Qantas Frequent Flyers Can Book Emirates First Class Again
Emirates is once again allowing Qantas members to redeem seats in their coveted first class cabin
Generally speaking, nothing good comes from war. The last few weeks have been a disaster for the big Middle Eastern airlines and while there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel (flight capacity increasing by the day), there's still some way to go.
That said, something positive has occurred! If you recall, Emirates cut off all award inventory in first class to Qantas Frequent Flyer on all routes that didn't touch Australia or New Zealand. This meant that if you wanted to fly a fifth freedom from the US to Europe in first, it wasn't possible.
Same situation for those looking to fly from Europe to Dubai or Dubai to Bangkok, all first class seats were gone, we coverd this originally in August last year with a follow up in October 2025.
Our eagle-eyed readers (thanks Philip!) have spotted that Emirates has now once again dropped award flights in first class for Qantas Frequent Flyers. Of course, the price now is astronomical thanks to the most recent Qantas devaluation, and you do need to be Qantas Silver or higher in order to book.
Initially I hoped Emirates would start releasing seats again when the Qantas redemption requirements changed to Silver or higher, but this never eventuated.
The tables have of course turned. A lot of people are still very uncomfortable flying through the Middle East, the situation is far from resolved, and while personally I have no hesitation travelling to Dubai, I can totally understand that many people with less flexibility in their travel schedule would rather bet on a sure thing, which generally involves flying via a different hub.
I'm fairly certain this whole "blocking of seats" was an Emirates thing, as each time we asked their PR team, they declined to comment. Qantas on the other hand always told us that these changes did not come from their end.
So, if you have an Emirates first class redemption in mind and a stack of Qantas Points to burn, now's a great time!
How To Search For Emirates Award Space
My favourite weapon(s) of choice to quickly find Emirates first class award space are of course Gyoza and Seats Aero. Both tools do an exceptional job at quickly unearthing those seats at the pointy end. While Seats Aero offers many more programs, Gyoza has a unique strenght where it's much better at finding seats with connections such as Brussels to Tokyo (via Dubai), which is a flight I booked personally.
To achieve a result like this with Seats Aero you usually have to run 2 searches and manually piece together the connection. Both are great. While we do partner with both providers, believe it or not I'm also a paying subscriber to both platforms. For Gyoza we even have a $100 discount code for the annual plan, so if you sign up, thank you!
In Conclusion
It's nice to have all routes back for redemption again. Albeit at a higher price point, for many it's still worth the splurge just to experience first class.
I myself pulled the trigger on a one way first class "game changer" redemption from Brussels to Tokyo later this year. Let's hope this is a somewhat "permanent change". Time will tell!
