We’re almost getting to that time of year when UA and other airlines announce any changes to their elite qualification programs for next year. Any thoughts yet on what UA may do?

I’m hoping this will be another year of no changes after the pretty significant hike up in Premier qualification last year. It’ll be interesting to see how many people drop down a level or two after the end of this year. I’m hoping UA will let this be a recalibration before they do something drastic again.

Personally, despite my concerns a year ago, I will handily requalify for Gold for 2026. I ended up with a slightly busier travel year than expected this year, plus I took some itineraries that required connections, so I will probably end up with ~33 PQF and ~12,000 PQP. I gave UA almost all of my flying this year. UA was the best option most of the time, but even when it maybe wasn’t, I still went with them. I also put probably more spend on my Quest card than I needed to. Guess I’m the kind of “brand loyal” customer that Scott Kirby keeps talking about.