Ten surprising airlines you can use your Qantas points with

Qatar Airways

Perhaps the most useful Oneworld alliance partner is Qatar Airways, however. The Doha-based airline flies out of five Australian cities, offering handy connections to dozens of cities across the Middle East, Europe and Africa.

Whisper it, but Qatar Airways arguably offers the highest quality product of all the Qantas partners, too. See qatarairways.com

LATAM

Aside from the solitary Sydney to Santiago route, Qantas is pretty much useless for South America. Divert your points to LATAM instead, and there’s also a direct flight from Melbourne, plus connections all over the continent from the Chilean capital.

If hopping around South America, prices for inter-country flights can be annoyingly expensive, so using points for LATAM flights from Lima to Bogota or Rio to Buenos Aires can end up an excellent investment. See latamairlines.com

Alaska Airlines

It’s tempting to disregard Alaska Airlines based on the name alone. If you’re not going to Alaska, why bother? Well, the name frankly needs changing, as Alaska Airlines is particularly good at connecting the western US, and its main base is in Seattle.

There are also several very useful routes going out of the Hawaiian Islands – and not just from Honolulu. See alaskaair.com

SriLankan Airlines

Among the smaller members of the Oneworld alliance, SriLankan Airlines nevertheless dips its toes into Australia, with direct flights from Colombo to Sydney and Melbourne.

Obviously, this is most useful if you want to explore Sri Lanka, but the connections to the Maldives and southern India are also worth knowing about if you want to avoid lengthier flight routes. See SriLankan.com

Royal Air Maroc

If looking at which Oneworld airline Australians are least likely to find themselves on, Royal Air Maroc is a worthy contender. If the intended destination is Morocco, then maybe the Dubai to Casablanca flight might come in useful.

There are also several flights between Morocco’s cities and Europe – particularly France. But for most of Africa, Qatar Airways or Emirates will get you there quicker from Australia. See royalairmaroc.com

Royal Jordanian

Perhaps even less likely, however, is Royal Jordanian. According to Oneworld, it’s the full member that services the fewest destinations – 45.

These include several European cities, plus the likes of Cairo, Beirut, Aqaba and Sharm El Sheikh. However, for Australians, the Gulf airlines are more likely to offer useful connections.

That said, the Amman to Bangkok route is potentially useful if booking multi-stop trips. See rj.com

Fiji Airways

For Qantas frequent flyers, there are a few restrictions on which Fiji Airways flights can be booked with points. Most Fijian domestic routes are out, barring those between Nadi, Suva and Labasa.

However, the international routes are fair game, which is potentially handy for getting to Fiji in the first place, and visiting lesser-known Pacific nations such as Kiribati, Tonga and Tuvalu.

Also useful are the connections between Fiji and Honolulu or the US West Coast. See fijiairways.com

WestJet

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Not part of any formal alliance, Canadian airline WestJet nevertheless has a codeshare agreement with Qantas.

Obviously, this is most useful for exploring Canada – WestJet has scores of routes from Vancouver which can be linked up with Qantas’ Sydney to Vancouver flights.

But WestJet also links Canada to a few European cities, plus plenty in the US and Caribbean. Again, the raft of flights from Hawaii is potentially useful for Aussies. See westjet.com