I think thabc's comment that the long weekend/spring break week is making them hold off until gate time. In my experience the past several months, they have been releasing all but two seats around the T-24 to T-20 mark.

I think that the decision making of upgrades is 100% on revenue generation and 0% on the convenience factor of pre-ordering of meals. In fact, that pre-ordering costs them more than just letting you choose from what’s available so I would say it’s 110% revenue generation as a deciding factor if I could. Sorry.

On my past three flights - despite there being 5, 9 and 7 available seats in First and me being number 1, 1 and 3 on the upgrade wait list respectively - upgrades were not processed until the GA arrived at the podium - 45 minutes out. The second flight, from Juneau to Seattle - was particularly egregious as the flight was showing 9 available F seats five days out, and it stayed that way right up to departure. What? Is JNU-SEA a hot market for last minute upgrades? And I'm a Titanium Million Miler at #1 on the waitlist. So much for being upgraded as many as 5 days out. Also, we're deprived of the benefit of choosing our seats and meals in advance.

That said, yes... I did get upgraded on each flight. Here's the problem, experienced on all three flights: They still had me down for the Economy Class meal option that I'd ordered in advance of my upgrade. Why would I want to eat an inferior economy class meal if I'm in First Class?

Yes, I was still able to order a First Class meal, but with the multiple upgrades, catering seemed to have been predicated upon the fact that we'd be eating those Economy Class meals. This, when First Class always fills up with upgrades.

The result - with the exception of my most recent flight - was that while I was allowed to order from the First Class offerings, only two entree choices were available. On the first flight - a hamburger or a cheese plate, on the second - a cheese plate or a little salad. On the second flight, there were still six people behind me who had yet to order, so unless they'd pre-ordered, their only choices were also limited to a cheese plate or the little chicken/cranberry salad.

No doubt some of you will write this off as first world whining, to which I respond that the way the game is played these days, First Class upgrades are a perk earned through our loyalty, and one of the benefits of First Class that make it a more desireable perk worth striving for is the meal service, where on flights as short as LAX - SEA, five entree choices are offered.

Cheese plates or salads are considered lighter entrees, which are great if you're Twiggy or some other light eating type. And - to me at least - hamburgers are great for lunch, but not a very First Class option for dinner. That said, the tastes of our modern day American fliers are considerably more rudimentary than those of the rest of the world, and so since the democratization of air travel here in 1978, hamburgers have become a staple of both lunch and dinner flights. That would not be the case in Europe, Asia or the Middle East.

Anyway, due to the popularity of the First Class upgrade perk, and given that expanded and higher quality food offerings are a part of what makes being upgraded to First Class so desireable, it's disappointing to be limited to such basic and/or limited offerings when a multitude of First Class seats were available days in advance and yet upgrades were not processed until 40 minutes before departure.

I would hope Alaska could do a nicer job of catering appropriately, given that First Class nearly always goes out full with upgrades, and most of us would rather enjoy the perk of a nice First Class meal as opposed to the lighter choices or sticking with whatever we'd ordered from Economy before we got upgraded.

If it makes you feel any better, I was recently upgraded for a flight about 110 hours out on an intra-CA route, where given the available seats (i.e., most of the cabin), I will be in 2A, which means that I'll have nearly first choice of everything in the snack basket, should the FA choose to pull it out and pass it around. (The other direction is still J2, with only Row 4 available, meaning that even if I receive an upgrade, the snack basket may be well-depleted prior to receiving any battlefield UG!)

In ALL of my experiences, and these short e175 flights are some of my most common AS flights as a Titanium, I have observed the flight attendant go back to the galley to replenish the snack baskets. Usually after a row or two. Never heard them say they ran out, even when sitting in row 4. I do remember, years ago, a United Express SkyWest e175 FA say they had slim offerings for the snack basket, but she mentioned that was a catering snafu. I don't believe this should be a big concern.

It is not a concern at all. It is called being a Smar Tass ;) I have, however, had such a flight not have any snack basket offering whatsoever, and Alaska still has not listened, notwithstanding I asked her to and she said she was listening.

Found this UG list peculiar after "processed" by the gate agent. It's 4/12 MFR-SEA AS2289. I bought F, but checked to see what the list looked like...

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...25ac5f7153.jpg

Was in the top 10 for upgrades today on my SEA-SAT flight and was bypassed by 10 single people for premium aisle or window seats (and like 7 middle seats, but I'm fine missing out on those), sticking me in main. No clue what caused the people 20+ behind me on the upgrade list to jump me to the premium seats, but it seems like it happens every flight now.

At least the N lounge wasn't turning away day passes.

It’s fine with me that when First is down to the last available seat and a party of two is at the top of the waitlist that the seat goes the third on the list. But when there are four seats left and a party of two is second and third on the list, I don”t agree with the second of two seats shortly after the online checkin window opens up is given to the fourth on the list just to keep precisely two available seats until the gate. Nothing wrong with keeping three seats available until then.

Here’s another twist to the story. After the first and the fourth person on the waitlist got seats within the first three rows, the aircraft changed to a 737-800 with no fourth row, which apparently impacted the very people sitting there, as no one was put back on the waitlist.

I'm still trying to learn the "new" way of how upgrades work since the PSS transition for Hawaiian. Was on an inter-island flight this past weekend. #1 and #2 on the upgrade waitlist same last name; #3 and #4 on the upgrade waitlist same last name; I was #5 and my friend was #6 (separate reservations) with 6 seats remaining in F with 2 pax checked in. Early in the morning (3:30am) day of flight , I noticed #1 and #2 were no longer on the upgrade waitlist nor were me and my friend. Both me and my friend got emails at 12:30am saying we were upgraded. #3 and #4 were now in the #1 and #2 positions with it saying 2 seats remaining (so it appears they were skipped for some reason). Late morning, they changed the equipment to a plane with more F seats. After this, #3 and #4 (who were now #1 and #2) were no longer on the upgrade waitlist so I assume they were cleared. What would make the system skip the original #3 and #4 passengers when the upgrade processor ran? At first, I thought it was because they were a booking of 2 and there was only 1 seat left, but since both my friend and I got emails telling us we were upgraded at the same time, this makes me think there were 2 upgrades available when we both cleared.

Also, if you haven't yet checked in for your flight, does the system not assign an F seat when you get upgraded? While me and my friend were already checked in and assigned seats in F when we were upgraded, they were not together so we changed our seats; at this point it seems original passenger #1 and #2 didn't have seats assigned after being cleared as there were still 4 unassigned seats in F (with the waitlist showing 2 seats remaining and 4 seats checked in - me, my friend and 2 other passengers who had already bought F and checked in around the 24hr mark).

Here's a fun new one for me. I have a flight on May 14 returning on May 17. The flight on the 14th still shows all 12 first class seats available but they want $80 for basically a 1 hr flight. I can wait. The return flight only showed 6 available but when I logged in yesterday. 13 days before and went to check the first class upgrade prices I was able to upgrade the return flight to first for $0. So now the big questions is will I get the first class upgrade 5 days out for the flight up.

Was #1 on the 2026.05.06 JFK-HNL list from T-24. Around 30min before boarding; I disappeared completely from the list along with some others. The new #1 got 3G and I kept my Y+ seat. The gate agent didn’t understand my question about why I had disappeared from the list and didn’t care.

All JFK employees have a I don’t care vibe.

I have a similar situation at SFO, a supervisor showed up and re-upgraded me. (I do have a screenshot of the original upgrade list to show).

I would do an Alaska Listens and follow up with Customer Care to report the discrepancy since that is a long flight (10 hours).