| โ ๏ธ Story update: Seats have been loaded at the T-355 mark once more from lunchtime on 17 April 2025. This was a much longer wait than usual! |
Most frequent flyers should know that Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer award space is loaded each day at 8 a.m Singapore time (GMT+8), 355 days before departure, when the airline loads flights into its reservations system.
Since award space, especially Saver, disappears quickly, camping on the website is the best strategy to snag seats on popular routes. Wake up too late and you might have to pay Advantage prices, or deal with the uncertainty of the waitlist.
However, every year there are two periods in April and November where I suddenly get a lot of messages from readers telling me that Singapore Airlines has changed its policy, because award space is no longer being released at the T-355 mark.
Thatโs the case right now, as a quick search of the website shows that award seats are only available up till 28 March 2026, and no further.
Donโt panic. Nothing has changed. This is just a temporary phenomenon that will be resolved over the next couple of days.
Singapore Airlines award seats no longer loading at T-355 mark
To understand whatโs going on, you first need to know about the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Northern Summer and Northern Winter schedules.
IATA divides the aviation calendar into two main scheduling seasons, referred to as the Northern Summer and Northern Winter schedules. These schedules help standardise planning for airlines globally, including departure and arrival slots, frequency of flights, and seasonal route adjustments.
| Season | Begins | Ends |
| โ๏ธ Northern Summer | Last Sunday in March | Last Saturday in October (same year) |
| โ๏ธ Northern Winter | Last Sunday in October | Last Saturday in March (following year) |
The 2026 Northern Summer season will begin on Sunday, 29 March 2026, and whatโs causing the bottleneck is that Singapore Airlines simply hasnโt loaded any flights for this season yet.
This affects both award and commercial seats, so you wonโt be able to book a commercial ticket with Singapore Airlines from 29 March 2026 onwards until the schedule is loaded.
By the way, this is a phenomenon that happens in both April and November; the former because of the lag in loading the Northern Summer schedule, the latter because of the delay in loading the Northern Winter schedule.
What happens now?
All we can do is wait.
Obviously, Singapore Airlines wants to start selling tickets on its planes as soon as it can, so itโs in their interest to load inventory sooner rather than later. However, there is no fixed date or time when it comes to loading the new schedule.
When that happens, there will be a โdumpโ of award and commercial space into the system, and youโll be able to book seats up till 355 days from whenever that date is.
For reference:
- In November 2024, award seats for T-355 stopped getting loaded on 5 November 2024, and were restored on 8 November 2024
- In April 2024, award seats for T-355 stopped getting loaded on 9 April 2024, and were restored on 11 April 2024
- In November 2023, award seats for T-355 stopped getting loaded on 6 November 2023, and were restored on 9 November 2023
So if youโre eyeing a redemption on a popular route, your best bet is to keep checking the Singapore Airlines website for updates. Iโll also drop a note in the MileLion Roars Telegram channel when that happens, so be sure to join.
Whatโs the usual schedule?
Outside of this twice-a-year bottleneck, Singapore Airlines award seats are loaded at 8 a.m Singapore time (GMT+8), 355 days before departure.
However, there is an exception for USA destinations, which follow a different schedule:
- New York (EWR/JFK):1 p.m Singapore time (GMT+8), 355 days before departure
- Houston (IAH): 2 p.m Singapore time (GMT+8), 355 days before departure
- All others (LAX/SEA/SFO): 4 p.m Singapore time (GMT+8), 355 days before departure
If youโre wondering when you should start camping on the website, a simple tool to add 355 days from today can be found here.
Conclusion
Singapore Airlines has stopped loading new award and commercial seats 355 days in advance of departure. This is only temporary, and is due to the switchover to the IATA Northern Summer schedule from 28 March 2026.
We can usually expect the bottleneck to be cleared within a few days, but thereโs no knowing for sure when exactly that will happen. So if youโre eyeing travel in 2026, youโll need to monitor the website and keep checking back.
Good luck!
โ55 days from today is 26 October 2025, the last Sunday in October 2025, which coincides with the start of the 2025/26 Northern Winter season. โ
missing โ3โ
fixed that, thanks.
saw availability for 10/26, but it looks like it hasnโt caught up with t-355
Hey, thanks for the info. Does Singapore release less seats on the weekends. Looks like immediately when they come out, it still shows up as waitlist.
Aaron, thanks for the informative piece. I am looking to redeem Business class tickets for TPE to SIN in March 2026. However, flights for the weekend I am looking at is already waitlisted even though it is still nearly a year away. I was able to secure redemptions for the outbound leg which was a week earlier.
Why is this the case? Is there truly such redemption demand or is SQ blocking tickets for redemption?
unfortunately, itโs quite normal that some routes open straight to waitlist (e.g. suites saver for sin-lhr). for what itโs worth, they will open up some seats as the months go by, so the only option now is to be patient and pray the waitlist gods smile on you.
do you know what is the criteria or reason why some routes go straight to waitlist? It isnโt a special public holiday (other than the end of the March school holidays โ but I was able to book the outbound at the start) and it isnโt as fancied a destination like Japan or London.
srsly, you better spend the effort fretting about not being able to book an award flight on planning how to earn more $$$z
not particularly. the inner workings are a black box, quite frankly! itโs better to have a backup plan ready
Thanks for sticking to good headlines that are not sensationalist, clickbait or other urgh worthy ploys.
Do you know if parters (a la Aeroplan) have also stopped releasing availability?
SIA has not released any inventory, period. so no one can book anything
Interesting. Thanks for the reply and phenomenal article!
It looks like weโve to wait a little bit longer this year then the past yearsโฆ
yes iโm quite surprised the inventory hasnโt been loaded yet
So when do we start panicking ๐ฅฒ
No reason for panic as itโs not about awards and we can assume that SQ will still be flying around 2026. The SS26 will be loaded sooner or later. Maybe somone forgot to press the button on Friday. ๐
Letโs hope thereโs no devaluation in the works along with the inventory dump.
This year seems a bit delayed lolโฆ hopefully to see within this week.
Was searching past week and couldnโt find anything. now i know. do you have facebook or something to update post once it opens up?
This is the longest wait for April 2026 award flights. Hope the schedule gets inputted soon. Thank you for the great info!
any day now!