EK only usually upgrade when the flights are full. However using your skywards is very easy, there are few black outs, no peak time upgrades and you can upgrade from the cheapest of Y tickets into J class. They have some good offers throughout the year for double and tripple miles - well they have this year. Their J class is superb on the SFO/LAX/JFK - DXB routes, howvever its a lottery from DXB to India.

I am a huge fan of Skywards due to the ease of using the miles. You get good bonuses when Silver and Gold, one return trip SFO-DXB-BOM gets you silver when you land back in the USA, so you'll earn 25% more miles on your second trip and 50% more on your third.

You can use EK miles on CO and UA within the USA.

For 5 flights a year, I would go with EK.. Anyone else back me up?