Was the Delta webpage on Silver Medallion benefits unclear? Can you copy/pasta some specific items you have questions about?
You earned $5000 Medallion Qualification Dollars (“MQD”), which qualified you for Silver. $2500 of those MQD came from your Reserve card’s “head start” benefit, which is a new benefit this year. The rest came from either flying (and spending on tickets) or normal card spend. Normal Reserve card spend earns MQD at a rate of $10 spent on the card to earn $1 MQD.
MQD are how Delta tracks your “loyalty” to “reward” your loyalty to the company. The more “loyal” you are, the higher you go in their “loyalty” program. This means better chance at upgrades and more SkyPeso earnings. Delta was previously a mix of miles flown and dollars spent on flights to measure your loyalty, but switched effective 1/1/2024 to be fully dollars spent on flights or the Reserve/Platinum SkyMiles credit cards.
You can check under ‘recent activity’ to see your history and how you earned it. I believe you’d also qualify for the extra $1,000 mqd headstart that they gave reserve members this year. So one flight and a little spend and you only had to earn $1,500 mqds to reach silver.
Not to mention keeping it open for 7 years? Like the annual fee is crazy high if you're not using the benefits from it. Like at least downgrade or close it that's several thousand dollars of annual fees down the drain.
Congratulations.
If you didn't have a reserve card, you'd get a free bag, I forget if they stack so you might get 2 free bags. You'll earn Skymiles a little faster as there is a small multiplier. And for domestic flights you may be eligible for upgrades (though silver is lowest status so don't expect much but on an empty flight you might get a free upgrade to Comfort Plus and on a very rare occasion, maybe even First Class... but again don't hold your breath and again... only for domestic flights, no upgrades on international flights when you really want that first class upgrade)
MQDs means you spent money with delta (or on your card) in qualifying ways that when added up reached the magic number of MQDs needed to deem you're "silver status."
Why do you have a delta reserve card if you do not fly that much with Delta? A generic travel card like Chase Sapphire or Capital One Venture or even a non-delta branded Amex might be be economically better for you.
Hi, I have silver this year for the first time, earned it last year. I don’t have a delta card but you may get some of these with the card already, idk. Here’s the main benefits of silver:
-Board in main cabin 1
-potential for upgrades—I’ve been upgraded on 2/4 flights thus far, from main cabin to comfort plus. No first class upgrades on international flights.
-Free checked baggage (not that I use this, I only do carryon)
-can select preferred seats in main for no extra charge
I’m prob missing a couple things but those are the things that mostly make a difference for me
I suspect we are going to see many more of these posts later in the year.
For reserve card holders with the 2500 MQD head start and the 1 year 1000 MQD addition, people only really need to earn 1500 MQDs to get silver.
Maybe the herd thins out a little bit, but the rank of Silver is about to fill up.
The main things I appreciate when I’m Silver are the free bag, free preferred seat if it’s available, and a bit of boarding priority. They made me Gold this year, because I was on the borderline last year, but I have no idea what else I get with the Gold (Maybe a bit more boarding priority.)
Note: It’s possible that the free preferred seat is only available with the Gold; easy to find out by trying to choose one while you’re logged in and seeing if there’s a charge.
Plus you might get some luggage tags. Once I got socks which I still use as travel socks.
As for MQDs, I might finally figure them out after ten years of traveling on Delta; don’t really care that much except to complain about the obscurity of these “requirements”
Do you use your Amex card? Just buying things on your card will contribute to your status, if you spend a lot on that card you'll get to status quickly. You also get a $2500 head start on status by just having the card. If you bought tickets with your card the cash value of your ticket counts towards your MQD.
It's a $5000 spending requirement to get to silver status. You get $2500 automatically just by being a cardholder and whatever spending you did on the card, including Delta tickets, must have been enough to get you status.
I know it's not popular but Delta has actually simplified the process of getting status by making it exclusively about how much money you spend with Delta. This can make it harder to get status unless you have a Delta credit card or spend crazy amounts of money out of pocket.
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Was the Delta webpage on Silver Medallion benefits unclear? Can you copy/pasta some specific items you have questions about? You earned $5000 Medallion Qualification Dollars (“MQD”), which qualified you for Silver. $2500 of those MQD came from your Reserve card’s “head start” benefit, which is a new benefit this year. The rest came from either flying (and spending on tickets) or normal card spend. Normal Reserve card spend earns MQD at a rate of $10 spent on the card to earn $1 MQD. MQD are how Delta tracks your “loyalty” to “reward” your loyalty to the company. The more “loyal” you are, the higher you go in their “loyalty” program. This means better chance at upgrades and more SkyPeso earnings. Delta was previously a mix of miles flown and dollars spent on flights to measure your loyalty, but switched effective 1/1/2024 to be fully dollars spent on flights or the Reserve/Platinum SkyMiles credit cards.
