Lufthansa First Class Awards With Partner Miles: Restrictions?

Over the years, it has become increasingly difficult to redeem partner airline miles for travel in Lufthansa first class. Admittedly this has been a slow and steady trend over the past 15 years, going back to when Lufthansa had 16 first class seats on the upper deck of its Boeing 747-400s (time flies!).

Anyway, it appears that in recent weeks, Lufthansa has added yet another barrier to redeeming for first class. It remains to be seen if this is permanent, or what exactly is going on…

Lufthansa first class award availability trends

While Lufthansa’s own Miles & More members can book first class awards as soon as the schedule opens (subject to capacity controls), Lufthansa has significant restrictions for those booking first class through partner frequent flyer programs.

When it comes to redeeming partner miles for Lufthansa first class, historically it has been possible to redeem miles for first class up to 15 days before departure. That’s not to say that all available first class seats were made available 15 days out, but rather, that was the outer limit for when space opened up.

In early 2024, that window was narrowed significantly, and ever since, Lufthansa seems to be opening first class awards to partner programs at most three to four days before departure.

Now we’re seeing yet another restriction (thanks to Connor for bringing this up) — in recent weeks, it appears that Lufthansa is only releasing first class award availability to partner programs for long haul flights originating in Germany. In other words, there’s some award space from Frankfurt (FRA) and Munich (MUC) to destinations around the globe, but not in the other direction.

Seats.aero is an awesome tool for searching award availability, and it has a Lufthansa first class award tracker. As you’ll see there, the only first class availability is departing Germany, and that has been the case for some time.

Now, I wouldn’t assume that this change is permanent, as it could change, and it’s not the first time that we’ve seen the airline only release award space in one direction of travel. It’s anyone’s guess how long this lasts, but it’s something to be aware of for the time being.

I think we all know which direction this is headed…

When it comes to redeeming miles for Lufthansa first class, I have to imagine that our best days are behind us:

• Lufthansa is increasingly introducing its new Allegris first class, and that’s blocked for both awards and upgrades
• Lufthansa Miles & More is moving to dynamic award pricing in the coming weeks, and it remains to be seen what that means for premium cabin award costs through Miles & More, or saver award availability through partner programs

The general industry trend we’ve seen is clear, as I wrote about some time back. We’re seeing airlines increasingly restrict award space to partner programs, to focus on monetizing their own programs.

So I’m not saying that Lufthansa will completely eliminate partner first class awards, but… I’m also not saying it won’t? I think the more likely direction this goes is that we see Miles & More added as a partner for international transferable points currencies, so that Lufthansa has more control over its award space.

Bottom line

Lufthansa is increasingly restricting award space through partner frequent flyer programs. As it currently stands, expect that you can only redeem partner miles for Lufthansa first class at most a few days out, and only for long haul segments originating in Germany (that latter restriction is new).

It’s anyone’s guess how this all evolves, but I have a hard time imagining that things will get much better. So if you want to fly Lufthansa first class with partner miles, it might not be a bad time to do so…

What do you make of these Lufthansa’s first class award availability trends?