Frontier Airlines Is One Of My Points and Miles Secret Weapons
Diamond status, a GoWild! pass, and rows 1-3 on every single Frontier flight. Here's how I built a Frontier setup that rivals legacy carriers on short-haul routes.
Every points-and-miles conversation gravitates toward the same three names.
Delta. American. United. They are the pillars of the community, but there’s a carrier I’ve quietly been stacking on top of all of it, one where I had the top-tier elite status before I ever stepped on one of their planes.
That carrier is Frontier Airlines. It’s one of my secret travel weapons.
I know. Stay with me.
Why Frontier Gets Dismissed
Most of the people I hear bad-mouthing Frontier have either never flown on Frontier or have only flown once or twice. Despite that, Frontier’s less-than-stellar reputation is earned in some ways. There is Wi-Fi. No meals. No charging ports. If you need to work at 30,000 feet or arrive fed, Frontier is not for you.
But the points-and-miles community has a blind spot when it comes to Frontier: it evaluates it as a civilian would, focusing on what’s missing rather than what’s actually achievable. When you run the right setup, Frontier stops being a bare-bones budget airline and starts functioning like a shorthaul premium product, particularly if you’re based in one of their base or focus cities.
In addition to the flights I’ve already taken on Frontier this year (13 through 5/31), I also have flights booked on Frontier to/from Las Vegas to celebrate my wife’s birthday, to/from San Salvador, to/from Orlando for a stay at the Waldorf Astoria at Disney, and a trip to/from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Fly cheap, stay nice. I flew Frontier to the east coast on positioning flights last year while I was completing the jetBlue 25 for 25 challenge. Those cheap flights made the challenge possible financially.
Here’s the system I built, piece by piece, and one that I use often, especially for day trips and positioning flights. Note my two cardinal rules for flying Frontier:
- I only fly on non-stop flights
- I never check a bag
Step One: Status Before Flying a Single Frontier Flight
I had Elite Diamond status, Frontier’s top tier, before I flew them a single time. Not through credit card spend, not through a challenge, not through years of loyalty. Through a hotel status match funded by a credit card benefit most people ignore.
The whole thing started with my Amex Platinum card (Read my full breakdown of the card). One of its less-talked-about benefits is complimentary Hilton Honors Gold status upon enrollment. Most people treat that as a hotel perk and move on. I used it as a Frontier entry point.
Frontier runs periodic status match campaigns through StatusMatch.com, where you can convert status from hotel programs, including Hilton Gold, into FrontierMiles elite status. In December 2023, I paid $599 to match my Hilton Gold status to Elite Platinum, Frontier’s top tier, and then I paid $99 more to move from Platinum to Diamond. That’s Frontier’s top-tier status, the one that normally requires flying 100,000 Elite Status Points worth of segments in a calendar year, purchased before boarding a single Frontier flight.
Was $599 steep? On paper. In practice, the first year of Diamond benefits paid that back inside two months.
What Diamond Actually Gets You
Elite Diamond comes with a full suite of perks that extend to up to eight people on your reservation (current benefits):
- UpFront Plus seat assignment at check-in for you, that’s rows 1 or 2, blocked middle seat, 36-38 inches of pitch
- Preboarding (Group 0), first on the plane before all other boarding groups
- Free carry-on for you and up to eight companions
- Two free checked bags for you and up to eight companions
- Full refundability up to 24 hours before departure
- Free Discount Den membership (normally $59.99/year)
- Unlimited companion travel allows anyone on any Frontier flight to travel on paid fares with me, with no blackout restrictions and no need to register them Note: The companion benefit cannot be combined with GoWild! fares
- 20x Elite Status Points on eligible flyfrontier.com purchases. Frontier calls this a “100% Mileage Multiplier” in their benefit language, which means double the base earn rate on qualifying purchases
- One free Gold Status Pass to gift annually, or apply to your own account for a 20,000 status point head start
- Family Pooling for miles
- Priority customer care chat
- No change/cancel fees (+1 day from departure)
The bag benefits alone (two checked bags plus a carry-on for a family of four) can run $300+ per round trip on Frontier without status. Diamond eliminates that cost entirely.
One underrated positive that rarely comes up: Frontier flies one of the youngest fleets of any major U.S. carrier. The entire operation runs on Airbus A320neo and A321neo family aircraft, with a median fleet age of around 4.7 years. For context, United’s median fleet age is 19.4 years. Newer aircraft mean better fuel efficiency, quieter cabins, and, in practice, fewer mechanical delays, which matters more on an airline with limited spare planes.
