Originally Posted by xliioper

Are you planning to pay for a new ticket on the SFO-ATL non-stop flight? You can't same-day change from a connecting itin to a non-stop, so you would have to exchange existing ticket and pay fare difference for new ticket (at which point, existing ticket would no longer be valid). Or buy new walk-up ticket and refund existing ticket (which can refunded before or after departure on domestic refundable fares).

https://www.delta.com/us/en/change-c...-flight-change