WIDE OPEN: Business Class Award Space to Asia With Delta or United Miles

Windbag Miles highlighted the excellent award availability in business class on two excellent products between North America and Asia which you can redeem with Delta or United miles respectively.

China Airlines has at least 2 business class award seats available nearly every day between now and the end of the schedule (except January 2-6, 2018), for San Francisco – Taipei.

Availability is similar in the other direction, here’s Taipei – San Francisco.

What’s more China Airlines has an awesome business class product on their new Airbus A350s which fly the route starting in mid-May.


Credit: China Airlines

Delta charges 80,000 miles each way and of course you can connect beyond Taipei on China Airlines. There are no fuel surcharges added to these awards when redeeming SkyMiles. You can of course also redeem Air France KLM Flying Blue or Korean Air SkyPass miles for these flights.

Meanwhile, Star Alliance member EVA Air has fantastic availability from their various North American gateways (New York JFK, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, Vancouver).

While imperfect, here’s United’s availability calendar (dates with dotted lines have business availability for two, with the non-stop filter set):

Indeed, non-stop space New York JFK – Taipei comes up as-expected:

Here’s a calendar, via Aeroplan and mapped using AwardNexus, of San Francisco – Taipei (and return) non-stop business class award space for 2 passengers:

Here’s additional flights that come up in a San Francisco – Taipei search:

I’d only caution that the Vancouver flight is operated by a Boeing 747 with less desirable inflight product.

EVA Air offers a business class product that’s four abreast on the Boeing 777-300ER. That means all aisle access. The seat is reverse herringbone and very similar to what Cathay Pacific, American Airlines, and others offer. It’s one of the best business class seats in the sky in my opinion.

They offer pre-order meals in their business (“Royal Laurel”) class and onboard internet.

For those of you interested (and you should be!), note that One Mile at a Time reported that effective May 31 EVA Air shifts Hello Kitty service from Houston to Chicago.

You can use flights to Taipei as a great jumping point to Northeast Asia, China, and Southeast Asia using EVA’s extensive route network:

Mileage costs:

  • United charges 80,000 each way between the US and North or South Asia for business class awards. Chase points transfer to United.

  • LifeMiles charges 75,000 each way between the US and North Asia and 78,00 between the US and South Asia for business class awards. LifeMiles frequently sells miles cheap.

  • Aeroplan charges 75,000 each way between the US and Asia south to Hong Kong, and 77,500 each way between the US and South Asia for business class awards. Membership Rewards points transfer to Aeroplan.

Get booking!

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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  1. The United site isn’t all it appears to be. I tried for a Europe flight this morning. Looks wide open but it won’t book. Very frustrating.

  2. Worth noting that Aeroplan doesn’t charge fuel surcharges on EVA, so the options you describe are definitely apples-to-apples.

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