You only need to poke around Delta's website or app for a few minutes, hunting for a business class seat in Europe or Asia, to get sick to your stomach. If you want to book a Delta lie-flat seat somewhere abroad, rates of 400,000 SkyMiles or more – each way – are the norm. Gross.
But there's a better way. In fact, there are a few.
Using miles from a partner airline like Air France or Virgin Atlantic (whose miles are even easier to earn thanks to credit card transfer partnerships), you might be able to book those exact same Delta One seats for a fraction of the miles. On the off-chance you find a half-decent-looking fare in cash – think $2,000 or so roundtrip – there are a few ways to use points from banks like Chase or Amex to cover the whole cost. And if you're really, really lucky (and patient), you could even catch a rare SkyMiles flash sale to book that lie-flat seat for a far more reasonable amount.
So yes, believe it or not, booking a Delta business class seat for a bargain can be done – workarounds like this are the key. Here's how.
Not all Delta One business class seats are created equal: Check out our breakdown of the best … and the worst!
Wait for a SkyMiles Flash Sale
We've got a mantra when it comes to Delta's mileage program: If you want to fly business class, forget about SkyMiles. That's the rule.
But rules always have exceptions.
Over the last year and change, we've found a handful of excellent SkyMiles flash sales with deeply discounted Delta One rates for our Thrifty Traveler Premium members. A few stellar standouts include:
- Flying Delta One Suites nonstop to Tokyo-Haneda (HND) for just 85,000 SkyMiles each way – a true “Unicorn deal” as far as Delta is concerned
- Ditto for trips to Seoul (ICN) for as low as 106,000 SkyMiles each way
- Just a few months back, we found roundtrip Delta One fares on the brand-new route to Taipei (TPE) as low as 146,000 SkyMiles
- Business class deals to Europe using SkyMiles have been even harder to find, but we found some roundtrip transatlantic fares as low as 166,000 SkyMiles late last year
- Getting all the way down to Santiago (SCL) in Chile and back for 140,000 SkyMiles roundtrip is a steal … especially when it was flying Delta One Suites!
Those are all from the last year or so, and they're all long-gone now. Are they the best deals in the world of points and miles? Hardly, especially when there are plenty of ways to book business class seats for 50,000 miles or less via other airlines.
But if SkyMiles are what you've got – and that's the case for many diehard Delta flyers – these rates are about as good as it gets these days.
Let me be clear: Even deals like still fairly rare, and they come and go quickly. But whenever we find them, we always send Thrifty Traveler Premium members an alert for business class redemptions like these.
And when they're this good and this rare, we also send a text alert so you can search and book as soon as possible.
If you want the best deal redeeming SkyMiles for business class, you'll need a Delta co-branded Amex card like the *delta skymiles gold card*. That triggers Delta's TakeOff 15 benefit, an automatic 15% discount when using SkyMiles to book Delta award seats.
Still, we wouldn't exactly encourage piling up SkyMiles by swiping your Delta credit card everywhere you go – odds are, you'll still need a mountain of them. You'd be much better off earning points from cards like the *amex gold* or *amex platinum*.
That way, you can sit on a bank of points and transfer them instantly over to Delta if a great deal pops up. If that doesn't happen, you're not married to SkyMiles – you could send them to other Amex transfer partners, including others that could come in handy to book Delta business class for even less.
Or Try to Upgrade with Your SkyMiles
The best way to book Delta business class for a bargain right now might be by booking an economy seat at the start.
Delta makes it easier to upgrade your seat than virtually any other airline: If seats are open, you can pay your way to upgrade. But easy doesn't mean cheap. Cash rates to do so are regularly north of $2,000 for a long-haul flight – and since the SkyMiles upgrade rates are tied to the cash price, that's 200,000 SkyMiles.
But heading into the spring, we noticed an undeniable trend: Upgrades on flights to Europe and even Asia were cheaper than … well, maybe ever, with many travelers scoring Delta One upgrades for just $500 or $600 within weeks – if not days – of departure.
