Travel Points and Miles Valuations – What Are They Worth? [January 2020]
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What are points and miles actually worth? Unfortunately, there are no official answers. In other words, airlines and hotels don’t give out their own point and mile valuations. Therefore, it’s up to you to make your own conclusions on that value. However, we’re here to help.
There are many factors that come into play when determining this metric. Below are questions you should ask yourself when evaluating the value of points and what we’ve taken into account to create our point and mile valuations:
- How valuable are these points?
- How flexible are these points and how many transfer partners are there?
- What are your redemption options?
- How much would you buy points and miles for?
- What’s the average redemption value from 3 different bookings?
- How abundant is award availability?
Table of contents
Table of Contents
Upgraded Points’ January 2020 Points and Miles Valuations
Flexible Points Programs
| Flexible Point Program | December 2019 Value (cents/point) | January 2020 Value (cents/point) | Value of 50,000 / 100,000 points |
| Amex Membership Rewards Points | 2.3 | 2.2 | $1,100 / $2,200 |
| Barclaycard Arrival Miles | 1.0 | 1.0 | $500 / $1,000 |
| Brex Rewards | 1.5 | 1.5 | $750 / $1,500 |
| Capital One | 1.25 | 1.25 | $625 / $1,250 |
| Chase Ultimate Rewards Points | 1.95 | 1.95 | $975 / $1,950 |
| Citi ThankYou Points | 1.6 | 1.6 | $800 / $1,600 |
| Diners Club Rewards Points | 2.0 | 2.0 | $1,000 / $2,000 |
Airline Loyalty Programs
Hotel Loyalty Programs
| Hotel Loyalty Program | December 2019 Value (cents/point) | January 2020 Value (cents/point) | Value of 50,000 / 100,000 points |
| Choice Hotels Choice Privileges Points | 0.6 | 0.6 | $300 / $600 |
| Radisson Hotels Radisson Rewards Points | 0.3 | 0.3 | $150 / $300 |
| Hilton Hotels Hilton Honors Points | 0.4 | 0.4 | $200 / $400 |
| Hyatt Hotels World of Hyatt Points | 1.6 | 1.6 | $800 / $1,600 |
| IHG Hotels & Resorts IHG Rewards Club Points | 0.5 | 0.5 | $250 / $500 |
| Marriott Hotels Marriott Bonvoy Points | 0.7 | 0.7 | $350 / $700 |
| Wyndham Hotels & Resorts Wyndham Rewards Points | 0.9 | 0.9 | $450 / $900 |
UP’s Highest Valued Points
Not all miles and points are created equal, so naturally, each category has its own winner with the highest valued points. Here’s why we ranked the highest valued points as such:
Transferrable Points: American Express Membership Rewards Points
American Express Membership Rewards continues to be the king of transferrable points. Amex partners with all alliances (SkyTeam, Star Alliance, and Oneworld), along with many non-alliance partners, so it’s easier to find award space compared to other transferrable points. Some of Amex’s transfer partners include Qantas, Air Canada Aeroplan, and Emirates.
Airline Miles: Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan Miles
Alaska Airlines has the best of both worlds: a variety of partners and solid redemption rates. Some of Alaska’s partners include American Airlines, Emirates, Japan Airlines, and more. Redemption rates are lower than other partners across the board — for example, a one-way business class flight on Japan Airlines from the U.S to Tokyo costs just 55,000 Mileage Plan miles.
Hotel Points: World of Hyatt Points
World of Hyatt has the most reasonable redemption rates of all the major hotel chains. Further, we’ve found that there are virtually no blackout dates and that all hotels are on a standard award chart, so you’ll always pay the same price for a room at any hotel. This allows you to explore fantastic Hyatt redemption opportunities ensuring maximum value.
Movers
There wasn’t a lot of points and miles news to cover in December, largely because it was a holiday month. However, there were 2 interesting movers – 1 transferrable point currency and 1 airline mile currency.
