The 10 most read MileLion articles for 2022

As 2022 draws to an end, it’s time once again to look back at the hottest stories on The MileLion this year. With 730+ posts so far (and counting), there was no shortage of things to cover in a year when travel came roaring back with a vengeance. 

When considering which posts qualified for the top 10, I only looked at those published in 2022 (with the exception of #2, because I think it tells a nice story). There are of course pages published in 2021 and earlier that continue to draw eyeballs and are well worth a read, such as:

• What Card Should I Use (300K views)
• Credit Card Lounge Benefits (240K views)
• Current Credit Card Sign-Up Bonuses (92K views)

Here’s the posts that got everyone talking!

(1) The MileLion’s 2022 Card Strategy (88K views)

The MileLion’s 2022 Credit Card Strategy

Given the bread and butter of this website, it should perhaps come as no surprise that the most read post by far was on credit card strategy. 

For those of you just beginning your miles journey, this is a great starting point for what cards you need to get and which card to use when. And don’t worry, you can get the job done with just four or so cards- it’s not rocket science.

Look out for an updated post for 2023, coming in just a few days.

(2) Cheapest pre-departure COVID-19 ART and PCR tests in Singapore (78K views)

Cheapest pre-departure COVID-19 ART and PCR tests in Singapore

Technically, this post was first published in 2021, but I wanted to mention it anyway because 2022 was the year that pre-departure testing disappeared for almost every country. Tele-ARTs, much less PCR tests, are nothing but an unpleasant memory now, though it didn’t happen all at once. 

• The UK dropped pre-departure testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 7 January
• Maldives dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 5 March
• Cambodia dropped testing for all travellers on 17 March
• Canada dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 1 April
• Australia dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 18 April
• Malaysia dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 1 May
• Thailand dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 1 May
• Vietnam dropped testing for all travellers on 15 May
• Indonesia dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 18 May
• The USA dropped testing for fully vaccinated travellers on 12 June
• New Zealand dropped pre-departure testing on 21 June, though it retained post-arrival testing until 13 September
• South Korea dropped pre-departure testing on 3 September, though it retained on-arrival testing until 1 October

This means that for the first half of 2022 at least, searches for the cheapest pre-departure tests in Singapore were off the charts. At last check, the cost of a PCR test had fallen to S$50, while a tele-ART would set you back just S$9. 

I’ve not updated this article since July 2022, and hope I’ll never need to do so again!

(3) Complete Guide: Singapore-Malaysia quarantine-free air travel from 1 April (73K views)

Complete Guide: Singapore – Malaysia quarantine-free air travel from 1 April

One of the most important events this year was the complete reopening of the Singapore-Malaysia border, without the need for designated VTL flights, specific travel history requirements, or testing. With so many Singaporeans and Malaysians cut off from family and friends across the causeway, interest in the topic was sky high. 

Getting here was hard work though. When the VTL first began in late 2021, travellers had to puzzle over registration with the MySejahtera app, fiddle with the fussy MySafeTravel portal and take up to 15 COVID-19 tests (no, really). 

Thankfully, those requirements faded away one by one, and now you don’t even need to fill up the SG Arrival Card if you’re travelling via the land border. 

(4) Full house: Singapore Airlines SilverKris Lounge headache (61K views)

Full house: Singapore Airlines’ SilverKris Lounge headache

November 2021 saw the opening of Singapore Airlines’ highly anticipated new SilverKris Lounge in Terminal 3. This was in many ways a huge step up from the previous facility, boasting a dining hall with live cooking stations, tended bar, individual shower suites and a sleeping area.

The problem was that it had to serve everyone, and I really mean everyone. First Class, Business Class, Solitaire PPS, PPS, KrisFlyer Gold, Star Gold, everyone. Prior to COVID, this demand would be spread over seven different lounges across two terminals, but since everything else was closed or under renovation, the SilverKris Business Class Lounge bore the full brunt. 

Unsurprisingly, that didn’t go well at all. Lounges are meant to be an escape from the hustle and bustle of the airport terminal, but the SilverKris Lounge was absolute chaos. Passengers were sprawled out across furniture, the buffet line was cleared out as soon as it was replenished, and waiting times for the shower were over an hour. In many places it was standing room only, some passengers resorted to sitting on window ledges. It looked like a refugee camp, with nicer interior décor. 

The situation gradually improved with the reopening of the KrisFlyer Gold Lounge on 20 May 2022, and the new First Class and The Private Room on 31 May 2022. Singapore Airlines eventually resumed two-terminal departures in October 2022, and reopened its three lounges there as well.