Step Two: The UpFront Plus Seat Is the Hidden Gem
Frontier launched UpFront Plus in April 2024. The concept is straightforward: Available in rows 1 and 2 only, window and aisle seats only, the middle seat is blocked. Pitch runs 36 to 38 inches, versus 30 to 32 inches in standard rows on Frontier. Row three enjoys the same seat pitch without the benefit of the blocked middle seat. I am able to select a row 3 seat at the time of booking for my entire party (of up to 8) at no charge.
For comparison, Delta Comfort+ offers a 33-35-inch pitch; AA’s Main Cabin Extra provides a 34-36-inch pitch; United’s Economy Plus offers 34-38 inches of pitch, depending on the aircraft. Southwest now offers Extra Legroom seats, which provide an additional 3 to 5 inches of legroom compared to standard seats, typically resulting in a pitch of 34 to 36 inches. Because there is no in-flight entertainment, you have more use of the space under the seat in front of you than you do on Delta or United.
None of the other carriers offer a blocked middle seat.
When UpFront Plus launched, then-CEO Barry Biffle described it to investors as “kind of a European business class.” That framing gets laughed at in travel circles, but he wasn’t wrong about the mechanics. Blocking the middle seat on a 3-3 narrow-body and calling it a premium product is exactly what Lufthansa, Air France, KLM, and British Airways do on short-haul European routes; they just charge three times more for it. Biffle departed in December 2025 and was replaced by James Dempsey, who has continued the same product strategy.
As a Diamond member, I get the UpFront Plus upgrade at check-in for free. My Flighty data tells my story: out of 84 Frontier segments flown since November 2023, every single flight with a seat on record landed in row 1, 2, or 3. Not once has a seat outside those three rows appeared in my history.
For a 2.5-hour flight from DFW to MCO (my most-flown Frontier route, with eight round-trips logged), that’s a materially different experience than sitting in 24B.
Step Three: GoWild! Makes the Math Absurd
Once the status was in place, I added the GoWild! All-You-Can-Fly Annual Pass. The current 2026-2027 pass runs $599 at full price, though Frontier consistently offers special pricing in the $299-$399 range. Watch for a Black Friday special.
You pay once, then fly as many times as you want during the pass period. Domestic GoWild! Availability opens at midnight local departure time, the calendar day before the flight, and typically has five seats available. For each nonstop domestic flight, you pay $0.01 in base airfare plus $15.40 in taxes and fees, for a total of $15.41 one-way. Connections add $5.30 per additional flight segment in flight segment tax.
Pair that with Diamond status, and the value becomes evident. Every GoWild! flight still gets me the Diamond treatment, UpFront Plus upgrade at check-in, free carry-on, and pre-boarding. You’re getting a blocked-middle-seat front-row experience on a pass that costs less than two round-trip tickets on a legacy carrier.
Frontier has unlocked a ton of nonstop trip departures from DFW for me:
- DFW to MCO: 8 departures
- DFW to DEN: 7 departures
- DFW to ONT: 6 departures
- DFW to LAS: 3 departures
- DFW to BNA, SAN, STL, ATL: 2 departures each
- DFW to BWI, IND, MDW, MIA, LAX, PHL, SFO, SNA, TUS: 1 each
18 unique nonstop destinations. 42 outbound segments from DFW across the network. For a Dallas-based traveler, Frontier maps almost perfectly onto the weekend-trip pattern: Sun Belt cities, the Mountain West, and secondary markets that get expensive on American or Southwest.
I’d actually rather fly Frontier than any other US airline if I have to sit in an economy seat on the legacy carrier.
Step Four: The Barclays Card Closes the Loop
The Frontier Airlines World Mastercard through Barclays isn’t a card I’d recommend as a primary card; its points system is closed, and the rewards rate doesn’t compete with transferable-points credit cards on everyday spending. But as a piece of the Frontier-specific setup, it earns its place for three reasons.
First, miles don’t expire as long as the card is open. Without it, FrontierMiles expire after 12 months of no accrual activity, and with 151,000 miles, that expiration clock matters. The card stops it entirely.
Second, award redemption fees are waived for cardholders. Frontier charges fees to redeem miles without the card. With it, those fees disappear, which matters when you’re sitting on six figures of miles.
