In our previous articles about airlines programs, we looked at Miles&More of the Lufthansa Group, at the changes implemented in British Airways (Executive) Club and into best options for a fast status achievement within Star Alliance. The SkyTeam alliance, being the second-biggest right after the Star Alliance and the youngest among the 3 biggest alliances, was unfortunately remaining in the shadow until now. It’s time to correct it. And we’ll start with the Flying Blue program of AirFrance/ KLM which is in our modest opinion one of the best options within SkyTeam. Why is it so? We’ll analyze it in this article.
SkyTeam
SkyTeam was founded back in 2000 (Star Alliance in 1997, OneWorld in 1999). Founding airlines were Aeromexico, Air France, Delta Airlines and Korean Air. All four founder airlines are still in the alliance along with
- Aerolineas Argentinas
- Air Europa
- China Airlines (not to mix up with Air China belonging to Star Alliance)
- China Eastern
- Garuda Indonesia
- Kenya Airways
- KLM
- Middle East Airlines
- Saudi Arabian Airlines
- SAS
- Tarom
- Vietnam Airlines
- Virgin Atlantic Airways
- Xiamen Airlines
It totals to 18 members (currently: Star Alliance – 26 members, OneWorld – 15 members).
Former members of the SkyTeam were:
- Aeroflot (membership currently suspended)
- Alitalia -> ITA (moved to Star Alliance after the integration into Lufthansa Group)
- China Southern (wanted to be alliance-independent)
- Continental Airlines (moved to Star Alliance after the merger with United Airlines)
- Copa (moved to Star Alliance having strong capital investment by Continental)
- Czech Airlines (does not exist anymore)
- Northwest Airlines (was integrated into Delta Airlines)
Flying Blue
FlyingBlue is used as the loyalty program not only by Air France and KLM, but also by Kenya Airways and Tarom. With it, 4 out of 18 members of SkyTeam are directly linked to Flying Blue. Within SkyTeam, Flying Blue competes just with 14 other programs.
The structure of the program
On the award side, several years ago Flying Blue switched from the distance-based award miles credits to the value-based credits. For each EUR spent on tickets (excluding usual components like taxes), additional services or booking of SAF, you get from 4 to 9 miles depending on your status level.
If the flight was marketed by another airline, you might still have the chance to get distance-based credits.
You can earn miles not only when flying with the airlines of the SkyTeam. Flying Blue partners with 37 airlines in total. On top of the SkyTeam members, these are
- Air Corsica
- Air Mauritius
- AirBaltic
- Aircalin (also using Flying Blue as its loyalty program)
- China Southern (temporarily suspended on 31.12.2025)
- Chalair Aviation
- Copa Airlines
- El Al
- Etihad
- GOL
- Japan Airlines
- Malaysia Airlines
- Oman Air
- Qantas
- Transavia (including status qualification, s. below)
- TwinJet
- WestJet
- Winair
FlyingBlue and Hotels
You can also earn miles when staying in hotels, booking a rental car or just doing day-to-day shopping or using FlyingBlue co-branded credit cards (mainly available in France and Switzerland).
Flying Blue strongly cooperates with ALL – Accor Life Limiteless: when your accounts of Flying Blue and ALL are connected, you get credits in both programs for flights on AirFance/ KLM and for stays in hotels of Accor Hotels Group. It is a real booster for free nights and sufficient miles for award flights.
Remember that booking via our partner platform, you get even more advantages than booking directly with Accor Hotels and at the same time, the nights do still count towards your status qualification and to the credits of points/ miles. So that you can benefit even triple-wise.
Further earning options
Flying Blue offers subscriptions allowing you to buy a certain amount of miles on a monthly basis. Furthermore, you can also purchase a booster which would multiply by a certain factor all miles you earned in the current and the previous months.
Flying Blue allows you to combine your account and the accounts of your loved ones into a kind of family account (the residency address of all members of the family account should be identical).
As you can see, there are a lot of different opportunities to get enough miles for an award ticket.
How does it look like at the status side of the program?
At the registration, you start at the Explorer level. For each flight segment you earn a fixed number of XP or Experience Points. This can be found in the appropriate table:
The table can be found here.
