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American Airlines’ best Business and First Class are both found on the 777-300ER, its newest international plane.

The 777-300ER features fully flat beds in Business Class and First Class, plus a walk up bar on board for the folks up front. So far the plane is flying 1-2 frequencies a day on some of American Airlines’ routes to London and Sao Paulo.

The plane will also fly Miami to Sao Paulo from November 6 to December 1 of this year.

American Airlines and US Airways’ award charts are the cheapest around at the moment, so it’s a great deal to get a new and world-class product like American Airlines has put on its 777-300ERs for 50k miles each way in Business Class to Europe or Brazil or 62,500 miles in First Class.

• How is award space in Business Class and First Class from Miami to Sao Paulo while the 777-300ER takes over one frequency?
• How is award space in Business Class and First Class on the other 777-300ER routes?

Miami to Sao Paulo

According to airlineroute.net, the daily frequency from November 6 to December 1, 2014 is:

• AA929 Miami 9:40 PM – 9:15 AM +1 Sao Paulo
• AA906 Sao Paulo 10:40 PM – 4:13 AM +1 Miami

Neither that frequency nor any other American Airline direct flight from Miami to Sao Paulo has award space in Business Class or First Class from November 6 to December 1.

There is space in economy. There is space on American’s partner TAM in Business Class (search on ba.com, book by calling American). There may be space as the date approaches as American Airlines opens some last minute award space.

Other 777-300ER Routes

Award space on American’s flagship aircraft in Business Class and First Class is bleak.

There is some space this week between Sao Paulo and Dallas in First Class for 62,500 miles. Note that the aircraft is listed as “77W” on aa.com.

There is also space on the route in both directions between Dallas and Sao Paulo on Tuesday in June, July, and August 2015.

I didn’t find award space on the 777-300ER in Business or First Class on any other American Airlines route. There probably is some–I didn’t search every route every day–but it is very rare.

If you search, you’ll get a lot of false positives that you need to sift through. For instance, I searched Dallas to London, and I found good award space this winter. Unfortunately every day I checked was an American Airlines flight not operated by the 777-300ER (“777” is the inferior 777-200)…

…or a British Airways flight (which means paying big fuel surcharges.)

I notice that many airlines “protect” their newest, best products from Saver award redemptions. Hopefully as American gets more 777-300ERs, the award space on its flights will improve in Business Class and First Class.

As I like to mention when discussing a cheap award on the US Airways chart, I remind everyone that we know that the US Airways® Premier World MasterCard® will no longer be offered as soon as the US Airways and American Airlines frequent flyer programs integrate, some time in early 2015. That means that the chance to earn 40,000 bonus miles after first purchase will disappear soon. Check out all the places you can go with just the sign up bonus.