Third, Family Pooling. Diamond status unlocks it, but the card makes it practical; miles across family members can be pooled into a single account for redemptions.
The card also accelerates status earning, but in a different way than the flying multiplier. The Barclays card earns 1 Elite Status Point per $1 spent, regardless of your status tier. That’s separate from the 20x multiplier Diamond members earn on Frontier purchases through flying. Between GoWild! bookings, any direct Frontier spending, and credit card spend, those status points accumulate from multiple directions, which is partly how 55,369 status points have hit the board this cycle toward the 100,000 needed to renew Diamond organically.
One quirk: the card provided Companion Tier certificates earned through promotional spend. In theory, they let you bring a companion for free. In practice, if you already have the Diamond unlimited companion pass, the certificates are redundant. I’m a victim of stacking too many benefits at once, not the worst problem to have.
The DFW Factor
Geography matters more than most strategy posts admit. Frontier has deliberately grown its DFW presence, and that footprint is what makes the entire setup viable. Nonstop flights to Denver, Orlando, Las Vegas, Ontario, Nashville, San Diego, Baltimore, Chicago Midway, Indianapolis, Miami, St. Louis, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Tucson, and more. Eighteen destinations I’ve personally flown nonstop from DFW, and all covered by the GoWild! pass.
If you’re not in Dallas, this setup still works, but really only if you’re based in one of Frontier’s connected cities. Per Cirium data from January 2026, 14 cities have 20+ nonstop destinations from Frontier: Atlanta, Denver, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Dallas, Orlando, Cleveland, Philadelphia, San Juan, Tampa, Chicago, Miami, plus the DC and Los Angeles metro areas. Atlanta is now Frontier’s largest operation by route count, with 61 nonstop destinations and a 40% year-over-year increase in departures as of 2025.
Denver is the headquarters hub and has deep connectivity across the West. If you’re based in one of those cities, the math on a GoWild! pass and Diamond status works as well as it does from DFW. If you’re in a market where Frontier serves only two or three routes, the pass loses most of its value, and availability on thin routes dries up quickly.
The Tools That Make It Work
Frontier’s native search interface is glitchy, even for basic bookings. For GoWild! pass users and miles redemptions, third-party tools close the gap.
SearchGWP.com is the one I rely on most, especially because it shows Frontier’s mile redemption prices and GoWild! prices side by side. Frontier’s own site forces you to search one city pair at a time, one day at a time. SearchGWP searches up to 400 flights in under 10 seconds and returns all available GoWild! and miles-priced flights out of a single airport, across any date, in one click. You can see seat counts, filter for nonstops, sort by price or duration, and get sent directly to Frontier to book. There’s a free trial and a paid tier. Not affiliated with Frontier, it was built by a GoWild! pass holder named Anthony who got tired of the native search experience. Available on web, iOS, and Android. Subscribe to their newsletter too: that’s how I get alerted when Frontier drops a miles sale.
The miles angle is underestimated. Frontier runs periodic sale events where domestic one-way flights drop to 2,500 miles and international to 5,000 miles. The fine print on a recent sale: valid on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays, 7-day advance purchase required, taxes and fees from $5.60. I feel that SearchGWP is currently the best tool for surfacing these discounted mile redemption prices in a browsable format, which means that if you’re not using it, you’re searching blind while everyone else sees the deals.
With 151,000 FrontierMiles in the account and redemption fees waived via the Barclays card, those sales compound. A one-way DFW to MCO for 2,500 miles plus $5.60 in taxes is a deal that almost no other domestic program touches at that price point. Frontier also expanded its redemption options in October 2025 to include bundles covering bags, seat selection, and no change or cancellation fees, starting at 2,000 miles. The program now has more ways to spend than it did a year ago.
Seats.aero recently added Frontier Miles in beta, which matters because it is primarily known in the points community for surfacing premium-cabin award space across partner programs. It’s my default tool for finding business class availability. Frontier showing up there reflects how the program is maturing. For award search across dates without logging into Frontier’s site city by city, it’s a useful addition to the toolkit.
A search on seats.aero on May 31st showed 2,700 upcoming one-way Frontier flights priced at just 5,000 miles.
The Tradeoffs
The setup above is worth using, but anyone who skips discussing Frontier’s downsides is selling something. If you know what you’re getting into on the front end, Frontier can be a great choice – a secret weapon. There are a lot of people who fly Frontier who have never flown at all, don’t fly often, or fly often and don’t realize that Frontier doesn’t work the same as the legacy carriers, and all of them can be easily disappointed.
