Emirates Skywards is arguably not the best frequent flyer program out there. This is mainly because the carrier surcharges on most Emirates Classic Reward flight redemptions are insanely high. The number of miles you need for a reward flight is relatively high as well. Plus, most partner awards are not that easy to book and Emirates Skywards miles annoyingly expire after three years.

But there are some good things about Emirates Skywards. For example, if you don’t mind paying more miles for “Flex Plus” rewards, Emirates often has reasonably good reward seat availability on its own flights.

Perhaps the best use of Emirates Skywards miles, which you can easily earn with selected Australian credit cards, is upgrading Emirates flights.

Upgrading Emirates flights with Skywards miles remains fairly good value. From time to time, Emirates even discounts the number of miles you need to upgrade from Flex Plus fares.

Although they publish very little information on their website about the process, Emirates makes it relatively easy to upgrade on flights with seats available. Depending on your fare type, you might even be able to confirm it immediately after booking your flight. Alternatively, you can choose to upgrade with Skywards miles when checking in or even after you’ve boarded your flight.

Unlike on Qantas international flights, upgrading on Emirates is not always a lottery. You don’t necessarily need to wait until a few days out from departure for your upgrade to come through.

Here’s how upgrading with Emirates Skywards miles works…

The basics of upgrading on Emirates with Skywards miles

The first thing you need to do if you want to upgrade an Emirates flight with miles is ensure you’re booking an upgradeable ticket.

Only Emirates marketed and operated flights can be upgraded using Skywards miles, so you’ll need to book directly with Emirates on the “EK” flight number. Emirates codeshare flights booked through Qantas with a “QF” flight number are ineligible to upgrade using points or miles.

When booking an EK-coded Emirates flight, note that you won’t be able to earn Qantas status credits. This is one downside for Qantas Frequent Flyer members. On the other hand, if you upgrade to Business or First Class you’ll get to fly in style – so maybe those status credits aren’t so important after all?

From Economy or Premium Economy, you can upgrade to Business Class. From Business, you can upgrade to First Class. Upgrades to Emirates Premium Economy are not currently available.

You cannot upgrade from Special fares. However, you can upgrade Classic Reward tickets under the same conditions that apply to regular Saver and Flex Plus tickets.

Upgrades are on a sector-by-sector basis. If you have multiple flights as part of your journey, you can request upgrades individually for each sector.

Other rules of upgrading with Skywards miles

If there are multiple passengers on your booking, you can use your miles to upgrade them as well. In fact, you have to do this unless you first call Emirates to split the booking. You may also use your Skywards miles to upgrade other people who you are not travelling with.

You can enjoy Emirates’ Chauffeur Drive service when upgrading to First Class, but not when upgrading to Business Class.

Section 14 of the Skywards Programme Rules has a full list of rules around Emirates Upgrade Rewards. However, these rules are a bit confusing and do not appear to be entirely accurate. For example, the first rule says that you cannot upgrade both the outbound and inbound journey of a return trip “collectively”. But in practice, you can upgrade in both directions – perhaps the rules mean that you just can’t do it at the same time, but this really isn’t clear.

When you can request an Emirates upgrade with miles

If you originally booked a Flex or Flex Plus fare, you can request an upgrade any time after booking. This means you can get your upgrade confirmed in advance, if there is availability. More on this below.

After online check-in opens 48 hours before departure, Emirates also allows passengers with Economy Class Saver and Business Class Saver fares to request upgrades using Skywards miles. Upgrading online is possible until six hours prior to departure. At this point, Emirates will typically approve your upgrade request if enough seats are still available in the higher cabin.

Passengers on Saver, Flex and Flex Plus fares can also request upgrades at the airport. You can ask at the check-in counter, or even ask a flight attendant after you’ve boarded the plane. When upgrading at the airport, Emirates will approve the request as long as there’s a seat available in the higher cabin.

Waiting until you get to the airport is a bit risky, as there is a chance the Business or First Class cabin could already be full by that point. On the other hand, it’s possible that an extra seat may become available at the last minute, for example if another passenger doesn’t show up or misses their connection.

How to check for Emirates upgrade availability

Officially, Emirates says that you need to call them to confirm upgrade availability on any given flight. But Emirates normally uses the same inventory for Saver Classic Reward and mileage upgrade space. So, your upgrade will probably come through immediately if you have a Flex or Flex Plus ticket and there is Emirates Saver Classic Reward availability on the flight.

Note that there is a difference between Saver and Flex Plus Classic Reward availability. On most Emirates routes, you can only book Saver Classic Rewards with Skywards miles on round-trip bookings. So, when searching for Saver reward seats on the Emirates website, make sure you’re looking for round-trip flights and cross-check the number of miles quoted for the redemption booking with the cost of a Saver Classic Reward on the Emirates Miles Calculator.

