At the airport by an agent.

wow, those are some VERY steep prices for upgrades. Both miles and money.

I (and I think a lot of other business PAX) pay out of my own pocket for the upgrade part of my ticket as our company pays up to economy comfort or premium economy. These prices are killing that option for me.

I'm not spending 90k miles on an upgrade, that's insane. I can get a business ticket for 62.5k + tax

Adding another data point, TLV-AMS:
1. No offer at OLCI, seat map was "locked" (in fact, it was not accessible already few days before departure), called the Plat line and was quoted 40K miles, this is same amount as the calculator (ticket was booked in X), asked about cash options but was told only option is miles.
2. At the airport was quoted 116$ (99€), so within normal prices of previous OLCI offers, I was actually quite surprised it was so low as the plane left with quite a lot of empty Y seats, I'd expected it to be more in the range of 140-160€.

It can make sense for the first group monetary wise, but I don't think there would be many takers - I expect a good part of those would be private travels booked because of the cheap price. Those people usually don't want to pay for premium cabins, either they simply can't afford or would rather spend in destination.

I would expect the greatest part of paid upgrades is the second group - a relatively well off corporate traveler, limited by internal rules to economy, but often on expensive short notice tickets, who would be able and willing to pay a couple hundred of his own money for an upgrade.
Pricing in 1000+ per sector surely must be killing this demand.

10/10 AMS-SIN-DPS was €800 in cash upgrade. Declined. Peaked in after take off. It was full!

Checked-in a group of colleagues for CDG-SFO, was proposed three upgrades to J from Y at 759, 739 and 724€. Declined.

One colleague asked at check-in if anything was available, but J was full and Y was half empty so they got one row of empty seats each to them instead!

Another data-point: When selecting seats for a family member at T-50 i was proposed a miles upgrade J to P for 75k (outbound leg only). That offer i did accept.

Which booking class in J? Was it also for CDG-USA? If it was D C or J, then it is the normal price I guess. If it was O, Z or I, it was a good deal.

Are these new offers only at the gate? Can they process them in the lounge?

If you are booked in an eligible fare, this is normally proposed at any time in MMB, not only at T-50

they can be processed at the lounge as well.

Another data point (or rather lack of data point, but still informative) : just flew to HKG on AF in J and was curious to see if paid upgrades to P would be proposed. Outbound to HKG : nothing proposed but the flight was P0J0W0Y0 several days before flight and that was indeed the case, so logical that no upgrades were proposed. Return to CDG : nothing proposed at OLCI, despite P empty (and J 95% full). I didn’t ask at the counter or at the lounge, but I found weird that nothing showed up at OLCI.

Paid or miles (56 hrs or OLCI) on award ticket
 

Quick question as I don’t remember where I saw data about this situation. I have a CDG - JNB award ticket in Business. Any chance of upgrading with new rules or OLCI? Thanks.

I don't know if short haul flights are of any relevance, but I had 69EUR upgrade price available in OLCI for AMS-PRG this morning. No miles, but then again I don't actually have any miles in FB yet. Flight was Cityhopper though.

For the return on Sunday, I can go to MMB and select Check options to upgrade with miles, that sends me to AF website and tells me there's no option to upgrade with miles (then again, might be a function of having 0 miles in account). I might report back in a couple of hours with OLCI offer.
edit: No OLCI offer. Also I realized this is a Cityjet flight.

Asked at check-in for an upgrade from Economy (V fare) to Business Class for AF11 JFK-CDG (flight with A380), but there was no seats available.
Also requested an upgrade to Premium Economy Class, there was 4 seats available and the price was about 330$ or 50.000 miles. I didn't take it.

Today DKR-CDG leg of a longer trip, 40 mins before OLCI opens, offer shows when logged in to AF website: economy (V) to PE 219e and 699e to Business.

In the past there used to be a pdf on their website called "Upgrade scheme AF/KL marketing flights", showing upgrade awards across fares.
Did anybody find an updated version, by any chance? I can only find the online calculator.