The staffing model. The pilots and flight attendants are direct employees of Frontier Airlines. They are the primary staff members you interact with while on the aircraft. Almost all ground-based staff—including gate agents, ticket counter agents, and ramp/baggage handlers—are typically employees of third-party contracting companies (such as Menzies, Unifi, or GAT Airline Ground Support) rather than Frontier Airlines itself. While these staff members are employees of a third-party vendor, they are trained to follow Frontier’s specific operational procedures and service policies. But I wouldn’t expect the same service from one of these employees as I would from a Delta Red Coat. The problem is, if you normally fly Delta, you do expect that level of service, or at least something close to it.
No Wi-Fi. If you work on planes and require WiFi, Frontier is not your carrier.
No in-flight entertainment. Download your entertainment before you board.
No live television. Give me a break, this isn’t jetBlue.
Small tray tables. Not much extra room once your laptop is on there. The empty middle seat tray table makes up for this.
Their checked-bag rules. Standard checked bags must weigh 40 lbs or less. This is 10 lbs lighter than most other airlines. Maximum dimensions must not exceed 62 linear inches (length + width + depth). Frontier ticket counters and bag drop lines are open 120 minutes before departure and close 60 minutes before departure. Missing this window by even a minute means you cannot check your bag. I have seen times when the line was longer than the hour you had to check your bag.
No meals, no snacks beyond purchase, no charging ports. Eat before you board, and charge up your stuff. These are minor inconveniences once you know them going in, frustrating if you don’t. Frontier offers a Fly Bar with snacks for sale. A glass of bottled water is complimentary.
Frontier involuntarily bumps more passengers than any other U.S. airline, and it isn’t close. DOT data puts Frontier at 2.25 involuntary bumps per 10,000 passengers in 2024, versus 0.67 for second-place American. That gap is not a rounding error. Elite Diamond status does offer some insulation; airlines typically prioritize frequent fliers when deciding who stays on the plane, but it’s not a guarantee, and it’s something every Frontier flier should know going in. If you’re flying on a GoWild! pass you are particularly subject to being bumped, as Frontier must compensate you at a multiple of what you paid for your ticket. At $.01, you’re the cheapest option for them.
On-time performance is poor. Frontier tied with American for the worst on-time arrival rate among major U.S. carriers in 2024. If a connection or a hard commitment is on the other end of the flight, build in a buffer or fly something else.
In 2024, I flew 38 flights on Frontier and experienced 15 hours of delays. Last year, there were 18 flights with a total of 6 hours of delays. So far this year, I’ve flown on Frontier 13 times and have experienced 4 hours of delays.
Thin operational margins when things go wrong. Frontier runs a lean fleet with limited spare aircraft. When a mechanical issue or crew problem hits, the recovery window is narrow. A delay can cascade into a cancellation, with few good options on the next flight out, particularly on routes where Frontier operates only a few times a week.
No interline agreements with other carriers. If Frontier significantly delays or cancels your flight, they will not put you on another airline. You’re rebooked on the next available Frontier flight, or you’re on your own. On a route served daily, that might mean a few hours. On a less-frequent route, it could mean the next day, or more. This is the tradeoff that matters most for time-sensitive travel.
GoWild! booking flexibility is constrained by design. Domestic flights open the day before departure. That works well for spontaneous trips and weekend travel. Unless there is an advance-booking window promotion in place, it doesn’t work for anyone who needs certainty more than a few days out. Blackout dates apply around major holidays.
The status match is not a permanent solution. The $599 I paid in December 2023 covered that match window through 2024. Renewing Diamond requires earning 100,000 Elite Status Points in a calendar year through flying and spending, a meaningful number. Most people would likely be fine at the Elite Platinum level (see below). As of today, 55,369 status points are on the board for this cycle. I have enough flights already booked to keep Diamond status through 2027. Watch for new match windows at StatusMatch.com and frontierstatusmatch.com if you want to restart the clock.
How to Build This Setup Today
1. Get Hilton Gold status. The Amex Platinum ($895/year) includes it upon enrollment. If you already hold the card, make sure the status is activated. Amex Gold cardholders can add it too via select enrollment offers. Hilton Honors Gold is also achievable through co-branded Hilton credit cards.
