Originally Posted by kyotoben

I think you can look at it like this:

NH is still very simple to get quasi-lifetime *G, by either reaching Platinum Status (50k Premium Points collected 50:50 from NH and *A flights, or 100% on NH flights) over the course of a calendar year OR if you reach 1MM flown on NH metal since you joined the program (any booking class with NH flight number, including award flights, but they might need to be registered separately), but ONLY IF (1) you live in Japan and (2) are eligible for the CC (in most cases you would already have a non *G CC from NH and already passed th credit check so they then just need to switch it) as long as you hold this particular CC, which comes with annual fees (Which is over 10k Yen annually). And the other point is that miles accrued to NH have a hard expiry date after 3 years, UNLESS you are have 1 MM status OR reach annual Diamond status, in which case mileage does not expire (for Diamond as long as you hold annual Diamond status, as 1 MM forever)

JL used to have almost the same system (with the difference that it does offer a route for those not residing in Japan) but switched to the 300k lifetime mile rule from this year. Only JL metal miles count (all classes but no award flights). Once you hit the 300k, you apply into global club which in essence gives you OWS "as long as you are a member of this global club", which basically means maintaining either (1) a CC in Japan if you reside here (similar to NH), OR (2) if you do not reside in Japan, it used to be the case that the global club membership had to be paid annually by miles (a few thousand or so). Award miles also expire after 3 years unless you have a much higher status than the 300k with the airline.

So in essence, both programs are not technically "true" lifetime programs, but you would essentially have the status as long as you can satisfy the requirements to be a member of the respective clubs (super flyers for NH and global club for JL), which comes at an annual cost of either paying for the CC or paying with miles as it is the case with JL.

In Japan by the way, since it is that easy to get and maintain the status, lounges are regularly overcrowded. I feel that there is more benefit of this status abroad.

Also, because there are so many ppl in Japan who maintain the *G and OWS status as described above, in order to ever be considered for an upgrade on their metals and able to clear any waitlist, simply fulfilling the lifetime thresholds for *G and OWS will not cut it for either NH or JL because (1) too many have the same status and (2) a considerable number of people have yet a better status within the NH and JL programs. At least that is my experience with both programs.