American Airlines
Your Miles Are a Currency. We Quietly Set the Exchange Rate.
$34B
Value Extracted
7
Key Initiatives
American Airlines is the largest US carrier and a case study in loyalty-program and fee enshittification. It moved AAdvantage to opaque dynamic award pricing, raised checked-bag fees to $40, and in 2024 briefly blocked mile-earning on most third-party bookings before reversing. EnshitifAi assigns American an Extraction Index of $34B, an editorial opinion, not a measured financial figure.
The Story
American Airlines spent decades teaching travelers that loyalty compounds — that miles were a currency you earned and owned. We helped them reframe loyalty as a variable the airline controls: published award charts retired in favor of opaque dynamic pricing, miles switched off for the cheapest fares, and for fourteen months in 2024 the right to earn miles at all gated to booking through American's own channels. The seat is the same aluminum tube it always was; everything bolted to it — legroom, a checked bag, sitting next to your child — is now a separate line item.
Common Questions
Is American Airlines enshittified?
By EnshitifAi's reckoning, yes. American retired its published AAdvantage award charts in favor of dynamic pricing, stopped basic-economy tickets from earning miles, and raised the first checked-bag fee to $40 for tickets issued on or after December 1, 2025. In 2024 it even tried to switch off mile-earning for most third-party bookings before reversing course.
What dark patterns does American Airlines use?
Drip pricing (the fare is the down payment; bags, seat assignments, and legroom are unbundled upcharges), loyalty-currency devaluation through dynamic award pricing with no published ceiling, and channel lock-in — the July 2024 attempt to deny AAdvantage miles to anyone not booking through American's own channels. It also charged families to sit together until the US DOT intervened in 2023.
Why did American Airlines stop giving miles for some bookings?
In 2024, under then-Chief Commercial Officer Vasu Raja, American tried to force travelers into its direct and NDC booking channels by denying AAdvantage miles on most third-party bookings. Travel agencies warned of roughly $1.5 billion in lost revenue, and American reversed the policy within about 24 hours of announcing Raja's departure in late May 2024.
How much are American Airlines bag fees now?
American's first checked-bag fee rose from $30 to $35 in February 2024 and to $40 for tickets issued on or after December 1, 2025, when it also scrapped the cheaper checked-bag pricing that had applied to short international routes. From February 18, 2026, a second checked bag costs $5 more unless prepaid online, up to 331 days before departure.
Key Achievements
- 1
Migrated AAdvantage to dynamic award pricing (begun 2019) and retired the published sAAver and AAnytime award charts in 2023 — eliminating the fixed price list members used to plan redemptions, so the cost of any award seat is now whatever the algorithm decides that day, with no published ceiling
- 2
Attempted in 2024, under Chief Commercial Officer Vasu Raja, to deny AAdvantage miles to customers booking through most third-party travel agencies — a 14-month push to force travelers into American's own direct and NDC channels — then reversed within roughly 24 hours of announcing Raja's departure in late May 2024, after agencies warned of about $1.5 billion in lost revenue
- 3
Raised the first checked-bag fee from $30 to $35 in February 2024 and to $40 for tickets issued on or after December 1, 2025, simultaneously eliminating the cheaper checked-bag pricing that had applied to short international routes
- 4
Scheduled a second-checked-bag increase effective February 18, 2026, charging $5 more unless the passenger prepays online up to 331 days before departure — converting a forgotten step at the airport into a penalty fee
- 5
Stopped basic economy tickets from earning AAdvantage miles and Loyalty Points (2025), stripping loyalty value from the lowest fares while still selling them inside the AAdvantage ecosystem
- 6
Unbundled the economy experience into a stack of upsells — Main Cabin Extra legroom, 'preferred' seat assignments, and priority boarding — monetizing the legroom that standard-economy pitch reductions had quietly removed
- 7
Charged families to sit with their own children until the US Department of Transportation pressured carriers in 2023, after which American committed to fee-free family seating — a benefit it had been billing for
A seat used to be a seat. We discovered it was actually eleven products in a trench coat, and the customer would gladly pay for each one rather than miss the flight.
Composite Source
VP of Ancillary Revenue & Seat Disaggregation
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