Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Malaysia Airlines to launch flights to Paris, redeemable with Avios

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Malaysia Airlines will restart flights between Paris and Kuala Lumpur next year after a nine year gap.

Paris will become only the second European destination for the airline, behind London.

It turns out that Paris CDG has more people flying to Kuala Lumpur than any other mainland European airport, and there are no direct options at present.

Malaysia Airlines to launch flights to Paris

Paris is also seen as a good airport to pick up connecting traffic from Eastern Europe and North Africa and does not have the slot constraints of Amsterdam.

Flights will operate daily from 29th March 2025 using an A350-900, image below.

Rhys reviewed Malaysia Airlines business class on the A350-900 here if you want to see what you will get.

The reason we mention this is that you can redeem Avios on Malaysia Airlines flights because the airline is a member of the oneworld airline alliance. You can also earn Avios and British Airways Executive Club tier points.

If you would need to connect in London from the UK regions to fly to Kuala Lumpur, going via Paris is now another option for you.

You can check out timings and prices for cash on the Malaysia Airlines website here.


best credit card to use when buying flights

How to maximise your miles when paying for flights (June 2025)

Some UK credit cards offer special bonuses when used for buying flights. If you spend a lot on airline tickets, using one of these cards could sharply increase the credit card points you earn.

Booking flights on any airline?

The American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Credit Card earns double points (2 Membership Rewards points per £1) when used to buy flights directly from an airline website.

The card comes with a sign-up bonus of 20,000 Membership Rewards points. These would convert to 20,000 Avios or various other airline or hotel programmes. The standard earning rate is 1 point per £1.

You can apply here.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Credit Card

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

Buying flights on British Airways?

The British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card earns double Avios (3 Avios per £1) when used at ba.com.

The card comes with a sign-up bonus of 30,000 Avios. The standard earning rate is 1.5 Avios per £1.

You do not earn bonus Avios if you pay for BA flights on the free British Airways American Express Credit Card or either of the Barclaycard Avios Mastercards.

You can apply here.

British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card

30,000 Avios and the famous annual Companion Voucher voucher Read our full review

Buying flights on Virgin Atlantic?

Both the free Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard and the annual fee Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard earn double Virgin Points when used at fly.virgin.com.

This means 1.5 Virgin Points per £1 on the free card and 3 Virgin Points per £1 on the paid card.

There is a sign-up bonus of 3,000 Virgin Points on the free card and 18,000 Virgin Points on the paid card.

You can apply for either of the cards here.

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

3,000 bonus points, no fee and 1 point for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Comments (30)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • BBbetter says:

    Talking about brands, I don’t understand how managements ignore the chance to rebrand and move on.
    Same with Air India. The new owners had a chance to use the Vistara brand they painstakingly built from the scratch and had everything a modern airline needed. All of that was dumped in favour of ‘refreshing’ the old air India brand.

  • The Savage Squirrel says:

    From the typical HfP reader’s point of view (i.e. departing Paris), the flights commence on the 30th. This is a very important point because I’m hoping to travel eastwards on the 29th, so this nearly worked for me but not quite 😀 😀

  • t0m says:

    The Art’otel web site seems to use the standard Radisson booking engine – so I’m thinking these offers probably will stack?

  • G says:

    MH Avios availability is notoriously sparse however.

    • LittleNick says:

      Yes, not a single reward seat available to Oneworld partners on LHR-KUL in any cabin for the next year when I checked some weeks ago, this may have changed since though. I doubt MH will release much award availability for CDG-KUL either

  • Pam says:

    Be very careful when booking Economy on Malaysia Airlines as they don’t earn any Avios (Q code). The BA website is very misleading as says which codes collect points but doesn’t mention those that don’t.

  • David S says:

    Inter Malaysia flights with MAS are almost impossible to use Avios to book and if you are flying using cash then only a J fare will get you any Avios or Tier Points. KL has nice lounges however and I’m using MAS for next years Tier point run. 40 Tier points each way for PEN to LGW for £75 is much better that throwing money at BA. Which got me thinking as to what other non BA options there are for Tier point runs and whether to use a VPN for bookings?

  • May Lim says:

    1. Malaysia Airlines starts first Kuala Lumpur to Paris flight from 22nd March 2025

    2. A good number of Malaysians especially from the elite government colleges under scholarship take French as their second or third language

    3. Many Malaysia Airlines engineers who can & are authorised to sign off on the repairs & maintenance records have joined rivals who are allowed to operate repairs & maintenance in Kuala Lumpur due to higher pay & golden handcuffs.

  • Aston100 says:

    I decided to book Bali to Paris.
    Cost £230 pp in economy.
    Paid an additional £41 pp to make the booking fully refundable / flexible.
    For the longhaul sector, I paid an additional £33 pp for row 26 window side where they have a pair of seats in the exit row with a huge amount of space in front.
    As the longhaul sector is an overnight flight with a 23:40 departure time from Kuala Lumpur I’m hoping there won’t be the usual crowd of people socialising in that area in front of my seats as often happens on daytime flights.

    From Paris CDG, I’m looking at paying the equivalent of about £65 pp (Avios and cash) for the short hop to London on BA.

    In theory, Malaysia Airlines should through check my luggage from Bali DPS all the way to Heathrow.

    I understand the base £230 price is promotional due to the launch of this route.

    Overall, approx £369 one way per person, fully flexible, 35kg luggage, decent seats (for economy on the long haul). Priority check-in and boarding for the two MAS flights.

    Very happy.

    • Aston100 says:

      Sorry, meant that the £369 pp is the grand total from Bali to London, with all the listed extras added on.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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