2. Watch for Frontier status match windows. Frontier runs these through its own microsite at frontierstatusmatch.com. Fees vary; the 2023 Diamond match ran $599, but other windows have priced Diamond at $199-$299. Hotel Gold status typically matches Frontier’s 50K (Elite Platinum) tier. Airline status at a high enough tier can reach Diamond. Check what’s available when a match window opens and run your math based on how often you (might) fly Frontier routes.
3. Add the GoWild! pass. Watch for introductory pricing. The 2026-2027 pass launched at $349 in November 2025. From May 13, 2026, through May 30, 2026, Discount Den members could purchase a GoWild 2026–27 Annual Pass for $399. The current price is $599 for travel through April 30, 2027.
4. Add the Barclays Frontier World Mastercard. It waives award redemption fees, prevents miles from expiring, and enables Family Pooling. If you’re sitting on a six-figure FrontierMiles balance, the card protects that investment.
5. Fly routes from focus cities. The nonstop network from Dallas is where the combination pays out most reliably. Check Frontier’s current route map or their site map (city-to-city flights) against your actual travel patterns before committing.
The Points and Miles Angle
Frontier isn’t a points transfer partner in any major transferable-points ecosystem, which is why it doesn’t appear in the standard points-maximization playbook. But the system above is built entirely on points-and-miles infrastructure: Amex Platinum status benefits flow into a Hilton status match, which flows into Frontier Platinum, which I upgraded to Diamond, which unlocks a free Discount Den membership, which unlocks GoWild! pass discounts, which turn into dozens of front-row flights for effectively the cost of taxes. The Barclays card keeps 150k accumulated miles from expiring and waives the fees to spend them.
That’s a five-layer status arbitrage chain that most travelers leave on the table because Frontier isn’t glamorous. The glamorous answer is business class to Europe on points. But for the 20 weekend trips a year when you’re going nonstop from DFW to Orlando, Denver, or Las Vegas, sitting in row 2 with an empty seat next to you on a pass that cost me $349 is a very good answer, too.
FAQ
Can I use my Amex Platinum Hilton Gold status to match to Frontier Diamond?
Hilton Gold status, including the version that comes complimentary with the Amex Platinum, can be used to apply for a Frontier status match. However, hotel status matches typically land at Frontier’s 50K (Elite Platinum) tier, not Diamond. Diamond matches have historically required airline elite status. The exact tier you receive depends on which match window is active and Frontier’s current terms. Check StatusMatch.com or frontierstatusmatch.com when a window opens for current tier mapping.
How does the Frontier GoWild! pass work with status benefits?
GoWild! gives you access to flights for a $0.01 base fare plus taxes. Your Diamond status benefits, UpFront Plus upgrade at check-in, free carry-on, priority boarding, apply on GoWild! flights. You do not earn Elite Status Points on GoWild! bookings, but the onboard experience is the same.
Is Frontier’s UpFront Plus actually worth it without Diamond status?
Without status, UpFront Plus seats are purchasable à la carte, typically priced around $49- $99 per segment. For a family of four on a round trip, the math deteriorates quickly. The seat is most valuable as a Diamond benefit, where it applies to your whole travel party at check-in, free of charge.
How many flights can you actually take on a GoWild! Annual Pass?
There’s no stated cap. The limitation is availability, GoWild! seats are last-seat inventory, so flights fill quickly after the booking window opens the day before departure. Heavy users report taking 50+ flights per year. The pass works best for travelers with schedule flexibility and access to a Frontier focus city.
What’s the best way to search for GoWild! flights without going insane?
SearchGWP.com. Frontier’s native search requires a destination and a date to be entered one at a time. SearchGWP searches up to 400 flights in under 10 seconds and provides all GoWild! and miles-priced flights out of your airport in one view, with seat counts, nonstop filters, and direct links to book on Frontier. It’s also currently the only tool that shows Frontier’s discounted mile redemption prices alongside GoWild! availability. Free trial at searchgwp.com; app available on iOS and Android.
Does Frontier fly internationally on the GoWild! pass?
Yes, with a longer booking window. International GoWild! bookings open 10 days before departure rather than one day out. Frontier’s international network from DFW includes select Caribbean and Latin American destinations.
Learn + Earn + Burn + Churn
Discover more from Pointstopia
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Barclays Frontier Mastercard Discount Den Elite Status Frontier Airlines FrontierMiles GoWild Pass Points And Miles Status Match UpFront Plus