- Not one but two travelers flying separately from Atlanta (ATL) to London-Heathrow (LHR) upgraded from economy to Delta One for $499 (or 49,900 SkyMiles) per passenger
- Days before making the trip back home, one flyer snagged a Delta One upgrade from Milan (MXP) to Atlanta (ATL) by paying just 44,900 SkyMiles
- Flying back from Amsterdam (AMS) to Minneapolis-St. Paul (MSP), members saw business class upgrades dip as low as $449 each
- About a week before departure, one traveler just upgraded to Delta One Suites from Minneapolis-St. Paul (MSP) to Seoul (ICN) for just $599 each
This is not a slam dunk – you're still probably more likely to see upgrade prices north of $1,000 or more.
Still, it's an undeniable trend with low upgrade rates on Delta more prevalent than in recent memory. And that means it's worth double-, triple-, quadruple-, and even quintuple-checking your Delta flights in the weeks and days before a trip overseas. While you might initially see eye-popping prices, the odds that the cost to upgrade falls below $1,000 (or half that) seem greater than ever.
But if you want any chance at a cheap upgrade, your first step is the most important one: Don't book Delta basic economy, as those cheap fares aren't eligible for upgrades whatsoever.
Read more: Upgrading is the Best (& Cheapest) Way to Book Delta One Business Class Now
Book Flights to Europe for 50K Through a Partner Airline
This is it: The single cheapest way to book a Delta business class seat.
Even when Delta is charging 300,000-some SkyMiles for a lie-flat seat to Europe, like these flights from New York City (JFK) to Munich (MUC) this summer…
You could book that exact same Delta One flight to Germany – same day, same plane, exact same lie-flat seat – for just 50,000 points. That's less than one-seventh of the cost!
Read our full guide on how to book Delta One seats for just 50,000 points!
The trick is saving your SkyMiles and using Virgin Atlantic Flying Club instead to book Delta business class. And since Virgin Atlantic is a transfer partner with all the big banks, you can easily turn 50,000 points from a *chase sapphire preferred* or the *amex gold* into the miles you need to book this. Frequent 30% transfer bonuses to Virgin from banks like Capital One, American Express, and a current promo from Chase make it even cheaper: Just 39,000 points each way!
So what's the catch with this seemingly too-good-to-be-true workaround? You need to find award availability to actually to book through Virgin at these lower rates … and Delta can be incredibly stingy with letting that happen.
But not always. In the last few months, we've sent Thrifty Traveler Premium members a handful of alerts to book Delta One to Europe for 50,000 points or less. Earlier this year, for example, we found a ton of Delta One availability bookable through Virgin Atlantic on many nonstop routes to Amsterdam (AMS), Dublin (DUB), Frankfurt (FRA), Lisbon (LIS), and Munich (MUC), among others.
These seats are long gone now – get an alert for the next Delta One deal bookable for 50,000 points with Thrifty Traveler Premium!
Years ago, you could even book ultra-long-haul Delta flights to Japan or elsewhere in Asia for just 60,000 Virgin points – or all the way to Australia for 75,000 points. Sadly, Virgin gutted that sweet spot.
It's probably only a matter of time before these 50,000-point redemptions to Europe meet the same fate. Enjoy it while you can!
Or London (& Beyond) … With a Different Airline's Miles
If London is calling and business class is on your bucket list, you'll want to look away from Virgin Atlantic and instead look to a pair of partners in Paris and Amsterdam instead: Air France and KLM's Flying Blue program.
I know, it seems counterintuitive. Why wouldn't you book with a British airline if you're looking to fly to Great Britain? Especially when Virgin Atlantic charges as low as 47,500 points each way for a Delta nonstop to London-Heathrow (LHR)?
Here's why: Virgin also tacks on about $700 more in taxes and fees on those award tickets to or from the United Kingdom. You know who doesn't do that? You guessed it: Air France/KLM Flying Blue.
That's right, you'll pay just $10.10 in cash when booking a Delta One award ticket from the U.S. to London – or $333 for a roundtrip. While it'll cost you more miles, that's easily worth the tradeoff to save several hundred dollars per ticket.
Exactly how many miles it'll cost you depends on where you're departing from: The longer the flight across the pond, the more miles it requires to book. Short nonstops from Boston (BOS) and New York City (JFK) are the cheapest at under 70,000 miles while flights from Midwestern hubs like Detroit (DTW) and Minneapolis-St. Paul (MSP) typically cost around 75,000 miles each way. And for the longest flights from Seattle (SEA) and Salt Lake City (SLC), you can expect to pay closer to 100,000 miles.
