The United Flight Simulator Auction: What 600,000+ MileagePlus Miles Actually Get You

United MileagePlus runs a recurring auction that almost no one in the points community talks about publicly: full-motion flight simulator time at the United Flight Training Center in Denver. You get hands-on time in the flight deck of a full-motion Boeing and Airbus simulator — the same equipment United's line pilots train on — flying real scenarios from takeoff to landing.

It is also getting expensive fast. We track every MileagePlus Exclusives listing on PointAuctions.com, and the two 2026 editions closed at a verified 885,000 miles (April, for a June session, on just 6 bids) and a verified 625,000 miles after 68 bids (May, for a July session). Whether that's worth it depends on a calculation most bidders never run honestly. Here's what actually matters.

What the simulator auction delivers

Here's what's actually in it:

A package for two — you and a guest

Time in both a Boeing and an Airbus full-motion simulator — about an hour of flying plus an hour observing in each

• Roundtrip United Economy airfare for two to Denver (one recent edition worded it as 'best available cabin based on availability')

• One night's hotel in Denver, with shuttle to the training center

• A facility tour, an emergency-procedures tour, and a meet-and-greet with the Flight Training Center team

• Access to the Denver training center campus, the same facility where United's line pilots train

The package does *not* include a pilot license, a type rating, or any FAA credential. This is an experiential session, not a training qualification. You fly the simulator the way an airline pilot flies one, but nobody is grading you against an ATP standard.

Why it's genuinely unique

American and Delta have both put simulator time up for miles, but only as one-offs. American ran a 787 full-motion sim auction at its Fort Worth Skyview campus in May 2025, open only to AAdvantage Mastercard cardholders via Mastercard's Priceless platform, and has run sim lots only as one-offs rather than a standing program. Delta auctioned A220 simulator time back in 2018 and has bundled sim access into Delta Days packages. Neither runs a standing program.

United is the only US carrier that keeps relisting simulator sessions, with multiple editions in 2026 alone. What also sets the United version apart:

• Full-motion simulator, not a fixed-base or desktop trainer — you physically feel the aircraft attitude, the vibration, the landing

Current airline-fleet types — you fly both a Boeing and an Airbus sim, the kind of equipment you might ride on next week

• An operational scenario, not a tour — a real flight profile with weather and instrument procedures

Consumer flight-sim experiences on non-motion rigs typically run a few hundred dollars an hour. Full-motion time at an airline training facility generally isn't available to civilians at any price outside auctions like this one.

What bidding looks like now

This is where our own tracking earns its keep, because the publicly cited numbers are stale. The often-quoted figure for this auction is around 350,000 miles, from earlier editions tracked on FlyerTalk — the 2019 edition was sitting around 100,000 miles when it first hit the thread, and winners through 2025 generally landed in the 200,000–350,000 range per the FlyerTalk megathread. Those earlier figures come from FlyerTalk, not our own tracking — we've only captured the two 2026 editions directly.

The 2026 editions left that range behind:

These are verified winning bids — we capture United's final results after each auction closes, not just the last bid we happened to see. The market has roughly doubled in a year (as of July 2026), and budgeting "around 350k" for the next edition would be planning for a price that no longer exists.

For context on how much of an outlier that is: across every United MileagePlus Exclusives lot we've verified, the median winning bid is just 52,000 miles miles. The simulator sits in a league of its own at the very top of the program's price distribution.

Running the miles math

MileagePlus miles are worth roughly 1.2 to 1.4 cents each on strong flight redemptions (as of July 2026), which is the real yardstick here: the same 625,000 to 885,000 miles would otherwise book two or three business-class seats to Europe. That is the trade you are actually weighing.

Is roughly four hours across a Boeing and an Airbus simulator worth that to you? It depends entirely on who's bidding:

Our cents per point guide has the full framework if you want to pressure-test your own answer, and our United MileagePlus one-mile drops explainer covers the far cheaper end of the same program.

How to catch the next edition

The simulator auction doesn't run on a published calendar, but it no longer takes 18 months to come back either. With two editions already in 2026, the practical playbook:

1. Check MileagePlus Exclusives monthly — editions appear at exclusives.mileageplus.com, United's official Exclusives platform, two to three months before the session date

2. Watch the FlyerTalk megathread — the simulator auction thread has tracked this since 2019

3. Have the miles ready — auctions have closed within two to three weeks of listing; you can't accumulate 600,000+ miles reactively

4. Set an alert on PointAuctions.com — we list every Exclusives drop, so watch United MileagePlus listings and you'll see the next edition the day it appears

Live United MileagePlus Exclusives right now:

Recent verified simulator closes:

The bottom line

United's flight simulator auction is one of the most distinctive recurring redemptions in US airline loyalty, and the 2026 bidding shows the market has figured that out. At 625,000 to 885,000 miles, the math only works for someone who values the experience above two business-class trips to Europe. Know which camp you're in before the next edition lists, because you won't have long to decide once it does.

Want the wider view? See every United MileagePlus closing price we've verified, or search live points auctions across every program.