Qantas Members Losing Access to Emirates First Class Rewards?

From Monday, 12 May 2025, Emirates will only release Classic Reward seats in First Class to its Skywards members with Silver, Gold or Platinum status. This likely means that tomorrow is the last day you’ll be able to redeem Qantas Points for an Emirates First Class seat.

Emirates has given barely any warning about this change. As flagged by LoyaltyLobby, the airline has just today added a small notice on a few pages of its website advising that “Effective 12th May 2025 classic rewards in First Class will be a Tier benefit available only to Platinum, Gold and Silver tier members.”

For example, this notice is currently visible on the Miles Calculator page of the Emirates website:

Unfortunately, this means that Emirates Skywards members without status will no longer be able to redeem Skywards miles for First Class rewards on Emirates. But there could be broader implications…

What does this mean for Qantas Frequent Flyer members?

Australian Frequent Flyer has reached out to both Emirates and Qantas to ask if this change will also impact Qantas Frequent Flyer redemptions on Emirates. We didn’t immediately hear back, but will update this article if and when we get more information.

My interpretation of the notice on the Emirates website is that Emirates First Class Classic Rewards will only be available to Skywards Silver, Gold and Platinum members from Monday. In other words, and in the absence of further information at this point, I would have to assume that Emirates First Class awards will no longer be available to book through any partner airlines.

This is how First Class redemptions on Air France have already worked for some time. The only way to book a seat in La Première using miles is with Flying Blue miles, and you need to have status in the program as well.

Emirates is already very restrictive about who can book its First Class seats using points or miles. Currently, Qantas Frequent Flyer and Air Canada Aeroplan are the only partner airline loyalty programs for which Emirates isn’t blocking access to its First Class reward seats. But, if what appears to be happening is true, then you’ll no longer even be able to redeem Qantas or Aeroplan points for those seats.

Emirates First Class is one of the most popular aspirational redemptions for Qantas Frequent Flyer members. It’s not hard to see why. Despite Emirates’ eye-watering carrier charges, it’s a seriously great way to fly. The on-board bar and showers available in Emirates’ A380 First Class are particularly beloved, as are the uber-premium alcoholic beverages and unlimited caviar.

Until now, Emirates has generally been pretty good at releasing First Class award space to Qantas Frequent Flyer members at the last minute.

Emirates has barely given notice of this change

Any changes that reduce access to reward seats are disappointing. But what’s particularly disappointing is the way Emirates has tried to sneak this one through without anyone noticing.

I mean, kudos – I guess – to Emirates for at least giving some notice that something is changing. This at least gives Emirates Skywards members sitting on hundreds of thousands of miles a small window of opportunity to book any final First Class redemptions they’ve been saving up for.

But Emirates has done pretty much the bare minimum to inform its members about this change. As far as we can see, it hasn’t sent out any formal notification to members, and has simply added the one-line notice in the screenshot above to a few pages on its website. It did this barely two days before the change comes into effect.

And if this change does indeed affect Qantas Frequent Flyer and Aeroplan members, members of those programs haven’t been notified at all of what is quite a substantial new limitation being imposed on how you can use those points.

Book now to avoid missing out

We’ll update this article when we have more information about what’s happening. We’re hoping that this change will only affect Skywards members, but we just don’t yet know for sure.

In the meantime, if you have Qantas Points that you’ve been planning to redeem for an Emirates First Class booking, you have until 6am on Monday (AEST) before the clock ticks over to midnight on the 12th of May in Dubai. If you can book now, it might be a good idea to do so just in case. (If needed, you can cancel Classic Rewards booked with Qantas Points until the day of departure for a penalty of 6,000 points.)

That’s not a lot of time to book. But as of now, Emirates does at least have a bit of First availability on various routes to and from Australia, including Sydney-Christchurch and Perth-Dubai.

You’ll find the best availability booking within a few days of departure, or around 10-12 months in advance. For example, we can currently see a bit of availability in First from Melbourne to Dubai – with onward connections to Europe available – for travel dates in March 2026.

Matt Graham

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to more than 100 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. His interests include aviation, economics & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.