Marriott Rewards^® Premier Credit Card — Full Review [2024]

Great Card If

• You stay a minimum of 25 nights per year in hotels (earns you the next tier status)
• Your job requires you to travel and stay in hotels frequently, and you use your personal card to pay for it
• You love to travel and stay at Marriott properties around the world
• You enjoy getting upgrades on your rooms so you can lounge in style

Don’t Get If

• You don’t prefer Marriott brand hotels over the other available brands
• The locations you travel to don’t have Marriott brand hotels
• You want more flexible redemption options

Sign-Up Bonus, Earning Categories, and Points

Right now the card offers bonus points upon signing up and spending the required amount in the allotted time (see card summary table above).

You earn 5 points for every $1 spent at over 5,700 participating Marriott Rewards and SPG hotels, 2 points for every $1 spent on airline tickets purchased directly with the airlines, at car rental agencies & restaurants and 1 point everywhere else.

Then, you get 1x points for everything else you purchase. With rewards rates as cheap as 6,000 pts per night (Category 1 PointSavers) and 5,000 for an upgrade, this is a pretty good deal.

Bottom Line:  Earn 5x points for hotel purchases and 2x on restaurants, airfare, and car rentals when you use the Marriott Premier card. Earn 1x points for everything else!

Card Benefits and Elite Status

The Chase Marriott Premier card benefits are really where this card shines. Each year, you automatically get 1 free hotel stay anywhere worldwide, up to a Category 5.

Category 5 hotels include Courtyard, Renaissance, Residence Inn, Fairfield Inn and more, depending on your location.

Next, you start off with Silver status in the Marriott Rewards Program, which is the second level of their status program. You’d have to stay 10 nights in a year to earn this otherwise, which makes it a nice perk!

Benefits include late checkout, weekend discounts, and a bonus of 20% added to the points earned for the stay. They also include a 5th night free each time you book 4 nights or more!

Gold is the next tier up, which requires staying 50 nights in the hotels in a year. This is quite a jump, but for those who travel often it isn’t that hard to achieve. At this level you get free breakfast for 2, lounge access (where applicable), and a 25% point bonus.

To make reaching Gold status and beyond a bit easier, for every $3,000 you spend on the card you also get 1 Elite credit toward your status (equal to one night’s stay).

So if you’ve only stayed 25 nights this year in hotels (giving you 40 Elite credits when added to your existing 15), but you’ve spent over $30,000 on the card, you should be awarded Gold status through the elite credit benefit from Chase.

Be sure to check that your Elite credits are getting applied to your account, as this can take up to 6-8 weeks.

If you truly travel a lot, then reaching the Platinum Elite status is your best bet. By doing so, you will earn 50% additional points per stay.

This will really help you rack up the points and allow you to redeem many awards for your personal travel.

Bottom Line: Get automatic Silver status and extra Elite Credits for spending on the ChaseMarriott Premier card! This makes Elite Status more attainable.

Other Travel Partners and Benefits

Traveling frequently with United becomes a little bit sweeter with the Marriott credit card, too. With the RewardsPlus Program, you can earn Silver status with United MileagePlus program when you reach Platinum Elite at Marriott.

If you want to transfer points to MileagePlus from Marriott Rewards, you’ll receive a 20% discount. That means 8,000 Marriott points will give you 2,000 MileagePlus points. (It takes 10,000 points to get 2,000 miles on most other airlines.)

Another great feature of the Marriott Premier card is no foreign transaction fees.

This is especially useful for travel abroad so that you can pay for the lodging without worrying about an additional standard 3% fee added on top of your bill.

With an $85 annual fee, you may wonder if the card is worth it. For frequent travelers, such as those who take trips for business, you will likely find no downside.

The 15 Elite credits per year and 1 free stay more than make up for this moderate fee. Plus, the sign-up bonus points can be put to use for free nights and upgrades worth way above that amount.

Like most cards, the sign-up bonus is only available to new cardmembers. If you’ve never used the card and want to maximize your ability to stay in style at Marriott hotels, then this is the card for you.

With extra benefits such as Silver status, a partnership with United, no foreign transaction fees, and the ability to earn additional Elite credits through spending, you will find this card very valuable if you travel with Marriott.

Bottom Line: The Marriott Premier card holds value with a free night each year, which is worth more than the annual fee of the card. It also gives Elite status and has additional benefits to boost value.

Best Way to Redeem Marriot Reward Points

Many ways exist to redeem your Marriott points. From room redemptions to upgrades to flights, you’ll likely be confused as to which might offer the highest values. Here are the ways we would suggest redeeming your points.

Types of Redemptions and Their Value

Redemptions can be standard, upgrades, PointSavers, or Instant Redemptions. All the styles can be reviewed here.

You tend to get better value when redeeming for higher category hotels, but the value varies widely among locations and categories, so be sure to do some number crunching.

Our sample valuations found anything from $0.004 to $0.016 per point, so getting rooms at the upper end of this range obviously maximizes your value for the dollar.

Also keep in mind that while the value of a point may be higher, that might not be more valuable to you.

Would you most like to really squeeze the most “value” out in terms of dollars? Or would you rather stretch the total number of nights you can be on the road?

