Airport Lounge Visits
I’ve long-professed my affinity for airport clubs. I’m keen on swinging by any lounge at least once, often in chunks. Quality can vary, but I’d rather rely on my own airport lounge visits than someone else’s reviews (yes, I acknowledge this irony). This pursuit is more intriguing because so many new options have just opened, are on the horizon, or both. And so then, I have plans for the lounges I will and will not visit in the foreseeable future. Here’s where I will and won’t be this year and why.
Hello
American Airlines
Once again, and like many of you, I reached Executive Platinum status with the AAdvantage program during the previous qualification year. I still hold a Citi AA Executive authorized user card, and I plan to visit plenty of Admirals Club – of various quality – as I’m traveling on AA, anyway. Perhaps the surest thing here is a return to maybe my favorite Admirals Club at DCA. Another predictable destination are more AA locations within that airport, for updated comparisons more than anything else. We’re going through DFW soon, and checking in on their offerings is a no-brainer for us.
It would be nice to visit to the Chelsea or Soho lounges at JFK again before another Flagship First transcontinental flight. But judging by current award prices, it probably won’t. I’ll keep looking, though.
Delta
I plan to visit a variety of Sky Clubs, maybe at a slower clip than American. Indeed, we have plenty of Amex cards offering access. But unreasonable award rates may keep us away from Delta (and their clubs) more than any access limitations – though not always. Delta’s the clear lounge leader among the big three domestic airlines. They have a superior product, and they know it.
So I’ll splurge on Delta here and there – whether it’s a more expensive award to get into a Sky Club, or bigger. I recently booked Delta One, with more bookings on the way, and I look forward to visiting a few of those lounges just as much, or more, than the flights themselves.
United
I’m confident this is the year I buy a United Club membership. I have buckets of Travel Bank funds, some closer to expiration. I’ll be using this for United flights, and since I’ll be with the airline, anyway, I’ll also use these funds for a membership. United leadership has intimated that club membership changes may be on the way, so I’ll have to keep my eyes peeled on how this may affect my plans.
Sapphire
When it comes to bank clubs, the Sapphire lounges come out well ahead of all others, in my view. And Chase is actively addressing the biggest issue with their version – the limited footprint. They’ve recently opened new locations in San Diego and Philadelphia, now offering nine options. (The terrace location in Austin is closing in mid-March.) A LAS location opens later this year, and LAX beyond. My sole Sapphire visit so far was an outstanding one at LGA just after opening. I’ll be focusing on more east coast locations this year. Based on how other plans develop, I may visit SAN or LAS.
Priority Pass
Overall, I feel like Priority Pass lounge options get a bad rap. Yes, many underwhelming options exist, but so do many hidden gems. I’m intentionally not sharing the latter here. I plan to foucs on finding more this year. I don’t recall ever having significant issues accessing Priority Pass lounges. Perhaps that lack of flash leads to lack of a queue. That’s fine with me; I consider it a success if just a third of the lounges are worth visiting again.
Goodbye
Centurion
VFTW recently wrote a nice piece about the fall of Centurion, putting into words what many of us already thought. I’ve had one outstanding (ATL) and a few just-okay (CLT) Centurion visits in the last five years or so. Pretty much all others have been of the get-me-out-of-here-ASAP variety. And then there’s the DEN location, where employees seemingly went out of their way to make me feel particularly unwelcome.
Even still, those positive and mediocre visits come with asterisks. Those ATL and CLT locations have been closed (and subsequently reopened) due to health violations. Some limitations are minor but still annoying. I discover a broken coffee machine at seemingly every Centurion Lounge I visit. And the Centurion requiring me to ask a bartender for a Diet Coke is silly.
And perhaps this behavior has rubbed off on the patrons. I’ve found poor guest behavior more widespread here than any other lounge network I’ve visited.
Capital One
Perhaps the most noticeable negative from my recent Capital One shutdown is that my Venture X authorized user card was cancelled, meaning I can no longer visit Capital One Lounges on my own. (No, I won’t fork over $90 to enter.) My Capital One Lounge experience started out great at DFW, with mostly disappointments since. And I still don’t know what to think of the Landing at Washington National.
Regardless, I may not have had more visits, anyway, because they hardly exist. After their first opening in DFW in 2021, Capital One has averaged less than one new lounge per year since. Only four Capital One Lounges currently exist, one being the abbreviated Landing version.
Pretty Much Anything in CLT
I do everything I can to avoid CLT. Living on the east coast with AA Executive Platinum status, this can be inconvenient. I sometimes choose less efficient options just to avoid what I consider our nation’s worst hub. Lounge options certainly don’t entice me to return.
As I previously mentioned, I’ve had a few okay Centurion CLT visits, but the health violations give me pause on future visits. The Admirals Club options here are atrocious, though. A dusty remnant of the US Airways days, American has done very little to refresh CLT’s larger Admirals Club at the intersection of Concourses C and D. When I’ve visited, most every seat in this filing-cabinet-of-a-lounge is occupied, the majority of patrons appearing unhappy. This lounge is where I first noticed those tacky vending machines in certain Admirals Clubs. Perhaps those are gone, though, as I noticed DCA has removed one – not that I plan to return to this CLT location to confirm. I preferred the Concourse B Admirals Club even with its tight confines, but that’s not saying much. Captain Obvious here says both of these options were beyond practicality years ago. Even worse, AA doesn’t seem to care.
Airport Lounge Visits – Conclusion
I have a few other lounge-related plans this year which I plan to write about in the future. And I look forward to a few surprises along the way, as well. The state of airport lounges is definitely a mixed bag. But attentive points and travel hobbyists who enjoy airport lounge visits can generally come out ahead, in my view. And while I’ve focused on domestic options in this article, we have access to more attractive international lounge options, of course.
When it comes to airport lounge visits, what plans do you have this year along the way to your destination?
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Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.
In general, I’ve found airline-operated lounges to be better than other lounges. And, I’m fortunate enough to have access to them. I’ve only needed to use a Priority Pass lounge once in the past two or so years and it was fine. Centurion lounges are people say and are never a consideration.