Benchmarking the US Big Three: What Did All That Scale Actually Buy?

The Loyalty Shift: Season 2, Edition 5

The Caravelo Loyalty Scorecard measures the strength of an airline’s relationship with its customers. We score each brand against the three pillars of the Relational Anchor (Access, Control, and Convenience) across fifteen sub-dimensions on a 0-5 scale, then combine them into a single Anchor Score. If you missed the methodology piece, you can find it here.

Today the scorecard crosses the Atlantic. American’s AAdvantage, Delta’s SkyMiles, and United’s MileagePlus are the most valuable loyalty programs ever built, worth $7.1 billion each for SkyMiles and AAdvantage in FY2024, and $6.2 billion for MileagePlus, more than most airlines earn from flying. Every category we have scored was still working out what to build. These three settled that question decades ago.

So what did all that scale buy? One carrier has the best currency in the country and the thinnest reason to use it. One sells a premium relationship on terms it will not guarantee. And one built a real gate, then handed the key to a bank.

The three programs we assessed

We assessed what each carrier operates today, not what it has announced or retired.

• American runs AAdvantage: miles, Loyalty Points as a separate status currency, four elite tiers plus an invitation-only fifth, and a Citi co-brand that became sole issuer in April 2026.
• Delta runs SkyMiles: revenue-based miles, Medallion status earned purely on dollars, and the deepest co-brand relationship in aviation, worth $2.4 billion from American Express in the June quarter alone.
• United runs MileagePlus: miles, Premier tiers on qualifying spend, PlusPoints as a tradeable upgrade currency, a Chase co-brand, and the only two consumer subscriptions here.

All three run a full frequent-flyer program, lead a global alliance, and sell status through a bank.

The US Scorecard: Three Giants, Three Different Answers

Here is how all three look side by side. We plot each carrier’s pillar scores as a triangle, so a balanced program fills the shape, and a lopsided one leaves it thin on one side.

For four editions, this series has closed the same sentence the same way: not one brand forms a balanced triangle. That run ends here.

• American draws the first balanced triangle we have scored, on 3.0 for Access, Control and Convenience alike. Even on every axis, and merely functional on every axis.
• Delta leans hard toward Convenience and thins out on Control, the widest internal gap in the edition.
• United reaches further on Access than any brand this series has recorded, then falls back on Control alongside both.

The balanced triangle exists, and it is balanced at competent.

Let’s go through each one.

American’s AAdvantage: The Best Currency, the Thinnest Login

By the measures a points program is judged on, American wins. IdeaWorks found it the only US carrier whose award prices have fallen since 2019, down 21%, with 94% of routes bookable at or below the traditional 25,000-mile round trip, and its miles are the most valuable of the three at 1.4 cents.

On Access, American holds one thing nobody else does and lacks one thing everybody needs.

• If American is still selling a seat for cash, a member can book it with miles. No blackout dates, no award pool that runs dry, and no other brand we have scored puts that in writing. The catch is price: American guarantees the seat, not the miles (a 3 out of 5 on Guaranteed Availability).
• Complimentary upgrades, Main Cabin Extra, systemwide upgrades and Admirals Club access make up a priority ladder no low-cost carrier can match (a 4 out of 5 on Priority and Early Access).
• Nothing here rewards flying more. Families cannot pool miles as United’s can, miles expire after 24 months, and Basic Economy earns zero miles and zero Loyalty Points, so American’s cheapest fares build nothing (2 out of 5 on Volume and Frequency Enablement).

On Control, American writes the best terms in the group and announces its changes the worst. Changes are free domestically and across the Americas, standby is free for everyone, and Trip Credit can be handed to eight other travellers, the only transferable credit of the three (a 4 out of 5 on Flexibility and Cancellation). It will hold a fare free for 24 hours, which Delta will not do at any price (a 3 out of 5 on Price Predictability), and it alone commits to seating families together at no extra charge.

Its rivals give notice; American does not. United published its April devaluation six weeks ahead and Delta runs changes through a newsroom. American’s Basic Economy cut appeared as a web page edit on 17 December 2025, the day it took effect; its only public comment was that it “routinely evaluate[s] our fare products to remain competitive in the marketplace.” It also posted and pulled its 2026 changes, began blocking partners from close-in award space, and in July raised First Class award pricing to Asia, all unannounced. Four undisclosed changes in seven months hold Pricing Clarity to 2 out of 5.

