Oh no even better, I underestimated how elite heavy Miami is for United. Upgrade lists are usually 10-30 people, with a few of my 1K friends even agreeing that receiving an upgrade is almost nonexistent... but hey, I don't blame them for avoiding american haha.

Haha yeah, United's program is def not my favorite, but I'd rather deal with that than the "500 mile upgrades", or even the very often case of AA gate agents skipping the upgrade list to upgrade non revs into first class, let alone... Oasis...

If you are DFW based EXP upgrade % for me YTD is 24%

Bingo

Upgrade potential: DEN vs IAH
 

Researching switching my flying to UA and wondering if anyone sees a difference in upgrades between DEN and IAH. I live in a smaller city (ABQ) and would be primarily connecting through those two.

Also, does anyone notice any differences between the two cities with time of day, day of week, or inbound/outbound? For example, does IAH tend to have more commuter traffic and therefore fewer upgrades during rush hour?

DFW (AA) vs IAH (UA): Upgrades
 

Looking at switching status pursuit and UA/AA are my main two options out of my home airport (ABQ). Wondering if anyone out there happens to have recent experience (or heard of anything on this forum) about upgrade potential with equivalent elite status when connecting through DFW on American vs IAH on United. Also, if there are any intermediary variables (eg rush hour in DFW is much lower odds than IAH but midday is much better).

Thanks folks

Both airports are seeing larger volumes of passengers vs. other hubs in United's network. From a time of day perspective, busyness will be driven by which banks of flights you are seeking to connect into from ABQ and to where.

From someone who connects through the two, DEN's terminal system has worked better for me as a connector historically since UA's flights were principally out of Terminal/Concourse B but that is changing with flights out of A. IAH can be a pain to navigate given the sheer number of terminals and where they put big planes vs. smaller UX planes so my longest runs between terminals and connections have been at IAH.

Additionally right now, from a club perspective DEN has only one UC for the next 12 months. IAH has multiple UCs that are finally reopening.

I would say upgrades are driven by when you fly and the sizes of aircraft as well as which cities you fly to. If you decide to go toe-to-toe with other UA elites during the AM and PM flight banks, you're going to have challenges.

David

These two airports are captive of their respective airlines and drive traffic and costs accordingly. I'd say this is 6 of one and half-dozen of another.

David

I flew FRA-SFO on Oct 24th and few days before the flight it was 45/60 booked and I was 20th in the upgrade list (as a 1K with the cheapest booked fare). Something must have happened but 10 more people behind me in the list (everyone) ended up upgraded and I believe there were even couple of seats empty both in Polaris and Premium Economy Plus.

I was booking the flight in the middle of september and I never seen any PZ space on any of the trans-atlantic flights.

I'm taking a guess - but I suspect you would be competing with more AA flyers out of ABQ than UA flyers. DFW is the second highest destination out of ABQ while IAH does not even make the top 10.

One of the biggest difference between UA and AA's program is that only CK, EXP, and PPro have unlimited free upgrades - all other elites need to use stickers to upgrade.

Did you also clear? How many cleared in the end? The 45/60 count might have included blocked inventory if Economy was oversold.

Aside: 20th as 1K even on a cheap fare is kind of surprising.

Oh fascinating. I guess United is just routing all their traffic through Denver. Where did you get that info? Would love to check it out.

Thanks - I think I’d make PPro so should be good.

This was my initial guess.

Thanks David - sounds like Denver is the clear winner.

Thanks. So, interestingly I looked at flight connections and they list DFW as 3rd (199 flights) and IAH as 5th (153). Phoenix, LA, and Denver are the others in the top 5, but are all served by multiple airlines, so those are skewed.

It does look like American has more flights to DFW than UA does to IAH, but this doesn’t say anything about load. For example, if the United flights were always full, but AA flights were at 85% capacity, that would theoretically be more advantageous for upgrades. Also, more flights midday from American may mean more flights where there are fewer business class folks.