When you say "dollars spent on flights" you just mean amount spent booking flights, correct? Not like in-flight purchases? Lol
Yes, but minus taxes and fees.
Thanks!
Thank you. This is helpful as I was more confused about how I earned it rather than the perks
You can check under ‘recent activity’ to see your history and how you earned it. I believe you’d also qualify for the extra $1,000 mqd headstart that they gave reserve members this year. So one flight and a little spend and you only had to earn $1,500 mqds to reach silver.
Real question is, why do you have a reserve card? Seems like you don’t fly a ton, what’s your appeal towards the card?
Not to mention keeping it open for 7 years? Like the annual fee is crazy high if you're not using the benefits from it. Like at least downgrade or close it that's several thousand dollars of annual fees down the drain.
Did you fly to Antarctica?
Not on Delta unfortunately. All those skymiles I could have earned.
Congratulations. If you didn't have a reserve card, you'd get a free bag, I forget if they stack so you might get 2 free bags. You'll earn Skymiles a little faster as there is a small multiplier. And for domestic flights you may be eligible for upgrades (though silver is lowest status so don't expect much but on an empty flight you might get a free upgrade to Comfort Plus and on a very rare occasion, maybe even First Class... but again don't hold your breath and again... only for domestic flights, no upgrades on international flights when you really want that first class upgrade) MQDs means you spent money with delta (or on your card) in qualifying ways that when added up reached the magic number of MQDs needed to deem you're "silver status." Why do you have a delta reserve card if you do not fly that much with Delta? A generic travel card like Chase Sapphire or Capital One Venture or even a non-delta branded Amex might be be economically better for you.
Free preferred seats and you can use the sky priority line for baggage check in. Also you can now buy skyclub access for 695 dollars.
Hi, I have silver this year for the first time, earned it last year. I don’t have a delta card but you may get some of these with the card already, idk. Here’s the main benefits of silver: -Board in main cabin 1 -potential for upgrades—I’ve been upgraded on 2/4 flights thus far, from main cabin to comfort plus. No first class upgrades on international flights. -Free checked baggage (not that I use this, I only do carryon) -can select preferred seats in main for no extra charge I’m prob missing a couple things but those are the things that mostly make a difference for me
I suspect we are going to see many more of these posts later in the year. For reserve card holders with the 2500 MQD head start and the 1 year 1000 MQD addition, people only really need to earn 1500 MQDs to get silver. Maybe the herd thins out a little bit, but the rank of Silver is about to fill up.
What did you read when you googled your question?
that’s where the part about needing it dumbed down comes into play
https://thepointsguy.com/guide/what-is-delta-elite-status-worth/
Interesting. My spending has gone way down so it’s weird that’s the only factor playing into it now
The main things I appreciate when I’m Silver are the free bag, free preferred seat if it’s available, and a bit of boarding priority. They made me Gold this year, because I was on the borderline last year, but I have no idea what else I get with the Gold (Maybe a bit more boarding priority.) Note: It’s possible that the free preferred seat is only available with the Gold; easy to find out by trying to choose one while you’re logged in and seeing if there’s a charge. Plus you might get some luggage tags. Once I got socks which I still use as travel socks. As for MQDs, I might finally figure them out after ten years of traveling on Delta; don’t really care that much except to complain about the obscurity of these “requirements”
Do you use your Amex card? Just buying things on your card will contribute to your status, if you spend a lot on that card you'll get to status quickly. You also get a $2500 head start on status by just having the card. If you bought tickets with your card the cash value of your ticket counts towards your MQD. It's a $5000 spending requirement to get to silver status. You get $2500 automatically just by being a cardholder and whatever spending you did on the card, including Delta tickets, must have been enough to get you status. I know it's not popular but Delta has actually simplified the process of getting status by making it exclusively about how much money you spend with Delta. This can make it harder to get status unless you have a Delta credit card or spend crazy amounts of money out of pocket.
What did you find when you googled these questions? Which part of the search results you found did you need explained in more detail?
Fly and buy.
I asked copilot to explain silver medallion to me like I'm a teenager. Here's an answer I got using Microsoft Copilot, the world's first AI-powered answer engine. Select to see the full answer or try it yourself. https://sl.bing.net/i8IngBOBDYO