Originally Posted by
redtop43
They accrue pretty slowly, even not counting for the rounding-up you get stickers for 16% of your flown miles; used to be 20%.
That's not entirely correct. If you're only flying discount coach fare, you accrue them more slowly than you have in the past since now it takes 12,500 EQMs to earn 4x500 mile upgrades, vs. 10,000 actual miles in the past. If you fly paid business/first class on some flights, you earn EQMs much faster (50%-200% faster depending on fare class and whether you're flying AA or a partner). On an AA discount business/first fare (A/D/I) you earn 2.0x EQMs, so you only have to fly 6,250 actual miles to earn the 4x500's, which upgrades 32% of your flown miles. You'll get that (and then some) on one business class round-trip from NY to London, for example (in the past you'd need 1.5 r/ts).
Do people buy stickers and then try to upgrade as often as possible?
Really would vary based on your personal situation. If you fly a lot of international business class but little domestic coach, then you'd probably have a surplus of stickers that you'd try to use whenever you can. If you only fly domestic coach fares, then you'll have to be more discerning about when you request stickers, unless you don't mind paying for extra ones.