Using Alaska Miles for Fiji Airways

Fiji Airways is a partner of Alaska Airlines and is a great option for getting to paradise – Fiji, Australia, New Zealand, or elsewhere in the South Pacific so you can use Alaska Miles for Fiji Airways. From my perspective, paradise is a pretty good destination for using miles and points!

Where Can I Fly on Fiji Airways?

Fiji Airways has direct flights to its hub, Nadi (NAN), from three US airports: San Francisco (SFO), Los Angeles (LAX), and Honolulu (HNL). It also flies from Honolulu to Apia, Samoa (APW) and Kiritimati, Kiribati (CXI)—also known as Christmas Island.

From Nadi you can connect onward to many of Fiji’s over 300 islands, as well as many airports in Australia, New Zealand, and elsewhere in the South Pacific.

Note that while Fiji Airways also flies from Nadi to Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Singapore, these cities cannot be booked with Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles; you’ll need to use another airline partner like American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, or Qantas.

Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan tickets allow one free stopover in each direction, so you can easily spend a few days in Fiji en route to Australia or New Zealand – or in Honolulu en route to the South Pacific.

How Many Alaska Airlines Miles Do I Need?

When traveling from the contiguous US, Alaska, or the Caribbean, you’ll need 40,000 miles for a one-way economy ticket or 55,000 miles for a one-way business class ticket. The award pricing is the same for Australia, New Zealand, and South Pacific destinations.

If you don’t live in Los Angeles or San Francisco, this price includes connecting flights on Alaska Airlines from your home airport to one of those international gateways. While Alaska Airlines is also partners with American Airlines, you cannot combine multiple partner airlines in the same direction, so you can’t use American Airlines flights to get to LAX or SFO.

If you’re starting in Honolulu, you won’t need quite as many miles – 27,500 in Coach or 45,000 in Business. If you live somewhere else in Hawaii, you’ll need to find your own way to Honolulu since Alaska Airlines doesn’t operate any inter-island flights. I flew from Honolulu to Sydney with a stopover in Fiji in November 2018 and it was a great deal for those flights!

And if you’re already in the South Pacific, you can also use Alaska Airlines miles between islands – though, at 17,500 miles for coach and 32,500 miles for business class, the prices aren’t great (you’re better off using British Airways Avios).

How Do I Get Alaska Airlines Miles?

Besides flying Alaska Airlines and its partners, there are two major ways to earn Alaska Airlines miles.

1. The co-branded Alaska Airlines cards from Bank of America. Both the personal and business versions of the card currently offer 40,000 bonus miles when you spend $2,000 in the first 90 days of holding the card.
   You’ll also receive an Alaska Airlines Companion Fare certificate which lets you bring a companion on any paid Alaska Airlines coach ticket – one-way or round-trip – for $99 + taxes and fees; you get one certificate when you hit the $2,000 spending threshold, and another one every year on your account anniversary.
2. Transfer Marriott Bonvoy points to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan. You can transfer points in 3,000 point increments at a 3:1 ratio (3,000 Bonvoy points = 1,000 Mileage Plan miles), and if you transfer 60,000 Bonvoy points you’ll get an extra bonus of 5,000 Mileage Plan miles (25,000 Alaska miles total).If you need more Marriott Bonvoy points, you can sign up for the Chase Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card, the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant American Express Card, and/or the Marriott Bonvoy Business American Express Card.

How to Book Fiji Airways Flights with Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan Miles

Go to Alaska’s website and search for flights from LAX or SFO (not your home airport – that comes later) to your desired destination. Note that Fiji only flies to SFO 3-4 days per week, so availability out of LAX is generally better

If there are flights available for the date you searched, they’ll appear in the search results; you can check other nearby dates by using the tabs above the search results.

You can also use the Calendar view in the sidebar to see availability for an entire month (though if you’re searching for a destination outside Fiji, this may include flights on other partners like Qantas).

If you’re having trouble finding availability for the full itinerary, and you have flexibility with your schedule, try searching separately for SFO/LAX-NAN (Nadi) and then NAN to wherever you’re trying to go – that will let you see whether adding a stopover in Nadi would make a difference.

If you don’t live in Los Angeles or San Francisco (whichever the flights you found originate from), once you’ve found your Fiji Airways flights, you can search for flights starting in your hometown on the same date. That will let you see whether Alaska Airlines has award flights available that you can include in your itinerary.If there are no Alaska Airlines flights, or there’s no award space, or the itinerary doesn’t make sense (like Houston to Los Angeles via Seattle), you can book a separate flight to get to LAX or SFO – just make sure to give yourself plenty of time to make your connection, including claiming and re-checking baggage in LAX if you’re checking bags.

Repeat this process in reverse to find availability for return flights.

Once you’ve found all the flights you need, you can book them online. If you managed to find a straightforward round-trip itinerary, great – you can just do a round-trip search with your cities and dates. If you have any stopovers or open jaws (flying into one city and out of another), use the “Multi-City” search tool to enter all of the cities and dates, then search for it all as a single itinerary

You can book online, or call Alaska Airlines to book over the phone for an extra fee.

Final Thoughts

If you have any interest in visiting Australia, New Zealand or South Pacific Islands such as Fiji, redeeming your Alaska Airlines miles for travel on Fiji Airways is a great way to get there. While it can be difficult to find availability in business class, you definitely won’t be able to beat the prices! Plus, searching and booking awards on Fiji Airways through Alaska’s site should be a pretty pleasant experience to top it off.