On Convenience, American is capable everywhere and forgetful in one place. The app rates 4.8 on both stores, Hotels, Cars, Cruises and Vacations plus a two-way Hyatt partnership give it as much reach beyond the flight as anyone here (a 4 out of 5 on Cross-Journey Integration), and it alone checks a disrupted passenger back in automatically. What it does not do is remember you: no profile seat preference, no automatic check-in, no stored payment wallet, and American’s own agent documentation concedes a saved Known Traveler Number “does not override the information added by the travel agency”. Profile data that loses to agency data is worse than no field at all (2 out of 5 on Remembered Preferences, the lowest score in the edition).

The ceiling is what the login is for. AAdvantage enrolments rose 30% year on year in the June quarter, driven by free AT&T-sponsored Wi-Fi that asks for an account number and nothing else. The fastest-growing loyalty program in America is growing on a Wi-Fi login.

American’s triangle is the first balanced shape this series has produced, and it is balanced at functional (Anchor 3.0). A Well-Built Commodity with the best currency in the country and no answer to the question that matters: what does a member get that a stranger cannot?

Delta’s SkyMiles: A Premium Promise on Discount Terms

Delta sells itself as the premium American airline, and by co-brand economics it is the most successful loyalty operator on earth. It also writes the weakest binding terms of the three, and the gap between those facts is the most instructive thing here.

On Access, Delta’s promise and Delta’s contract do not match. Its marketing page says every seat for sale can be booked with miles; its Program Rules reserve the right to allocate “no Award seats on certain flights.” Delta does release award space often, and sometimes very cheaply, but only through sales it never announces, so with no award chart since 2015 a member cannot know what a seat should cost or whether it will be there (a 2 out of 5 on Guaranteed Availability).

Delta’s exclusivity is real but free to obtain, and there is more of it than at either rival.

• Sync Wi-Fi on 1,200-plus aircraft cannot be bought for cash at any price, only unlocked with a SkyMiles number.
• Digital ID moves members through bag drop, security and boarding at seven airports, with no paid equivalent.
• SkyMiles Experiences runs members-only auctions priced in miles, with no cash route in.
• Platinum and Diamond members can gift status to four other people, the only member-to-member mechanic in fifteen brands scored.

But every one opens with a free signup. The gate is a form, not a moat (a 3 out of 5 on Exclusive Inventory).

Status tracks dollars, not distance. Medallion runs on Medallion Qualification Dollars alone, up to $10,000 of which can come from Amex card fees, and Delta sells more at roughly $300 per hundred. The frequent traveller on cheap fares, a kind of customer a loyalty program should want, moves nowhere (2 out of 5 on Volume and Frequency Enablement).

On Control, Delta is generous after you buy and unhelpful before. Any member, elite or not, can cancel an award and have the miles back instantly, and award taxes start at $5.60 with no fuel surcharges, the cleanest redemption terms of the three (a 3 out of 5 on Flexibility and Cancellation). What it will not do is hold a price: “Only the actual purchase of your delta.com e-ticket(s) will guarantee the quoted fare,” and both rivals will (a 2 out of 5 on Price Predictability).

Delta’s newest fares subtract rather than add. In July it sold a stripped version of its premium cabins: no upgrades, seats assigned only after check-in, $300 to $500 to change. Passengers pay business-class fares and lose the benefits that make business class a loyalty product. Delta called the Delta One version Basic Business, which suggests it did not want the brand attached either.

On Convenience, Delta is at its strongest and can prove it. It is the only carrier here that checks a member in automatically, its app rates highest on both stores, and it alone publishes engagement to match: 85% of members use the app when flying, rising to 97% of Medallions on travel day. Vacations, Stays, Cars and Cruises extend the account well past the flight (a 4 out of 5 on both Digital User Experience and Cross-Journey Integration).

The constraint sits in the other two pillars, not in the product. Delta’s four weakest scores all cover things a member cannot look up: whether an award seat exists, what it costs, whether a fare can be held, what status will require. None of that is a capability gap, which is the encouraging part. Every one is a decision Delta could reverse tomorrow.

Delta’s triangle leans further toward Convenience than any shape here and runs thin on Control (Anchor 2.9). A Well-Built Commodity selling a premium relationship on terms it does not guarantee.