Silver status
In order to reach the silver status, you need to earn 100 XP. For example, flying from Amsterdam to Singapore via Jeddah with Saudia in business class, you earn
AMS – JED: 24 XP (Long 1)
JED – SIN: 30 XP (Long 2)
SIN – JED: 30 XP (Long 2)
JED – AMS: 24 XP (Long 1)
Total: 108 XP
And with it, you are already a silver member.
Once you reach silver status, the required 100 XP are deducted from your XP account.
For the gold status, you need to earn further 180 XP.
The requirement for the platinum status is 300 XP.
Requalification
If you wish to get to the platinum status within the same year, you will need to earn 100 + 180 + 300 = 580 XP. For the requalification in the following years, however, it is enough to earn just the number of XP required for your current level. If you are already on the platin level, you just need further 300 XP in the new year in order to requalify or just 180 XP in order to requalify to gold status.
The XP which were not used in the current year are rolled over into the next year. Let’s assume you earned 360 XP in the current year, but you need only 300 XP for the platin requalification. The remaining 60 XP remain in your account and count towards your qualification in the following year, facilitating even further your requalification.
What to do if you do not fly enough for a requalification in a certain year? You can earn additional XP when buying a SAF option for one of your booked flights. Air France and KLM offer you different options with different number of XP which you can buy even still at the day of your departure.
If you manage to keep your platin status for 10 consecutive years, you can keep it for life without any further need of requalification.
Ultimate
Few years ago, Flying Blue introduced a new (and currently the highest) level – Ultimate. The conditions to reach it are, however, pretty demanding: you need to earn 900 UXP (Ultimate XP) within two years. UXP can be earned only on flights marketed by Air France and KLM.
What are the benefits on each level?
Reaching silver, you can get 50% more of award miles (6 miles instead of 4 per EUR spent). You can use Priority Check-in (which is not the case with a silver status level or equivalent within Star Alliance), priority drop-off for your luggage and board before usual passengers.
Some free seat options are available for your selection 24 hours before departure.
You have the right to have one additional piece of luggage on SkyTeam-operated flights. This can be useful if you buy a ticket which does not include the luggage. With your Flying Blue status, you still can take a luggage with you without paying extra for it.
The Flying Blue silver level corresponds to the Elite level within SkyTeam.
Gold level
The gold level corresponds to the Elite Plus level within SkyTeam and provides you with the following additional benefits:
- 7 miles per EUR spent
- Access to SkyTeam lounges
- Sky Priority – priority throughout the airport
- Free seat options 72 hours before departure
Platin level
Platinum level (also Elite Plus within SkyTeam) brings just a few more advantages:
- 8 miles per EUR spent
- Free access to all seat options right at the booking
- Platin service line
The biggest advantage of the platin level is the possibility to get it for life and with it to skip all further requalification requirements, while keeping its benefits for the rest of your life.
Ultimate level
If you manage to earn sufficient UXP within the given time frame, the Ultimate level provides you again with an additional level of benefits on top of all the above:
- 9 miles per EUR spent
- Dedicated Ultimate Assistant available 24×7
- Complimentary access to Air France and KLM lounges for you and up to 8 guests
- Ultimate airport services for you and up to eight guests (where available)
- Four upgrade vouchers per qualified year
- Gifting one Flying Blue platin status level per year
Ultimate level does not offer a lifetime qualification and due to restrictions on earning UXP only with Air France and KLM is much more limited in its qualification options.
Why do we estimate that Flying Blue is one of the best programs within SkyTeam?
The combination of all available options for award miles earnings along with relatively easy status qualification (in the past, there were offers of Saudia from Europe to ASEAN in the business class for as low as 1200 EUR per person). In other words, for 1200 EUR and one single return trip you could go up in your status level. The quality of the business cabin in most of Golf airlines (Saudia included) is by far much better than in any European airline, even if they use smaller airplanes like A320.
But also with regional flights within Europe (for example, connecting flights from FRA to BCN via AMS or CDG) you can earn 60 XP on a return flight in business. If you do just 5 regional flights a year, you reach already the requalification to the platin status, if you plan to keep it for 10 years and to get the platin for life status.
If you feel a need to deep-dive into the topic and to discuss optimization opportunities for your flights, do not hesitate to contact us. A Singabiz® Representative will be glad to assist you.