Even so, the SilverKris Business Class section still gets quite packed during peak departure times (usually evenings), as those 1,150 seats fill up faster than you expect.

(5) Air Premia launches Singapore-Seoul flights (and it’s anything but budget) (58K views)

Air Premia launches Singapore-Seoul flights (and it’s anything but budget)

South Korea is one of the top holiday destinations for Singaporeans, and the easing of travel restrictions was probably what inspired Air Premia to join Singapore Airlines, Asiana, Korean Air and T’way Air in offering direct Singapore to Seoul service. 

Air Premia’s model is fascinating. It markets itself as a hybrid service carrier, which “fills the gap in the market by fulfilling routes which low-cost carriers are not able to fly, and full-service carriers cannot provide attractive prices for”. 

Instead of focusing on short-haul routes, it goes for the long-haul market. And while it may look like a budget carrier, all passengers get 15kg of checked baggage, seatback IFE screens, in-seat power, Wi-Fi starting from US$2.95, and a whopping 35 inches (yes) of seat pitch. For a limited period, all passengers even received complimentary access to the marhaba Loounge at Changi Airport!

Long-haul budget travel has proved a graveyard for many airlines (see Air Asia X, Norwegian Air, Wow Air, XL Airlines and Zoom Airlines), but Air Premia is still chugging along. In addition to Singapore, the airline has added flights to Los Angeles, Ho Chi Minh and Tokyo Narita, using a fleet of all Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners. 

Any airline that offers 35 inches of seat pitch in Economy is fine by me. Best of luck to them in 2023.

(6) Indonesia scraps on-arrival PCR tests (55K views)

Indonesia scraps on-arrival PCR tests for all, and visa requirement for ASEAN nationals

In February 2022, Bali reopened to tourists under the “Warm Up Vacation” scheme, which featured the kind of doublespeak Orwell would be proud of. 

“Warm-up vacation is different to quarantine,” insisted tourism representatives through gritted teeth. Because tourists were allowed to move around their hotel and use its facilities, the argument went, this four-night quarantine, sorry, warm-up, was something else entirely.

Well, the market voted with its feet. The first day of warm-up saw only six visitors arriving, and officials quickly realised they weren’t fooling anyone. Bali’s real reopening was quickly brought forward to March with three PCR tests and a four-night minimum stay, reduced to two PCR tests and no minimum stay later that month.

I visited Bali soon after, and while it was as charming as ever, there were still way too many inconveniences for tourists. You had to register with a contact tracing app before flying. You needed mandatory travel insurance. There was on-arrival PCR testing. Everyone needed a visa, even Singaporeans (I avoided this through my APEC Business Travel Card).

Fortunately, Indonesia eventually scrapped on-arrival PCR tests for all travellers and waived the visa requirement for ASEAN nationals from 6 April 2022 (pre-departure PCR testing was still required; that eventually went away in May 2022).

Travel to Bali is now as straightforward as pre-COVID days.

(7) Review: DBS Vantage Card (54K views)

Review: DBS Vantage Card

In February 2022, a leak on the Accor Plus website showed that DBS was planning to launch a premium credit card called the DBS Vantage. Details were scarce, other than it’d be a Visa Infinite and come with a 12-month Accor Plus Explorer membership.

Later that month, more details appeared on the DBS website of a S$120,000 card that was…completely underwhelming. 

For an annual fee of S$736 (which would make this the most expensive card in the $120K segment), cardholders would receive:

• “Up to” 1.6 mpd for local spend
• “Up to” 2.4 mpd for FCY spend
• “Up to” 3.4 mpd for dining and petrol
• Accor Plus Explorer membership
• 25,000 miles each year

Apart from the Accor Plus Explorer membership (worth S$408), there was very little to get excited about here. There was no lounge access, no airport limo transfers, no complimentary hotel nights or any other $120K gimmick. We had no idea what the minimum spend to trigger the “up to” rates would be.

This had the potential to be the most DoA card since the KrisFlyer UOB Debit Card, so thank goodness DBS went back to the drawing board and came back with a radically different product in June 2022. The annual fee was reduced to S$588.50, with: 

• 1.5 mpd on local spend
• 2.2 mpd on FCY spend
• 4 mpd on dining and petrol until 31 December 2022, with no cap
• Accor Plus Explorer membership
• 10 complimentary Priority Pass visits
• 25,000 miles each year
• Up to 55,000 miles sign-up bonus

Now that’s more like it. There new-and-improved DBS Vantage received quite the response, and more than held its own in the $120K card showdown. 

