Airways is a partner available only on the Alaska Airlines website and not on the American, British Airways, or Qantas websites.

Learn more about how to find award space using the Alaska Airlines website. (coming soon)

Find Award Space with Etihad

One partner, Etihad, is not available on any of the above websites. You’ll need to search for Etihad award space on its own website and then call American Airlines to book it.

Learn more about how to find award space using the Etihad Airways website. (coming soon)

Find Award Space with ExpertFlyer

There is one partner, Air Tahiti Nui, that cannot be found on any of the above websites but can be found on ExpertFlyer. ExpertFlyer can also find a few other carriers if you prefer to use this tool. It is a paid service, so you may prefer to call an agent instead.

• American Airlines
• Alaska Airlines
• Finnair
• Air Tahiti Nui

Learn more about how to find award space using ExpertFlyer. (coming soon)

Find Award Space by Phone

Finally, there are several partners that do not make it possible to search for award space online:

• Cape Air
• Gulf Air
• Jet Airways
• Seaborne Airlines

You’ll need to call American Airlines if you want to book travel on these carriers. True, you could find award space by looking at these airlines’ own websites, but remember that they may offer more awards to their members than they provide to the members of partner airlines like American.