Yes, you need to have 225,000 MQMs by December 31 this year if you want to be Diamond for 2024 and extend to 2025. That has been confirmed several times by Delta.

The one item that remains vague is whether "earned" Diamond has better privileges than "extended" Diamond in 2025 and beyond. That is what we are debating.

If Delta assigns full privileges to "extended" Diamond they kill the incentive for all of us with significant MQM accumulations to requalify for status. There are members out there with a million MQMs. They would free ride for 10 years if they so chose. That just cannot be what Delta intends, unless they made another egregious miscalculation (don't put it beyond them).

There is precedent (e.g. during Covid) in which Delta extended status without choice privileges. So I think there is 99% certainty that "extended" status will NOT come with full privileges.