Can it hold its own after the 4 mpd on dining and petrol lapses at the end of 2022? We’ll have to see. 

(8) 2022 Edition: The $120K Credit Card Showdown (51K views)

2022 Edition: The $120K Credit Card Showdown

The $120K Credit Card Showdown has been one of the most popular series on The MileLion ever since the first edition in 2017, and this year’s was particularly intriguing thanks to the debut of the DBS Vantage. Could the new kid on the block shake up the $120K segment?

Yes and no. Ultimately, it was long-time stalwarts Citi Prestige and HSBC Visa Infinite which came out on top, now that the lifting of border restrictions made unlimited lounge access and airport limo benefits useful once again. That’s not to say the rest of the cards didn’t shine in their own ways, like the DBS Vantage’s hefty sign-up bonus, OCBC VOYAGE’s excellent value (for a time) Travel with OCBC redemptions, or Maybank Visa Infinite’s first year fee waiver with an unlimited Priority Pass, to mention a few. 

But with a looming recession and the associated belt-tightening, it’ll be interesting to see how these cards justify their S$488-650 annual fees in 2023.

(9) Good news: Overseas tele-supervised ARTs can now be used as pre-departure tests when returning to Singapore from any country (50K views)

Good news: Tele-ARTs can now be used as pre-departure tests when returning to Singapore from any country

One of the biggest hassles of the Vaccinated Travel Lane (which really outstayed its welcome) was the need to take a pre-departure test before returning to Singapore. This involved hunting down an overseas ART or PCR test provider and presenting a negative result during check-in, adding costs and inconvenience. 

So everyone cheered the news when MOH announced that travellers to Singapore could satisfy the pre-departure test requirement by taking a remotely-supervised tele-ART. Only one problem: the rules were a mess. 

The option was only available to Singapore residents travelling to Singapore from 42 countries, some of which didn’t even have direct air links to Singapore. VTL partner Switzerland was absent from the list, but Iran and Yemen were included. All the Southeast Asian countries were missing. Iceland and Norway were excluded, while Denmark and Sweden made the cut. And they even bothered to list the Vatican City enclave…but forgot all about mighty San Marino?

There was really no reason why it had to be this complicated, and all the hair splitting felt like some bureaucrat’s wet dream. Moreover, it gave rise to all sorts of hypothetical questions, some of which bordered on the ludicrous. Since the USA is on the list, can I do my test from Guam? Since Denmark is there, can I ART from Greenland? Oh nice, Netherlands is featured. Aruba and Sint Maarten can? What’s internet connectivity on the Isle of Man like? It sounds absurd— and it should — but that’s what lists like these foster. 

Well, two weeks later, MOH finally came to their senses and approved tele-ARTs for Singapore residents returning from any country. That’s how it should have been from the beginning, quite frankly. 

And then Singapore removed the pre-departure test requirement entirely a few weeks later, making this much ado about nothing. 

(10) Trust Link Credit Card Review: Too many emoji, not enough free rice (50k views)

Trust Link Credit Card Review: Too many emoji, not enough free rice

I can honestly tell you that I did not expect a review of an aunty card to be among the top posts for 2022. 

But I gotta hand it to Trust Bank. I mean, who else could offer S$35 of NTUC vouchers and a 1kg bag of rice as a sign-up offer, and get the kind of press they did? 

In addition to emoji-laden T&Cs, Trust Bank’s other claim to fame was being the first digital bank to launch in Singapore. For better or worse, they chose to go down the rebates route, with the Trust Link Credit Card and “up to 21% rebates” on FairPrice Group shopping.

The system is hopelessly complicated which makes optimisation a tricky task, but I kind of feel like that’s the idea. Outside of FairPrice Group spend, the Trust Card is virtually useless. But in order to trigger the FairPrice Group bonuses, you need to spend outside of FairPrice Group!

In any case, true MileLion acolytes knew the real draw was the free rice, and thus began the Great Rice Hunt of 2022, as readers dutifully signed up for the free vouchers, tracked down their free rice, posted photos, then chucked the card into a drawer. 

I’m so proud of this community. 

Conclusion

So that’s what made the news in 2022! Never a dull moment in this hobby, and with all this COVID nonsense finally behind us, bring on 2023. 

As we look ahead to the new year, I’d love to hear what kind of articles you’d like to read more of. I can’t promise to have the time and energy to make them all, but I’ll certainly try!

What would you like to read about in 2023? Let me know below.