Award flight · one-way
Hyderabad → Delhi on points: 6 options, and the guesswork is finally off the board. Air India's domestic chart prices the PAIR, not the heading — the full April-2026 pull lists each city pair exactly once — so the cells read first-hand for Delhi → Hyderabad are this direction's cells too: 5,000 in economy, 20,000 up front, both now verified rather than inferred. Air India owns this trunk on mainline metal, both airport tables say so and Air India Express does not touch the pair, so Aeroplan bands the identical seat off 786 miles at 7,500 and 12,500. In rupees the split is clean: ₹4,000 against ₹7,500 in the back, ₹16,000 against ₹12,500 in front. Take the house chart behind the curtain and Toronto in front of it. 3 rows are first-hand chart reads.
The play · economy
Which card mints this?
+7 more ways in — the full funnel, ratios and ₹/mile side by side →
One of your cards is in those 7 — see it in the funnel →
| Program | Metal / routing | Points | Surcharge | All-in ₹ | vs play |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Air Canada Aeroplan the play | Star Alliance partner metal, Aeroplan distance-band award (1,266 km) — or Air India nonstop | 7,500 | — | ₹7,500 | the play |
| Air India Maharaja Points | Air India mainline nonstop (Star Alliance), Value tier — Air India Express does not fly this pair | ~5,000 est. | — | ₹4,000 | 0.5× |
| IndiGo BluChip | IndiGo nonstop — BluChip, dynamic (revenue-priced) | ~10,400 est. | — | ₹5,200 | 0.7× |
The play · business
Which card mints this?
+7 more ways in — the full funnel, ratios and ₹/mile side by side →
One of your cards is in those 7 — see it in the funnel →
| Program | Metal / routing | Points | Surcharge | All-in ₹ | vs play |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Air Canada Aeroplan the play | Star Alliance partner metal, Aeroplan distance-band award (1,266 km) — or Air India nonstop | 12,500 | — | ₹12,500 | the play |
| Air India Maharaja Points | Air India mainline nonstop (Star Alliance), Value tier — Air India Express has no business cabin and does not fly this pair anyway | ~20,000 est. | — | ₹16,000 | 1.3× |
The play · first
Which card mints this?
+7 more ways in — the full funnel, ratios and ₹/mile side by side →
One of your cards is in those 7 — see it in the funnel →
| Program | Metal / routing | Points | Surcharge | All-in ₹ | vs play |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Air Canada Aeroplan the play | Star Alliance partner metal, Aeroplan distance-band award (1,266 km) — or Air India nonstop | 25,000 | — | ₹25,000 | the play |
All-in ₹ = points × the program's house value (valuation index) + the sourced one-way surcharge; a dash means the carrier doesn't publish it and the ranking counts it ₹0 — the row's note carries the caveat. That surcharge is the airline's own cash charge on an award — YQ, as the notes below call it — and it is not the fuel-surcharge waiver your credit card advertises: that one hands back a hundred rupees or two at a petrol pump, this one runs to tens of thousands and decides whether the award is worth taking at all. “Dynamic” and estimated (~… est.) rows never compete for the play — the crown is always a verified, bookable price. Feed-ins come from the same transfer data as the optimizer, multi-hop chains included.
Chart-priced, not live seats. These prices are read off each programme’s published award chart and valued at our own house ₹/point. 37% of the 39,855 priced options on the board are stated estimates for programmes that publish no chart; they are marked ~ est. and never crowned the play. Nobody here can see whether a seat exists on your date — confirm the space with the programme before you transfer. Points that leave your issuer do not come back.
The cash on top of the miles. Air India Maharaja Points makes you liable for one if the operating airline levies it, without saying whether it does. Air Canada Aeroplan states it adds none on its own metal. Government taxes and airport charges are payable in every case. Almost no programme publishes the amount, so the desk carries each one’s policy in its own words — on its programme hub — rather than a number nobody published. 1 other programme priced here publishes nothing the desk could read.
Air India Star Alliance
Aeroplan prices Star partner awards by total distance FLOWN. This row is the direct great-circle band; a connecting routing that flies farther can land in the next band up. A valid Star routing (nonstop or via a Star hub within the maximum permitted mileage) is assumed.
