Sep 26, 2019, 6:52 pm
Last edit by: Mwenenzi
Qantas routes Australia to/from USA Canada
Looking for awards only on LAX-SYD route restricts your options.
AS award chart:---> https://www.alaskaair.com/content/mi...s/award-charts
Note these routes and/or aircraft type may change. Not all routes have flights every day.
May not be up to date
The QF A380 have first, business, premium economy & economy classes. Only the A380 has first class.
The QF B787's have, business, premium economy & economy classes. The B787s do not have first class.
All QF B747's have been retired and sent to the Mojave desert. (July 2020)
QF starts to release their awards 353 days out to QF frequent flyers. But awards can be released any time out to departure. Anyone can join the QF ffp and then search for award availability. Be careful about mixed economy/business QF awards. These have an identifying symbol on the award flight.
A business class flight will give access to the Qantas Club or Qantas Business lounge. Major domestic airports have both a Qantas Club lounge, for mid level Oneworld status holders and paid QF club members, and a better Business lounge, with access by business class of service or top level Oneworld status. Domestic lounges can get very busy at morning and late afternoon peaks.
From QF web site QF seat maps
Qantas Australia domestic
Award availability on QF domestic routes in both business & economy is usually OK. Can be harder on longer routes (say 3~ 4 hour flights).
The workhorse of QF Mainline domestic fleet is the B737-800. QF have 75 of these in a 12J162Y configuration. Some schedules have a A330, some of which have international style business seats. These 2 aircraft types are also used on trans Tasman routes (Australia to New Zealand).
General Qantas information Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas
The QantasLink brand is used on regional routes to smaller cities and towns. The aircraft used are Dash 8's (de Havilland Canada DHC-8-200, Bombardier Dash 8 Q300 & Q400) in all an Y configuration, Foker 100 in all 105Y configuration and B717's in 12JY98 or 125Y configuration.
General QantasLink information Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QantasLink
Qantas information Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QantasLink
AA sub forum thread They have the same problems getting awards on QF and to AU/NZ & South Pacific--->
AA miles awards: using / redeeming AA miles on Qantas (QF) & related (consolidated)
AA MileSAAver award to / from Australia, New Zealand (master thread)
FJ / Fiji Airways (ex-Air Pacific) and AA, miles, awards, etc. (consolidated)
AA Miles Award: TN / Air Tahiti Nui award redemptions (master thread)
Revisions
11 Jun 2022 QF announcements removed (except for 2) as AU is open and QF is flying AU<--->USA
15 Jun 2022 Deleted some dead links
11 Dec 2022 Remove redundant links. Revise routes
27 Dec 2022 MEL DFW added
25 Feb 2023 Formatting
13 Aug 2023 Added SYD-SFO
Looking for awards only on LAX-SYD route restricts your options.
AS award chart:---> https://www.alaskaair.com/content/mi...s/award-charts
Note these routes and/or aircraft type may change. Not all routes have flights every day.
May not be up to date
BNE-LAX B330
MEL-DFW B787
MEL-LAX B787 (was the first A380 route for Qantas on 21 October 2008)
MEL-DFW B787
SYD-DFW B787 A380
SYD-HNL
SYD-AKL-JFK B787 (from June 2023)
SYD-LAX A380 B787
SYD-SFO
SYD-YVR
GeneralMEL-DFW B787
MEL-LAX B787 (was the first A380 route for Qantas on 21 October 2008)
MEL-DFW B787
SYD-DFW B787 A380
SYD-HNL
SYD-AKL-JFK B787 (from June 2023)
SYD-LAX A380 B787
SYD-SFO
SYD-YVR
The QF A380 have first, business, premium economy & economy classes. Only the A380 has first class.
The QF B787's have, business, premium economy & economy classes. The B787s do not have first class.
All QF B747's have been retired and sent to the Mojave desert. (July 2020)
QF starts to release their awards 353 days out to QF frequent flyers. But awards can be released any time out to departure. Anyone can join the QF ffp and then search for award availability. Be careful about mixed economy/business QF awards. These have an identifying symbol on the award flight.
A business class flight will give access to the Qantas Club or Qantas Business lounge. Major domestic airports have both a Qantas Club lounge, for mid level Oneworld status holders and paid QF club members, and a better Business lounge, with access by business class of service or top level Oneworld status. Domestic lounges can get very busy at morning and late afternoon peaks.
From QF web site QF seat maps
Qantas Australia domestic
Award availability on QF domestic routes in both business & economy is usually OK. Can be harder on longer routes (say 3~ 4 hour flights).
The workhorse of QF Mainline domestic fleet is the B737-800. QF have 75 of these in a 12J162Y configuration. Some schedules have a A330, some of which have international style business seats. These 2 aircraft types are also used on trans Tasman routes (Australia to New Zealand).
General Qantas information Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas
The QantasLink brand is used on regional routes to smaller cities and towns. The aircraft used are Dash 8's (de Havilland Canada DHC-8-200, Bombardier Dash 8 Q300 & Q400) in all an Y configuration, Foker 100 in all 105Y configuration and B717's in 12JY98 or 125Y configuration.
