AAdvantage eShopping: Earn American miles for online purchases

One of the best ways to earn American Airlines miles on purchases you’re already making is through the AAdvantage eShopping website. You can earn American miles by clicking through this site before making online purchases.

Many of the miles you can earn through the American Airlines shopping portal are base miles. As such, the AAdvantage eShopping portal is a good way to earn American miles you can redeem for flights and a vehicle by which you can earn Loyalty Points for American Airlines elite status.

Here’s what you need to know about the American AAdvantage eShopping portal.

What is American AAdvantage eShopping?

Many airline and hotel loyalty programs offer online shopping portals, but the AAdvantage eShopping portal is tied to American Airlines. As such, you can earn American miles and, in some cases, Loyalty Points when you click through the AAdvantage eShopping portal before making an online purchase. Common reward rates range from 1 mile per dollar spent to around 10 miles per dollar spent, but you’ll occasionally see higher rates. Sometimes, you’ll get a set number of miles per qualifying purchase.

To earn miles with the American Airlines shopping portal, you must first have an American Airlines AAdvantage account. Once you have that, head to the AAdvantage eShopping website to create an account. To do so, you must provide your name, AAdvantage number, email, ZIP code and desired password.

Once you have an AAdvantage eShopping account, head to the AAdvantage eShopping site. Make sure you are logged in before each online shopping trip. Then, enter your desired merchant in the “Find a store or product” box at the top of the website and click “Enter” to search.

Doing so will take you to the merchant’s landing page or a list of possible merchants. You’ll see at this point whether your merchant currently offers an elevated earning rate. For example, Viator was offering 8 miles per dollar spent instead of the standard 2 miles per dollar when I wrote this story.

Before clicking the “Shop now” button to head to the merchant’s website and make your purchase, scroll down to read the “Mileage terms” box to ensure your purchase will be eligible. If satisfied, scroll back up and click “Shop now.” A new window will open, and you’ll be redirected to your merchant’s website. Once there, shop as you normally would in that window. If you make a qualifying purchase in that window, you should earn American miles as detailed on the AAdvantage eShopping page for that merchant at the time of your purchase.

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Related: How to earn miles in the American Airlines AAdvantage program

Does AAdvantage eShopping earn Loyalty Points?

If you want to earn American Airlines elite status, you’ll be excited to learn you can earn Loyalty Points through the American AAdvantage eShopping portal. The miles you’ll earn — such as 8 miles per dollar spent — are base miles and therefore also count as Loyalty Points.

However, any bonus miles you earn through airline shopping portal promotions won’t count as Loyalty Points.

If you are worried about missing out on earning American miles when shopping online, install the AAdvantage eShopping button browser extension.

Once installed, the AAdvantage eShopping button will let you know when you can earn American miles on an online purchase. All you need to do to earn miles when shopping online with a participating merchant is click the button.

The AAdvantage eShopping button will also automatically apply coupons and let you know if you can purchase a product on a different website at a lower rate.

Related: Best uses of American Airlines miles

SimplyMiles vs. AAdvantage eShopping

American AAdvantage members sometimes get confused about how SimplyMiles differs from AAdvantage eShopping. In short, SimplyMiles is a website where you can enroll in offers with select merchants that provide American miles when you use an enrolled Mastercard to pay for an eligible purchase with that merchant.

Except when the terms of SimplyMiles or AAdvantage eShopping prohibit it, you can earn American miles on a purchase with both SimplyMiles and AAdvantage eShopping if the merchant participates in both.

Related: Everything you need to know about credit card merchant offers

Best cards to use with AAdvantage eShopping

Clicking through AAdvantage eShopping doesn’t change which card is best for your online purchases. Suppose you click through to an office supply store. In that case, you’ll want to use a card like the Ink Business Cash Credit Card that lets you earn 5% cash back on the first $25,000 spent in combined purchases each account anniversary year at office supply stores and on internet, cable and phone services. Likewise, if you click through to a hotel brand, you’ll want to use one of the best cards for travel purchases.