American Express Ends 30% Virgin Atlantic Transfer Bonus
American Express ran a 30% transfer bonus from Membership Rewards to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club in December. This promotion ended on December 28, 2019, so we’ve dropped our Amex Membership Rewards valuation back to 2.2 cents per point from 2.3 cents per point.
Amex Membership Rewards points have remained the most valuable transferrable points currency per our valuations. Consider using your Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles to book ANA first class or Delta One for cheap if you took advantage of the transfer bonus.
American Airlines Runs Awesome Web Special Awards
American Airlines introduced discounted Web Special awards earlier in the year. These are similar to Delta’s famous SkyMiles Flash Sales that make flights on specific routes cheaper. Previously we’ve seen discounted short-haul award tickets and 20,000-mile tickets between Los Angeles (LAX) and Australia.
However, this month we saw the most exciting Web Special award come to light.
American Airlines offered tickets from select U.S. cities to Tokyo (HND/NRT) in business class for just 42,500 American AAdvantage miles one-way. This award would usually cost 70,000 AAdvantage miles one-way.
We’ve raised our American Airlines AAdvantage valuation to 1.45 cents per point from 1.30 cents per point despite most dates already being sold out. We’re hopeful that similar Web Special awards will pop up in the future.
Flying Blue January Promo Awards Pending
We’re still awaiting the announcement of Flying Blue’s January Promo Awards. In December, we saw cheap business class tickets from Chicago (ORD) and Toronto (YYZ) to Europe, and we’re hopeful that January’s awards are just as fruitful.
Final Thoughts
While the value of points and miles can vary, you want to ensure that you’re getting a great value when redeeming those hard-earned points. When it comes to flexible points, Amex Membership Rewards points are valued at the highest cent per point. Given the number of Amex airline and hotel partners, these points are extremely flexible. Amex Membership Rewards also offers good transfer rates with a ton of redemption options. All of these elements ensure that you get the most of your points.
dear sir,
I have lost my Emirates skywards number. i want to regain to get more points for benifits.
please help me.
Thanks.
Nirendu kumar Ghosh
Hi Nirendu. The best way to get your Emirates Skywards number is to call or live chat with Emirates. They have a live chat feature here: https://www.emirates.com/english/help/
I hope this helps!
How much are Japan Airlines points worth? I would love to fly them in First Class.
Hi Natalie,
We do not currently have a valuation of Japan Airlines miles but keep in mind that all points/miles valuations are subjective. Have you seen our guide on the best ways to fly to Japan with points and miles? I think you will find it very helpful! https://upgradedpoints.com/best-ways-to-fly-to-japan-with-points/
I really appreciate the work you’ve put into this. It shows the quality of your work that you got everything right except that you’ve undervalued Bonvoy points. Since 60k Bonvoy points can be exchanged for 25k airline miles on all the MR airline transfers plus about 25 others, then 60 Bonvoy points should be worth at least 25 MR points, especially as Bonvoy points transfer to high-value miles like Alaskan or Korean. The MR hotel transfers shouldn’t change the valuation as 1 Bonvoy point for Marriott is worth more than either 25/60 Choice points or 1.5*25/60 Hilton points to me.
The only reason for valuing Bonvoy points at less than 2.1*25/60=0.875¢ is the fact that Bonvoy points sometimes take an unreasonably long time to transfer, and if that’s why you are devaluing Bonvoy points, I can’t disagree.
Hi Jim,
Thank you for the feedback, we appreciate the kind words. The amount of time a point transfer can take is definitely a reason why Bonvoy points are valued less than Membership Reward points. Additionally, as you mentioned you have to transfer 60k Marriott points at a time in order to achieve a similar value that you get with Membership Reward points, this also causes Bonvoy to lose some value in our opinion as there are no such requirements with Membership Reward points.
As you know, placing an evaluation on your points is very subjective and vary greatly depending on a large number of factors. So no method is perfect, and we encourage each of our readers to do their research and form their own opinions when deciding on to best value their points and miles.
Thanks for reading!
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