Though the airline offers complimentary soft drinks, coffee, tea, juice, water, Biscoff cookies and pretzels on flights over 250 miles, on longer flights in which additional options are available for purchase, AAdvantage members can now redeem AAdvantage miles rather than pay cash.
Keep reading for more details on how you can redeem miles for inflight purchases.
Redeem AAdvantage miles for inflight drinks and snacks
This offer is available on American Airlines mainline flights but not on flights operated by its regional subsidiary, American Eagle. Alcoholic beverages are available for purchase (with cash or miles) on domestic flights over 250 miles, while snacks are available on select flights over 1,300 miles. Note that on each flight, drink and snack options may vary.
Possible beverage and snack options include Cool Ranch Doritos Minis, a fruit and cheese plate, Goose IPA, Jack Daniel’s whiskey, Bud Light, and Tito’s vodka.
If they're planning to redeem miles for inflight food, members must ensure their AAdvantage number has been added to their booking. For the buy-on-board service, members must show their boarding pass to the flight attendant (either a paper pass or a digital one on their personal electronic device). The flight attendant will then scan the boarding pass to deduct the miles from the AAdvantage member's account.
Each AAdvantage mile is worth 1 cent when redeemed for buy-on-board items. This is significantly lower than TPG's March 2025 valuation of AAdvantage miles of 1.65 cents each.
Select AAdvantage cobranded credit card holders receive a 25% discount on inflight purchases when paying with an eligible card; however, this discount is not offered when you redeem miles to pay for snacks and drinks.
Bottom line
Redeeming your American Airlines AAdvantage miles for buy-on-board items at 1 cent per mile each won't give you as great a redemption value as a long-haul premium-cabin flight.
However, if you only fly American occasionally and have a small number of miles you might not otherwise use, it could be a good way to use them up before they expire.
Related reading:
- How to keep your airline, hotel and rental car points and miles from expiring
- Airline 'snackdown': Who has the best free snacks in the sky?
- American Airlines basic economy: What you need to know about bags, seats, boarding and more
- United debuts new way to pay for onboard snacks and drinks
- American upgrades inflight Wi-Fi, but stops short of making good on free messaging promise