Feed it: 3,750 Axis EDGE Miles (1:2) · 7,500 SBI Travel Credits (1:1) · 18,750 Axis EDGE Reward Points (5:2)
Air India Star Alliance
Verified 2026-08-08 against the full April-2026 domestic economy table, which prints the pair once and direction-blind — "DEL,HYD, old 5,000, new 5,000–13,500". Held flat through an overhaul that cut 110 other economy routes. This row carried an estimate for months only because the partial tables the trade press reprinted skip the pair. Both airport tables agree on the metal: Hyderabad lists Delhi under Air India mainline alongside Mumbai and Tirupati, and files Bengaluru and Goa under Air India Express instead.
Estimate Air India publishes no award chart. Its own Points Calculator states that “Fares indicated above are dependent on the time of booking and seat availability”, and Maharaja Club prices every award either as a Value fare (the discounted rate for booking well in advance) or as a higher Prime fare closer to departure. This number is the Value-fare floor as sampled after the April-2026 repricing — not a published chart cell: Value space is not always available on a given flight, and the same seat prices higher once it is gone. Pricing model re-verified against Air India’s Maharaja Club T&C and Points Calculator on 2026-08-09.
Feed it: 5,000 IndusInd Reward Points (1:1) · 2,500 Axis EDGE Miles (1:2) · 5,000 ICICI Reward Points (1:1)
IndiGo
IndiGo BluChip has no award chart at all — redemptions track the live fare at a dynamic ₹0.40–0.60 per BluChip, minimum 500 points, taxes cash-only, own metal only with no partners. It is a rupee offset wearing points clothing, not a chart price. Mirrored from del-hyd: the chart cell is the same in either direction, so 10,400 is the del-hyd number read back the other way — an estimate until this direction is re-read, and never crowned THE PLAY.
Estimate Reverse of del-hyd — IndiGo BluChip prices the zone pair or the distance band, not the direction, so this mirrors the del-hyd economy cell one-for-one; the desk has not separately re-read the chart for this direction. IndiGo BluChip is revenue-linked ~Rs0.50/pt; ~= typical one-way IndiGo economy fare / Rs0.50 for ~786 mi - a rupee offset that moves 1:1 with the live fare. Own-metal only, no partners.
Feed it: 15,600 HSBC Reward Points (1.5:1 via Accor Live Limitless (ALL)) · 52,000 Axis EDGE Reward Points (5:1) · 31,200 HDFC Reward Points (3:1 via Accor Live Limitless (ALL))
Air India Star Alliance
Aeroplan prices Star partner awards by total distance FLOWN. This row is the direct great-circle band; a connecting routing that flies farther can land in the next band up. A valid Star routing (nonstop or via a Star hub within the maximum permitted mileage) is assumed.
Feed it: 6,250 Axis EDGE Miles (1:2) · 12,500 SBI Travel Credits (1:1) · 31,250 Axis EDGE Reward Points (5:2)
Air India Star Alliance
New row, 2026-08-08. The full domestic business table prints "DEL,HYD, old 25,000, new 20,000–23,000", a 20% cut, and the chart lists the pair once for both headings. 20,000 is the Value cell and the number that ships; 23,000 is the band ceiling that has already put a wrong price on three other corridors on this desk. ₹16,000 at the ₹0.80 house value for two and a quarter hours in a narrowbody recliner, against Aeroplan's 12,500 points at ₹1.00 — the front cabin stays Toronto's.
Estimate Air India publishes no award chart. Its own Points Calculator states that “Fares indicated above are dependent on the time of booking and seat availability”, and Maharaja Club prices every award either as a Value fare (the discounted rate for booking well in advance) or as a higher Prime fare closer to departure. This number is the Value-fare floor as sampled after the April-2026 repricing — not a published chart cell: Value space is not always available on a given flight, and the same seat prices higher once it is gone. Pricing model re-verified against Air India’s Maharaja Club T&C and Points Calculator on 2026-08-09.
Feed it: 20,000 IndusInd Reward Points (1:1) · 10,000 Axis EDGE Miles (1:2) · 20,000 ICICI Reward Points (1:1)
Air India Star Alliance
Aeroplan prices Star partner awards by total distance FLOWN. This row is the direct great-circle band; a connecting routing that flies farther can land in the next band up. A valid Star routing (nonstop or via a Star hub within the maximum permitted mileage) is assumed.
Feed it: 12,500 Axis EDGE Miles (1:2) · 25,000 SBI Travel Credits (1:1) · 62,500 Axis EDGE Reward Points (5:2)
Flying back? Delhi to Hyderabad on points (DEL–HYD). Or take the whole region: every corridor we price into South Asia — 380 of them. Or pick any two hubs — 2,450 corridors priced.