It is no surprise that award search tools are an essential resource for serious point chasing travelers, and that's where Roame comes in.Travel has been slowly developing one of the more extensive platforms out there. Its new offering is a significant one, “EVA Air Infinity MileageLands”, the loyalty program of Taiwan's flag carrier and member of Star Alliance.

It's not just an airline being added to a drop down menu, it's more than that. In fact, it's actually an undeniable fact about EVA's own loyalty program that searching through their native availability can be especially rewarding; EVA gets a significant amount of the inventory for the best awards for its Infinity MileageLands members and partner programs get a much smaller amount. For travelers who know their destination, what's practically possible is altered when Roame surfaces that space from a single search interface.

EVA Air is among the Airlines Listed in the Roame Now Shows

Currently, the EVA Air integration is available for all user tiers for EVA Air's nonstop and connecting flights. There are a couple of practical points to keep in mind before you begin your search.

At present, the platform shows availability for one passenger at a time on EVA Air flights.Please note that the platform currently only shows availability for 1 passenger on EVA Air routes. For bookings of two or more people, you must check multi-seat availability directly in Infinity MileageLands before transferring points, as Roame's single-passenger display does not provide information about the availability of multiple seats on the same flight.

The feature is now live for every Roame user, but the site has announced that search function for EVA Air will be later limited to Pro users. If you would like to avoid a subscription, it is a shrewd idea to try using this in the initial open access period, while it is available for free.

The Best Ways to Actually Use EVA Air Miles

But the more poignant question is how much are the EVA Air Infinity MileageLands miles worth once you have them? There are a number of truly redeeming features to the program, and some are just about as good as other programs some are really exceptional.

For those who fly to Asia, EVA offers its business class to Taiwan on offer at 75,000 miles one way, while Vietnam is 80,000 miles. EVA's business class product is solid and the airline has developed a decent reputation for service quality and cabin standard especially on the long-distance transpacific lines.

The program is especially interesting for North American travelers because of the partner redemption opportunities:

• Turkish Airlines business class to Europe: 65,000 miles one-way from the U.S. and fuel surcharges in the ballpark of $310 a lot more reserved than a lot of European carriers. The per-mile cost of the product is running at a few cents per mile, against cash rates frequently over $3,300, a sign of a good product and good inflight dining.
• The United Polaris service from West Coast to Newark features one of the cleanest domestic premium cabins via any partner program, a lie flat seat, real bedding, and a couple of minimal taxes.
• To Warsaw: 65,000 miles to Europe with surcharges of nearly $285 with nonstop flights from several U.S. airports.
• South America economy sweet spot: EVA does not differentiate between countries in South America, so a flight from the U.S. to Buenos Aires, or Santiago, is 30,000 miles one-way in economy a strong value on a long-haul flight where cash fares can significantly increase.

How to Accumulate Infinity MileageLands Miles

EVA Air's transfer partner ecosystem is smaller than that of programs such as Amex Membership Rewards or Chase Ultimate Rewards, but it offers viable options for transferring points based on your existing points currencies. The rates and current transfers for the partners are:

• Cite ThankYou Points: Transfer 1 for 1 the most effective choice if you have Citi cards.
• Capital One Miles: Transfer at 4:3 slightly less effective, but available for cardholders of the Capital One Venture or X card.
• Top-ups are 5% at HSBC Rewards.
• Please note: Barclays Arrival Miles are transferable at 7:5.
• Hilton Honors: Transfer at 10:1 the least efficient; only use for topping off accounts, not to build up primary points.

Of all the choices, Citi ThankYou points are the easiest to use to earn Infinity MileageLands miles. If you have been collecting ThankYou points on the Citi Strata Premier or other ThankYou-accumulating products, then the time to consider EVA Air might be now.

The balance is also built by flying on EVA Air or the other Star Alliance airlines (with the Infinity MileageLands number stamped on their tickets). EVA's own co-branded card products also contribute to the balance, if available.

The Native Availability Advantage is an issue that is important

It is important to note the reason of Roame's EVA Air addition being more useful than an additional partner program on a search tool. As with many airlines, the availability of awards at the lowest rate to the airline's program is announced early, and the availability of awards in the partner program (for example, United MileagePlus) can be limited either to the final days of the booking period or not be available at all on some routes and dates.

The old method of looking for EVA Air award space via partner programs often resulted in booking a smaller version of the supply. Viewing the full view of space from within Infinity MileageLands itself demonstrates the value of native search, which would never be found in a partner program search. For trips such as the U.S. to Japan, in which EVA Air's connections via Taipei are popular, that visibility difference can be the difference between having award space and having none.

The Pro Tier Question

Don't be afraid to use the open access window to search Roame while using EVA Air. If the capability is to be made available after the Pro subscription, as Roame has confirmed it will be, travelers who wish to continue to check Infinity MileageLands availability will have to pay for their membership. The benefits of Roame Pro are dependent on the number of programs being researched, how often, but for users that search regularly on the platform across multiple currencies and multiple itineraries, it's a pretty quick return on investment.

The Bottom Line

Roame.Travel has introduced EVA Air Infinity MileageLands to its award search platform, which is now available to all travelers on both nonstop and one-stop EVA Air-operated flights. The integration is especially useful because EVA Air offers much more award space to its own program than to other partner programs, which translates into Roame's home search surfaces being available that wouldn't be in most of the other tools. 

Some redemption highlights are Turkish Airlines business class to Europe at 65,000 miles with small surcharges, United Polaris economy flights within the United States at 29,000 miles, LOT Polish economy flights to Warsaw at 65,000 miles, and South America economy flights at 30,000 miles one-way. Citi ThankYou Points provide the best 1:1 transfer rate to Infinity MileageLands. The search feature in EVA Air will be coming to Roame's Pro tier in future, so it is better to avail of search feature at present than later.