The former may get you 1 or 2 nights in a really fancy hotel, and the latter may get you 5-10 nights in a lower quality hotel but allow you access to a higher quality or longer trip.

Quick Tips for Redeeming Points

Tip #1: Standard redemptions seem to give the highest value.

Tip #2: Redeem your rooms in multiples of 5 if you’re going to be staying put for a longer period of time and are flexible.

For every 5 nights you book, you get 1 night totally free! This applies to standard room redemptions.

Tip #3: For the truly flexible traveler, the PointSavers option will allow you to stretch your points much further.

The maximum discount available for these rewards is up to 33%! Check it out regularly to find deals that might appeal to you.

Tip #4: If you are a United MileagePlus flyer, use the RewardsPlus benefit to transfer points from your Marriott account to your MileagePlus account at a 20% discount over other airlines. Transferring points back into your Marriott account can be done at a 1:1 ratio.

Tip #5: Transferring points to airlines is a good way to use points that aren’t being used. However, in most cases, using them for free Marriott nights will give you a higher value than you can get with an airline transfer.

If you start accumulating a large number of Marriott points, a transfer may be more valuable if you don’t have any other options, but be sure to do your own calculation.

For instance, 10,000 Marriott points could be worth $80-$150 when used as a free night. The same amount only gives you 2,000 airline miles. At $0.02 each that’s only $40, so the hotel room is much more valuable.

However, if you transfer 140k points and get 50k airline miles, you could turn that into $1,000+ in airline value. In Marriott, you may be able to get anywhere from $500-$1,000, but it depends on where you stay.

Tip #6: Room upgrades are tricky and must be calculated for each specific instance.

Sometimes they are worth the value, and sometimes they aren’t. Check into using the cash upgrade option to get your desired upgrade at the highest value (and potentially save your points).

Also, when you’re Gold or Platinum, you can get free upgrades anyway and still earn points on your room; if you use a points upgrade you won’t earn points that night.

Tip #7: We don’t recommend using the Instant Rewards, as they tend to be of much lower value than room redemptions.

Best Way To Maximize Marriot Reward Points

Clearly, you’ll get the highest value earning points by using the card while staying at hotels and raking in points from the rewards program itself.

But there are other ways to earn points and some tips you can follow to make sure you get the most value out of this card.

Tip #1: As we said, your best bet is to use this card for 5x points and get the 5x or 10x through the Marriott Rewards program when staying at the hotels.

You’ll also get an Elite status bonus as you make your way up the ranks!

Tip #2: If you’re traveling with companions, use the card to book their rooms as well and earn additional points.

You can earn points for up to an additional 2 rooms, but it must all be on your card and you must be staying in one of the rooms.

Tip #3: For any large event (weddings, conferences, etc.) you are planning, hold it at a Marriott hotel to earn huge.

Get up to 3x earning (50k pts max) on the rate, points for any guests that stay in a room, and lots of Elite credits!

Tip #4: Earning Elite status allows you to earn points more quickly, so reaching Platinum is going to pay off if you stay in hotels a lot.

The bonus jumps from 25% to 50% and you’ll get even better benefits, including Hertz Gold status when you earn Gold Elite status, and MileagePlus Silver when you reach Platinum status.

Tip #5: Be flexible. If you keep an eye on the Bonus Deals, you can find some that give you an extra 1,000-2,000 points per night.

You may also find exclusive savings in different hotels or areas, which helps you both maximize the earning of points and minimize your spending!

Tip #6: Participate in the new Badges Rewards program Marriott has added to their loyalty program.

You will earn a few extra miles here and there (the total available right now is 1,725). Though the earnings aren’t massive, you could earn up to 350 pts by staying at each of the different brands for a minimum of 2 nights (25 pt each).

While doing this, you can also earn the Explorer badges, for which a total of 375 pts are available. Finally, earn up to 400 points as you work your way toward 1000 nights of cumulative stays.

Tip #7: If you’re more interested in airline miles, switch from earning points to earning miles through your chosen airline program.

At the basic membership level, the value of the two is equal. Therefore, earn miles if that is what you are interested in. This way, you don’t have to wait until you accumulate a minimum amount to transfer.

However, we don’t recommend doing this if you have Elite status, as you will earn more points than miles in equivalent value. You can always transfer later. See Card Math for details.

Tip #8:  If you want to be a spokesperson for Marriott, you can earn up to 50,000 points each year through the Referral bonus.

You can earn 5 referrals each year, and you earn 2,000 points per stay they make in the year (up to 5 per person). Even more lucrative, your friends will also earn the 2,000 points bonus up to 10k points!

Tip #9: If you are a Platinum member, be sure to get your Platinum Arrival Gift! Depending on the hotel brand, you can get between 200-1,000 bonus points for your stay.

Marriott has a variety of partners in their program through which you can earn and redeem miles. The following is a list of Marriott’s stated partners:

Marriott Partners: Hertz, CruisesOnly, ShopMyWay Mall, Flowers, Gifts & Wine Boutique, NRG Home Solar, EnergyPlus, The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, Avios, Ctrip, Travelling Connect.

Airline Transfer Partners

Other Non-Airline Partners

And finally, you can transfer to the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas loyalty program: Low End (5,000/2,000), High End (250,000/100,000)

Or you can use the points to book rail tickets in Europe and Asia.