Emirates is known for their incredible first class cabin which includes a fully enclosed suite, gourmet food, an extensive premium wine list including free flowing Dom Perignon, unlimited caviar, as well as two shower suites for the first class passengers.

A few years ago it was relatively easy to book Emirates first class but over the years the number of miles you need as well as the taxes and fees have gone up significantly while Emirates has limited the number of award seats available.

Business class is fairly easy to come by and there’s a great way to upgrade to first class which not many people know about.

Space Available First Class Upgrades from Business Class

Most airlines don’t let you upgrade from economy to business class or from business class to first class on international flights even if there are seats available. They would rather the seats go out empty. Their rationale is that if everyone knows they can just upgrade at the last minute, nobody will buy the seats to begin with!

But not Emirates.

They do a great job of offering last seat availability for upgrades. That means if a seat is for sale, you can upgrade to it with cash or miles. We’re obviously going to focus on using miles to upgrade. Now there are some caveats to this as they may not have catered the entire cabin to accommodate a full cabin so you may not be offered an upgrade even if there are seats available.

Upgrading Before Your Flight

Emirates has functionality on their website to apply for an upgrade before your flight, however this is capacity controlled. That means, upgrade space has to be available which they are fairly stingy with. You’ll be on the waitlist from the time you apply to 48 hours before the flight. If there isn’t upgrade space, you will be removed from the waitlist and your upgrade request will be cancelled. But fear not, there is a better way!

Upgrading Day of Departure

As I mentioned before, Emirates will allow you to upgrade if there is space available on the day of departure and all you have to do is ask!

Here are all the places you can ask about an upgrade:

• At the check in desk

• At the lounge

• At the gate

• Even on the plane once you’ve boarded

You can upgrade from business to first class for a reasonable number of miles. This even works from economy to business class.

Check Expert Flyer

To see how many seats are available on your flight, the easiest way is to pull up the seat map on Expert Flyer. I’ve had a subscription to Expert Flyer for as long as I can remember. It costs $4.99 per month and while it isn’t as useful as it used to be, I still get a lot of value out of it, especially with my award booking service.

For the average traveler, it might not make sense to have a membership, but if you’re trying to gauge your upgrade odds on an Emirates flight, it certainly could be!

All you need to do is enter in your flight details in the seat map section and it will pull up how many seats are taken and how many are available.

As you can see in the screenshot above, there are 3 available seats for the flight from JFK to Milan which means if you are booked in business class on this flight, you should be able to upgrade to first class with miles at check in.

Now if your seat map is showing completely full like this one from LAX to Dubai, your chances are much lower at scoring an upgrade but not zero. I would still ask at check in if there are any seats as people can cancel or change their flights last minute. They will also let you know if anyone hasn’t checked in for the flight yet and that might give you reason to ask at the lounge, at the gate, or even on the plane.

How Many Miles Will It Cost?

The number of miles your upgrade will cost depends on how many miles your original ticket cost. Keep in mind you can only upgrade one cabin, so you can’t go from economy to first. Additionally, the ticket has to be booked on Emirates. You can’t book the ticket through a partner like Air Canada.

Emirates doesn’t have a lot of information on their website about the upgrade process but you’ll just need to pay the difference between the first class price and the number of miles you paid for your business class flight. Emirates does have a good mileage calculator on their website.

Last month, I helped book two separate clients on the same flight a day a part (complete coincidence). All six (2 and a baby on one day and 4 on the next) upgraded to first class from JFK to Milan. They each paid around a additional 28,000 miles. That is an incredible value considering the flight would have cost around $15,000 each!

Traveling with a Lap Infant: YMMV

Normally, when traveling with a lap infant on an international flight, regardless of if it is a cash fare or a mileage fare, you have to pay 10% of the adult cash fare for the lap infant. That can be pretty brutal for an expensive first class flight. However, as I mentioned earlier, I had booked a client in business class from JFK to Milan in Emirates business class and helped them upgrade to first class at check in. This is purely anecdotal but they were not asked to pay anything additional for their lap infant when upgrading. I am not sure if it was just a friendly check in agent, or if they don’t require you to pay the additional fare for your lap infant when upgrading. Unfortunately, the first class cabin was full on the way home so we weren’t able to get a second data point.

Wrapping Up

Flying Emirates first class is a bucket list experience but finding first class award space has been extremely tough to find. While not fool proof, booking a business class ticket and upgrading with miles at check in is a great way to secure a first class flight with Emirates.