Earn airline miles with credit cards : How to find the right Swiss credit card for your award miles.

More and more companies are offering the opportunity to collect airline miles : with rental car companies, insurance companies and retailers, mileage hunters can get their money's worth. Credit cards are also part of the portfolio of airline miles aficionados.

Credit cards with a mileage bonus

There are a large number of Swiss credit cards that can be used to collect airline miles. However, depending on the credit card, you will receive a different number of award miles. A comparison is worthwhile.

On moneyland.ch, all cards can be sorted on the results page of the credit card comparison using a dropdown according to the scope of services in the airline miles area.

Miles & More and Flying Blue

Most Swiss credit cards generate award miles for the Miles & More airline miles program, which is part of the world's largest airline alliance, the Star Alliance. An exception is Viseca's Flying Blue World MasterCard with Flying Blue miles for KLM, Air France and other airlines in the SkyTeam alliance.

Different bonus programs

The mileage programs of the various credit cards also differ in terms of the type of airline miles that can be gained with them. While the cards from SWISS Miles & More and Cornèrcard generate award miles directly from Miles & More, in the case of the Diners Club Classic Card the reward points have to be converted into airline miles. Diners Club users receive 1,000 award miles from Miles & More for 4,000 points. With the Miles & More credit card from Diners it is also possible to collect airline miles.

Miles as a welcome gift

The majority of credit cards with mile rating offer airline miles as a one-off "welcome gift". With the purchase of the Flying Blue World MasterCard, 5000 Flying Blue miles are credited to the account. Cornèrcard Miles & More Classic offers 5,000 award miles for Miles & More as a starter package. The Cornèrcard Miles & More Gold even scores with a welcome offer of 10,000 award miles - as much as only the SWISS Miles & More Platinum from Swisscard and the Diners Club Miles & More offer. The majority of cards offer an annual loyalty bonus in the form of award miles in addition to the welcome offer.

Revenue-dependent airline miles credits

All credit cards with mile rating offer award miles for the sales generated. For all cards, sales are understood to be the entirety of purchases at home and abroad - sales do not include cash withdrawals, fees and interest. The credit cards differ in terms of their conversion rate: while you need 4 francs for 1 award mile with the regular Diners Club, for example, you only need 2 francs to spend with the Cornèrcard mileage cards.

Different validity of the award miles

As a rule, the award miles generated by Swiss credit cards are valid for 3 years. With some cards such as the Flying Blue World MasterCard, Cornèrcard Miles & More and SWISS Miles & More from Swisscard, the award miles remain valid indefinitely - provided that you generate at least one mileage-eligible card turnover per month.

Credit cards for mileage collectors

Which credit cards are best for mileage hunters? The Moneyland editorial team calculated the number of airline miles generated for 2 years on the basis of an occasional user with a turnover of 3,600 francs (excluding cash withdrawals) and a frequent user with a turnover of 20,000 francs.

Cornèrcard Miles & More

For occasional users , the Cornèrcard Miles & More Classic leads the ranking with 8,600 award miles.

SWISS and Cornèrcard Miles & More Gold

The gold cards for frequent users are the Cornèrcard Miles & More Gold (32,000 miles for 2 years) and the SWISS Miles & More Gold American Express (47,500 miles).

The gold cards are only surpassed by the platinum cards, which are, however, significantly more expensive in terms of annual fees: SWISS Miles & More Platinum MasterCard (35,000 miles) and SWISS Miles & More Platinum American Express (63,000 miles).