Your Guru Guide on How to Earn KrisFlyer Miles for Newbies

The first step above all is to sign up for a KrisFlyer account.

Signing up is free, so hurray for that. And you can do it easily on KrisFlyer’s website. Occasionally, there will be sign up promos but they are kinda rare, in case you decide on waiting for one.

What’s great about the KrisFlyer membership program is that it rewards customers for spending on airlines.

This includes airlines like Singapore Airlines, Scoot, Star Alliance, airlines like Thai Airways and United Airlines, as well as partner airlines like Virgin and Vistara.

You might be asking yourself that all important question, though, how many miles do I need to redeem a free flight?

Well, here’s an idea of the amount of KrisFlyer miles you’d need for certain flights and destinations for Economy Saver return trips (the cheapest fare class):

Aside from redeeming miles for free flights, one of the ways you can earn miles by is flying.

But that defeats the purpose, doesn’t it?

After all, the whole point of accruing air miles is to get flight tickets for “free”, not pay for them.

In terms of earning KrisFlyer miles, though, that depends on the fare class you book tickets under. Take this return flight from Singapore to Barcelona for example. If you fly Economy, you can earn up to 13,544 miles.

Again, this will vary according to the fare class.

For Economy Lite and Value, you will only earn 50% (6,772 miles) of that amount, while you can earn 10,158 miles with Economy Standard.

Confusing, right? But it doesn’t stop there.

Compare this with Premium Economy (16,930 miles) and Business Flexi (20,316 miles) for the same return trip.

It’s safe to say that it pays to book more expensive flights. So the moral of the story is don’t book budget if you’re planning on racking up the miles.

If you’d like to suss out the miles needed for your favourite destinations, check out the KrisFlyer miles calculator.

Firstly, most cards except for KrisFlyer ones don’t earn miles directly. Instead, you will earn bank points that you can then convert into miles. It would be good to pick a credit card with no minimum spend.

Which begs the question, how much is 1 KrisFlyer mile worth, and how best to stock up on miles?

Well, the answer depends on who you ask and what you do but you can expect one mile to have an average value of 1.4 cents to 1.8 cents.

In terms of racking up miles, one pro tip is to maximise your local spend with the right credit card, whether it’s dining out or online shopping. A KrisFlyer branded card is great for this as it allows you to make full use of your daily expenditures.

Also, try to sign up for a credit card deal that offers you a hefty sign-up bonus miles amount. Of course, you’d need to pick the card that best suits your spending habits and daily life.

But pick the right card, and you’ll be rewarded handsomely.

Best credit cards for KrisFlyer miles:

This is ultra easy and all you need to do is download the Kris+ app (App Store + Google Play). There’ll be over 190 partners for you to pick, ranging from bubble tea to taxi bookings, and you can earn KrisPay miles which can be converted into KrisFlyer miles.

And there are plenty of fantastic promotions for you to spend on.

For instance, some restaurants have wickedly good conversion rate of $1 to 9 KrisPay miles.

After you stock up on all those KrisPay miles, you can either offset future purchases with them, or, as we would naturally advice you to do, convert them into KrisFlyer miles.

You can check out partnerships like Infinite Journeys, a collab between KrisFlyer and Shangri-La, where you can earn KrisFlyer miles with all of your stays at any Shangri-La, JEN, Traders, and Kerry hotel globally.

At the same time, you can earn Shangi-La’s Golden Circle Award Points, which can also be converted into miles.

In any case, there are many hotel partners that KrisFlyer has paired up with, so just keep a look out for these establishments the next time you travel.

You can even earn miles with car rentals too, so keep your eyes peeled for KrisFlyer’s list of partners the next time you embark on that YOLO road trip.

Shopaholics rejoice; now you have that all-important excuse to indulge in your favourite pastime – indulging in a bit of retail therapy.

For a start, KrisShop is a great place to level up your miles games.

You can also check out KrisFlyer’s retail partners like Changi Rewards and CapitaLand.

Again, make sure you pick the right credit card to optimise your spend. The best bet is probably a co-branded card like the American Express Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer Credit Card.

Why stop at geeking out at miles only? You can also earn miles while having fun at the same time by joining KrisFlyer’s branded contests or games.

All you’ve got to do is follow Singapore Airlines’ Instagram or Facebook page, and there’ll be announcement of these games and contests every once in awhile.