The Honest Positioning
Skim nearly any thread about Lufthansa's loyalty program and you'll hit the same warning buried in the fine print: Miles & More miles are famously hard to spend well, and the carrier stacks heavy surcharges on top of almost every award. So before this Lufthansa Miles and More guide persuades you to bank a single mile, the honest truth is this — for most travelers the smarter move is to skip Miles & More entirely and book Lufthansa's planes with a more flexible Star Alliance currency instead.
Lufthansa's own miles carry surcharge-laden award pricing and a near-total lack of easy ways to earn them from everyday credit card spending. That's precisely why seasoned redemption guides push you toward Aeroplan or Avianca LifeMiles to unlock the same seats for fewer points — and sometimes on better terms. If you already hold M&M miles, keep reading: there are a handful of genuinely smart niche uses. If you're starting from zero and have any transferable currency, the Aeroplan guide is probably the better home for your points.
How to Earn Miles & More
The first surprise most people hit is structural: Miles & More has no U.S. transferable-currency partners. You cannot move Chase, Amex, Capital One, Citi, or Bilt points into it directly, which removes the simplest way most of us accumulate airline miles.
So how does anyone build M&M miles? Realistically:
- Fly Lufthansa, Swiss, Austrian, or other Lufthansa Group carriers and credit the segments to Miles & More.
- Partner flights on other Star Alliance airlines that credit to M&M under the program's earning rules.
- Co-branded cards and promotions in markets where Miles & More operates — though these are generally not the U.S. cards you likely carry.
Because the best Star Alliance options for U.S. travelers — Aeroplan, Avianca LifeMiles, and ANA — all take 1:1 transfers from mainstream bank currencies, those programs almost always dominate M&M for the same Lufthansa seats. That contrast is the single biggest reason to treat M&M as a specialist currency rather than a daily driver.
The First-Class Unlock
If there's one genuine reason to care about Miles & More, it's the Lufthansa first class award. Lufthansa has a long, well-documented habit of releasing first-class inventory to its own members before those same seats show up to Star Alliance partners. In practice that means your most reliable path to book Lufthansa first class points can run straight through M&M itself rather than through a partner program.
On transatlantic routes Lufthansa First has historically started near 87,000 miles one-way, but treat that as a reference level rather than a price: since 3 June 2025 Miles & More prices awards on Lufthansa, SWISS, Austrian and Discover metal dynamically, off the fare, so the miles are quoted at booking and the published award chart no longer covers these flights. It is still widely considered one of aviation's great experiences, with a proper seat, serious service, and a first-class lounge network that's the closest thing flying gets to a private club. The tradeoff is that you're paying with a hard-to-earn currency and absorbing real surcharges, so the "value" only materializes if you actually value that specific product over the alternatives.
If your travel is truly long-haul to Asia, the same first-class product prices higher; the value math shifts, so it pays to run the specific route through a mileage comparison rather than assume the transatlantic number applies everywhere.
Surcharges and Expiry
Two costs quietly eat at Miles & More redemptions, and both are worth spelling out before you transfer or spend anything.
1. Surcharges. Lufthansa awards pile on carrier-imposed fuel surcharges (the infamous YQ) on top of the miles. A "free" first-class award can still carry a respectable cash bill, which drags down the real cents-per-mile you're getting. Always price the total out-of-pocket cost against the cash fare — the CPP calculator makes that comparison concrete — because a redemption that looks great at face value can quietly lose its luster once fees are added.
2. Expiry. Miles & More miles don't last forever. Miles that sit untouched in your account can expire, which makes M&M a poor place to hoard points speculatively. Unlike transferable currencies that sit safely on a card, orphaned M&M miles carry a clock — bank them only if you actually have a redemption in mind, and treat the balance as spendable inventory rather than long-term savings.
When It's Actually Right
Given all that, when does Miles & More actually make sense? The honest list is narrow:
- You already hold M&M miles and want to use them rather than let them expire.
- You're chasing Lufthansa First Class specifically and want the best shot at the program's own inventory before partners see it.
- You fly Lufthansa Group often and are building elite status, where earning in the currency that tracks toward status has its own logic.
Outside those cases, the Miles and More sweet spots are thinner than most people hope. For general transatlantic and long-haul award travel, the Aeroplan guide is the stronger default — it transfers 1:1 from Chase, Amex, Capital One, and Bilt, and it books the same Star Alliance metal with more flexibility. Think of M&M as a specialist's tool for one specific product, not your all-purpose award currency.
The Bottom Line
Bottom line: Miles & More is a program you arrive at with a purpose, not one you accumulate in the background. If that purpose is the Lufthansa first class experience, focus your earning energy there and be deliberate about booking before miles expire.
Before you commit, put your actual dates and route into the search tool and read the total out-of-pocket cost alongside the miles — then open the explore map to see how the same transatlantic first-class product compares across the Star Alliance carriers you can book directly with flexible points.