United’s MileagePlus: The Card Is the Program

United is the only carrier here, and one of two brands across the series, that has built something a traveller cannot get without logging in. It then spent 2026 deciding the login was not the part that mattered.

On Access, the gating is real and, unusually for this industry, contractual.

• Chase cardholders get at least 10% off award flights, rising to at least 15% with Premier status, the only committed member price advantage in five editions.
• A cheaper tier of award seats is visible only to cardholders and Premier members, and United releases more seats into it than into the version everyone else sees.
• Non-members get no inflight Wi-Fi at all, because Starlink installation removes the paid portal entirely.

Those three earn a 4 out of 5 on Exclusive Inventory, the strongest Access sub-score here. United is also the only one that lowers the cost of flying more: free five-person mile pooling with no cap, opened to more than 40 partners in June, plus annual subscriptions for Economy Plus seating and checked bags (3 out of 5 on Volume and Frequency Enablement).

The gate, though, is built for cardholders rather than members. On 2 April United cut base members from five miles per dollar to three, lifted cardholders to six, and left basic economy earning nothing without a card or status. Under-18 family linking lets children inherit their parent’s cardholder earn rate. Specialist coverage read it as cardholders winning and everyone else losing. A Chase card now sets a traveller’s earn rate, the price of their award, and which inventory they see at all.

On Control, United gives its elites the most and its Basic Economy passengers the least. Free same-day confirmed change reaches every Premier tier including Silver, which neither rival offers, and ConnectionSaver texts a passenger when the aircraft is being held for them (a 4 out of 5 on Real-Time Flexibility). At the other end, Basic Economy allows no changes and no standby, a carry-on costs $65 at the gate plus a $65 hold, and the new Polaris Base fare charges for seats, halves the baggage allowance and excludes the Polaris Lounge (2 out of 5 on Ancillary Control and Upgrades, the most extractive model of the three).

PlusPoints, the last fixed price chart in the program, goes dynamic in February 2027. United’s loyalty president put it plainly: “It’s not a devaluation. It’s just market pricing.”

On Convenience, United ships more than anyone here. It is the only carrier pushing an upgrade-clearance notification to every passenger, the only one running predictive security wait times on its own data, and the first and only US airline to text live weather radar maps during a delay (a 4 out of 5 on Proactive Communication). The one thing it will not do is act for you: self-service tools “automatically provide travelers with personalized rebooking options,” where Delta and American simply rebook you. That cuts both ways, and leaving the choice with the member is part of why United leads on Real-Time Flexibility.

The limitation is who owns the moat. United proved an airline can build real Access inside a points program, then sold the key to a bank, and now monetises the membership as advertising inventory through Kinective Media, a retail-media network built on decades of MileagePlus data.

United’s triangle stretches further on Access than any shape in five editions, then falls back to the same Control level as everyone else (Anchor 3.2). A Well-Built Commodity of an unusual kind, because the moat is real and a credit card company owns the drawbridge.

What the US Diagnostic Tells Us

The shared pattern across all three inverts the one this series has found everywhere else.

Convenience is where these three outclass every category we have scored.

Access, nearly absent in every previous edition, is stronger here than anywhere we have looked, though it belongs almost entirely to United.

But Control, which should have been the easy pillar for carriers of this size and age, is where all three come up short, and not one clears 3.0.

Two comparisons are worth sitting with. None of the three publishes an award chart, while SunExpress, a Turkish leisure carrier, publishes that a point is worth one euro cent. And Wizz Air reached an Anchor of 2.9 on memberships costing less than a checked bag, and still beats all three on Price Predictability. Nor is anything external pushing them: the DOT opened an inquiry in September 2024 and has published nothing since, and the rule forcing fee disclosure at booking was rolled back in July after the industry sued.

Decades of investment and twenty billion dollars a year of program revenue bought the best convenience in the industry, a great deal of status, and a relationship that now runs through a credit card rather than an aircraft.

Next, the scorecard changes hemisphere and business model. We turn the tool on three of Asia-Pacific’s most aggressive low-cost carriers: Scoot, Cebu Pacific, and VietJet.

The question inverts there. None of them has anything like the co-brand economics now underwriting American, Delta, and United, so whatever holds their travellers cannot be a credit card.

So what is it instead?