Don't worry: Flying Blue miles are some of the easiest miles to earn thanks to transfer partnerships from all the top travel credit cards like the *chase sapphire preferred*, *venture x*, or the *amex gold*.
Just as with booking other nonstop flights to Europe through Virgin Atlantic, you'll need to find award availability to actually find these low rates flying Delta business class. And again, that can be incredibly hit or miss. It's been a few months since we've seen solid award space like this alert we sent to Thrifty Traveler Premium members.
But the value of using Flying Blue miles to book Delta One flights goes beyond the U.K. For long-haul flights to Asia and even Australia, you can often get a better deal by using Air France/KLM miles than you will using other airline programs – not just Delta SkyMiles, but Virgin Atlantic, too.
For example, Virgin Atlantic would charge 105,000 points for a one-way flight in Delta business class from Seattle (SEA) to Tokyo-Haneda (HND) … and with SkyMiles, you're probably looking north of 500,000 miles.
Using Air France miles instead, you can book that same route for 94,000 miles. A little bit goes a long way, right?
You'll find similar savings on many Delta nonstops from U.S. cities to destinations all over Asia and Oceania. Throw in a well-timed transfer bonus to Air France/KLM Flying Blue from banks like Chase or Amex, and these slightly better deals get … well, even better!
Find a Cash Fare & Make It Free with Points
The words “business class” and “cheap” rarely go hand in hand – especially with Delta, of all airlines. But trust me, cheap Delta One business class fares are out there. And when you find one, there's are a few relatively easy ways to make it free using credit card points.
Flying business class, cheap is still a relative term. The normal fares of $5,000 or more roundtrip certainly aren't a deal, but how about roughly half that? Starting a search with Google Flights, it was fairly easy to find a roughly $2,800 roundtrip fare from Boston (BOS) to Dublin (DUB) in Delta One.
We've found far cheaper Delta business class fares for our Thrifty Traveler Premium subscribers over the years, though…
- Earlier this year, we found nonstop Delta fares to Rome (FCO), Milan (MXP), Madrid (MAD), and Barcelona (BCN) for under $2,300 roundtrip
- We've also recently seen Delta One tickets to Buenos Aires (EZE) for $2,600 roundtrip or to Lima (LIM) for as low as $1,151
- Looking to stay closer to home? How about a rare chance to fly Delta One Suites on the Airbus A330-900neo from Seattle (SEA) to Honolulu (HNL) earlier this spring for just $1,315 roundtrip?
But this is Thrifty Traveler. There's always an angle to find some additional savings … like taking a cheap flight and making it free using credit card points.
Credit card points from banks like Capital One, Chase, and American Express open an avenue to make that happen – without forcing you to jump through all the hoops of finding award availability and transferring your points. Let's make it real with that $1,300-some fare to Hawaii in Delta One suites with a few examples.
- Using Capital One's insanely easy method of covering any travel purchase using Venture Miles, you could book that fare on your *venture x*, then go back and erase the entire purchase using 131,600 Venture Miles
- Chase Ultimate Rewards points are even more valuable when booking flights through the Chase Travel℠ portal: You could book that same flight for 105,280 points from the *chase sapphire preferred* … or, better yet, just 87,700 or so points on the *chase sapphire reserve*
- But the best deal of all is reserved for travelers with *biz platinum*, which gets you a 35% points rebate on any premium cabin tickets booked through the travel portal – for up to 500,000 points back each year. After that 35% rebate kicks in, it brings down the final tally to roughly 85,500 Amex points.
Bottom Line
Don't resign yourself to paying Delta's sky-high rates to fly business class abroad.
If you're patient – and I mean really patient – you can, in fact, get a good deal using your SkyMiles to fly business class, whether you get an alert to book a lie-flat seat at a discounted rate or wait to upgrade days before departure. But better yet, turning away from SkyMiles and instead focusing on other points and miles programs can help you score a serious bargain on Delta business class … even when the airline itself is charging a king's ransom.