The smallest of the three major airline alliances expands into Asia. Oneworld will soon have a new member in Philippine Airlines. The upcoming entry of the Filipino flag carrier seems to have shut the door on the possibility of a Starlux Airlines entry.
In this post:
- Oneworld invites a new member: Philippine Airlines
- Shutting The Door On The Possibility of Starlux Joining
- Great News For the Filipino Diaspora – Less For Reward Flight Redemption Opportunities
- Is Oneworld Member Status Sustainable for PAL?
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Oneworld invites a new member. Philippine Airlines to join the alliance
Oneworld is the smallest of the three major alliances worldwide in terms of passengers carried.
Also, the alliance has quite a small footprint in Southeast Asia. So far only one airline represented it, that airline being Malaysia Airlines.
However, that’s changing, but not in a very significant way, as I’ll get into shortly.
Oneworld Alliance is now expanding in South East Asia, inviting Philippine Airlines to become its 16th full member.
Philippine Airlines follows the addition of Fiji Airways in 2024 and Oman Air in 2025. Once again, this is an invitation and not the official entry of Philippine Airlines into the new alliance.
The date for the official entry of Philippine Airlines into Oneworld still hasn’t been released.
The signing of the invitation took place at the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Annual General Meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on June 6th 2026.
Shutting The Door On The Possibility of Starlux Joining
What the paperwork officially says is that Philippine Airlines will be joining the Oneworld Alliance. What it also says that isn’t written in the documents is that this probably shuts the door on any possibility of Starlux Airlines ever joining the alliance too.
Starlux Airlines is the latest airline to launch operations out of Taiwan. The airline is competing directly with EVA Air and China Airlines, with them respectively being members of Star Alliance and SkyTeam.
Adding Philippine Airlines into the mix of Oneworld members effectively shuts off the possibility of Starlux making that move. There would be too many carriers from the same region competing with one another.
Additionally, it seems that Starlux was not the most welcomed airline by founding member Cathay Pacific, which is based not all that far from Taipei in Hong Kong.
Therefore, it was much easier for them to accept into the alliance a less menacing presence as Philippine Airlines, compared with the uprising force of Starlux, which would effectively drive away traffic from Hong Kong International Airport towards Taipei.
That poses another interesting question, which is not something that I will be delving into in this post, which is: what is Starlux going to do? Are they going to remain an independent carrier without an alliance affiliation? I see it as almost impossible for them to join the Star Alliance or SkyTeam, as the other two Taiwan-based carriers already are part of those.
Great News For the Filipino Diaspora – Less For Reward Flight Redemption Opportunities
Now there is a demographic for which this is great news, and there is one for which this is not as good news as for the other.
It’s great news for the Filipino diaspora, which will see connections increase towards Oneworld hubs. Philippine Airlines will start suddenly flying more towards destinations that are strongholds of the Oneworld alliance.
That might include, thanks to the capabilities of the A350-1000, even London Heathrow and other European destinations.
The demographic for which this is not as great news is the frequent flyer populace. For frequent flyers, Philippine Airlines was an opportunity to find good deals at bargain prices on many medium- and long-haul routes.
Pricing might become more expensive as the airline becomes part of the Oneworld Alliance and operations and pricing will standardize with other members.
In other words, it’s possible that Mabuhay Miles might become less valuable and suffer a devaluation in coming months and years.
On the flip side of that is the Philippine Airlines Mabuhay members will have access to a much more extensive network of lounges across the globe compared to what they have enjoyed until now.
Is Oneworld Member Status Sustainable for PAL?
Now it’s all nice and glamorous when we see the ceremonies and the signatures on the documents and what not, but what is often overlooked is the cost that entering an alliance has on the operator’s bottom line.
Standardized operations. Fees and other costs build up when you’re joining a new alliance, and they can stack up and become pretty hefty, especially for an airline that isn’t particularly large.
Philippine Airlines is not the biggest of carriers and not even the most solid financially of carriers worldwide. They have faced numerous struggles over the past years, between COVID and afterwards, with restructuring also taking place.
So the big question is, is this Oneworld entry actually sustainable for the carrier or not?
The answer, I think, we’ll get only when the next full yearly financial report comes out and we can take a look at what actually happened underneath the hood of this shiny new Oneworld invitation.