General QantasLink information Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QantasLink
Qantas information Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QantasLink
AA sub forum thread They have the same problems getting awards on QF and to AU/NZ & South Pacific--->
AA miles awards: using / redeeming AA miles on Qantas (QF) & related (consolidated)
AA MileSAAver award to / from Australia, New Zealand (master thread)
FJ / Fiji Airways (ex-Air Pacific) and AA, miles, awards, etc. (consolidated)
AA Miles Award: TN / Air Tahiti Nui award redemptions (master thread)
Revisions
11 Jun 2022 QF announcements removed (except for 2) as AU is open and QF is flying AU<--->USA
15 Jun 2022 Deleted some dead links
11 Dec 2022 Remove redundant links. Revise routes
27 Dec 2022 MEL DFW added
25 Feb 2023 Formatting
13 Aug 2023 Added SYD-SFO
Consolidated Qantas (QF) Awards Availability/Booking/Routing Thread
Nov 4, 2024 | 3:36 pm
#706
Join Date: Jan 2010
Programs: UA, AS
Posts: 2,596
Alaska IT over many years has had bugs that sometimes lasted for years without fixing, so I am not surprised. It is great you have been lucky with Qantas awards so far and we can all hope AS IT fixes the problem, but based on past history it may not be soon.
Nov 10, 2024 | 3:41 pm
#707
Join Date: Apr 1999
Location: Seattle, Cagayan de Oro
Programs: CebGo 5J, Hilton Diamond, IHG Platinum, Alaska Titanium
Posts: 4,778
Sweet FA still. I think AS and QF relationship is not good. No award seats system wide for QF using AS miles. Not even simple SYD-MEL awards in economy till EOS
Nov 11, 2024 | 9:38 am
#708
Join Date: Jan 2010
Programs: UA, AS
Posts: 2,596
I would suggest if folks want to see QF awards fixed, they contact AS and report the problems via as many methods as possible, feedback form, reporting to an agent who forwards the issue to IT, and email. Reporting issues here is good such that it makes customers aware, but it does not help get the problems fixed.
Nov 14, 2024 | 5:44 pm
#709
Join Date: Oct 2012
Programs: HH/PCR/SPG
Posts: 21
Nov 15, 2024 | 2:31 am
#710
Join Date: Jul 2011
Programs: QF Plat, VA Plat, BA Gold
Posts: 547
Feb 9, 2026 | 4:14 pm
#711
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: SEA
Programs: Alaska Gold
Posts: 56
Grabbed a Qantas business seat on the a380 for a couple weeks out today for 85k points. A couple data points that might be relevant to others:
- Phantom availability on a couple of previous attempts to book this, my theory is that it's related to someone else booking the seat before I got to it. I saw space on a few different days before I was actually able to get it to go through. When booking, clear signs that it's phantom availability seem to be if the direct segment (LAX-SYD) didn't show available but SEA-LAX-SYD did, and also I noticed that it was showing PAE-LAX-SYD as available when the seat really existed, but didn't show it when it was phantom availability (even though it still showed SEA-LAX-SYD). It does seem like space tends to open up fairly frequently though, especially as the date gets closer
- Initially the Qantas site wouldn't let me select a seat and said I needed to wait until check-in, but after 3 or 4 hours I tried again and it worked. And it even let me (as Atmos Gold now for 2026) reserve an extra legroom bulkhead seat which was a nice surprise
Feb 9, 2026 | 4:46 pm
#712
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: PDX
Programs: AS Platinum, Hertz President's Circle, IHG Plat, Hyatt Discoverist, Marriott Silver
Posts: 12,382
Grabbed a Qantas business seat on the a380 for a couple weeks out today for 85k points. A couple data points that might be relevant to others:
- Phantom availability on a couple of previous attempts to book this, my theory is that it's related to someone else booking the seat before I got to it. I saw space on a few different days before I was actually able to get it to go through. When booking, clear signs that it's phantom availability seem to be if the direct segment (LAX-SYD) didn't show available but SEA-LAX-SYD did, and also I noticed that it was showing PAE-LAX-SYD as available when the seat really existed, but didn't show it when it was phantom availability (even though it still showed SEA-LAX-SYD). It does seem like space tends to open up fairly frequently though, especially as the date gets closer
- Initially the Qantas site wouldn't let me select a seat and said I needed to wait until check-in, but after 3 or 4 hours I tried again and it worked. And it even let me (as Atmos Gold now for 2026) reserve an extra legroom bulkhead seat which was a nice surprise
Feb 9, 2026 | 7:45 pm
#713
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: SEA
Programs: Alaska Gold
Posts: 56
On that one I had been able to assign seats right away after booking. I was Platinum at the time, not sure if it makes a difference.
Apr 20, 2026 | 1:43 am
#714
Join Date: May 2024
Location: Ho Chi Minh City
Programs: United Gold, Atmos Platinum, IHG Diamond Ambassador, Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 346
Seems like BNE is the best airport to find awards in biz/fist class? 130k for BNE-LAX with a long stopover in Sydney and multiple days with flights to NRT for 60k in biz.
Apr 20, 2026 | 2:28 am
#715
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: MEL CHC
Posts: 22,880
If BNE-SYD-LAX the BNE-SYD will have business class and SYD-LAX may have first class depending on aircraft. Need to process AU emigration controls at SYD. A bus or train ride from SYD T3 domestic to SYD T1 international.
Apr 20, 2026 | 3:13 am
#716
Join Date: May 2024
Location: Ho Chi Minh City
Programs: United Gold, Atmos Platinum, IHG Diamond Ambassador, Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 346
Will not find QF first class to BNE. Only the QF A380 have first class.
If BNE-SYD-LAX the BNE-SYD will have business class and SYD-LAX may have first class depending on aircraft. Need to process AU emigration controls at SYD. A bus or train ride from SYD T3 domestic to SYD T1 international.
If BNE-SYD-LAX the BNE-SYD will have business class and SYD-LAX may have first class depending on aircraft. Need to process AU emigration controls at SYD. A bus or train ride from SYD T3 domestic to SYD T1 international.
Correct. The entire route is BNE-SYD-LAX with the layover being in SYD.
I ended up booking a a380 first class flight from Syd-LAX but the domestic leg is in coach from BNE.