Note that Emirates Saver Classic Reward availability may differ compared to what’s available to book as Emirates Classic Rewards using Qantas points.

Fortunately, there is an easier way to check upgrade availability! When booking a flight on the Emirates website, Emirates marks flights with upgrades currently available with an upgrade icon and the text “Upgrade available”. The website also shows you how many Skywards miles the upgrade would cost you:

If an upgrade is not currently available, the website will say that the fare is “Eligible” to upgrade. This means you can waitlist for an upgrade or try your luck once check-in opens. Beware: this is not the same thing as an upgrade being “available”!

How many Skywards miles do you need to upgrade Emirates flights?

As mentioned above, Emirates will tell you how many miles you need to upgrade from each of the different fare types when you book your flight on its website.

You can also check the number of miles needed to upgrade from any fare type, and on any route, using the Emirates Miles Calculator.

Unfortunately, Emirates does not publish upgrade reward charts that let you easily compare the cost of upgrading on different routes. It only displays these amounts when you search using its Miles Calculator. You can only search for one route and cabin class at a time.

If booking a journey with multiple flights (e.g. Melbourne to London via Dubai), the prices shown on the Emirates Miles Calculator only apply if you upgrade both sectors at the same time. This is something you can only do in advance via the Emirates call centre. If upgrading one sector at a time, the amount of miles you’ll need to pay could be higher.

Also, beware that Emirates could change the number of miles needed to upgrade a flight at any time. As per the Skywards programme rules:

Emirates Skywards reserves the right to change, modify or amend any part of the Emirates Skywards programme at any time in accordance with the Programme Rules. This right includes, but is not limited to, changes in Emirates Skywards partner affiliation, rules for earning and redeeming mileage credit, rules for use of travel awards, flight schedules, Member travel benefits and specific features of promotional offers.

Some examples of upgrade costs on common Emirates routes

The tables below show the number of Skywards miles you would need to upgrade on selected Emirates routes that Australians commonly use. All amounts shown are for one-way flights, so double them for return flights.

Upgrading to Business Class

These amounts are for upgrades to Business Class:

As you may have noticed, some of these amounts don’t make much sense. For example, it costs more miles to upgrade from Economy Saver to Business Class on a two-hour fifth-freedom flight from Singapore to Phnom Penh than a 14-hour flight from Dubai to New York.

Upgrading to First Class

This table shows the number of Skywards miles you’d need to upgrade from Business to First Class on Emirates flights:

Why upgrading with Skywards miles can be good value

When you book a Classic Reward on Emirates with Skywards miles, you need to pay Emirates’ exorbitant carrier charges in addition to the legitimate government and airport fees. This also applies when redeeming Qantas points for Emirates flights, or points with any other partner airline except Air Canada.

But when you buy an Economy ticket and upgrade, you only have to pay the amount of Skywards miles that it costs for the upgrade. You don’t need to pay Emirates’ carrier charges when upgrading. That makes a huge difference!

On flights departing from countries where the local government charges higher taxes to passengers in premium cabins, you might need to pay extra government taxes. For example, if you upgraded a flight departing the UK from Economy to Business Class, you’d need to pay the applicable additional Air Passenger Duty. But that’s not an Emirates charge, and is a rare exception.

Case study: Perth to Amsterdam and back

For example, it costs 224,000 Emirates Skywards miles + $3,674.34 to book a round-trip Business Saver Classic Reward from Perth to Amsterdam (via Dubai). A Flex Plus Business Class reward booking on the same route would cost 355,000 Skywards miles + $3,674.34 round-trip.

Of the fees and taxes payable on this “reward” booking, only $270.74 are legitimate third-party taxes. Emirates pockets the remaining $3,403.60.

Since these flights are available as Business Saver Classic Rewards, if you bought a commercial Economy Class ticket on the same flights, you should theoretically be able to upgrade.

So, is that better value? You bet it is…

You could book an Economy Flex ticket on the same return flights from Perth to Amsterdam for $2,331.74. Then, after booking, simply upgrade all the flights for 156,000 Skywards miles. (That’s 78,000 miles per direction.)

In summary, you could pay 224,000 Skywards miles and $3,675 to book “reward” flights in Business Class. Or, you could pay 156,000 Skywards miles and $2,332 to book Economy Flex and immediately upgrade to Business Class.

Skywards is not the easiest program to understand

If this all sounds complicated, it unfortunately is. Emirates’ frequent flyer program is not particularly transparent with its rules and pricing, and seems to like giving members as little easy-to-find information as possible. That said, if you know what you’re doing, upgrading with Skywards miles can be fairly easy and reasonable value.

So, if you already have Skywards miles that you want to use or an upcoming flight booked with Emirates, upgrading could be a good option. But we wouldn’t necessarily recommend transferring points to Skywards unless you know what you’re doing.

Matt Graham

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 90 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include aviation, economics & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.