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We've seen several devaluations to the United Airlines MileagePlus program in recent years, so you may be excited to learn about a consistent way to get competitive value from your hard-earned rewards: Using miles to cover your credit card's annual fee. Depending on what's in your wallet, you can unlock up to 1.75¢ per mile on this non-flight redemption, which is pretty good.
Here's how you can redeem United miles toward your credit card's annual fee, the value it provides, and whether it's a good deal.
Use United Miles To Cover Your Card’s Annual Fee
Starting back in May 2020, United added the ability to redeem United miles to cover the annual fee on United Airlines co-branded credit cards. At first, the redemption rate was an even 1.5¢ per mile across all cards. However, United has inflated the value of this redemption method for several cards over time. Now, you can unlock up to 1.75¢ per mile when making these redemptions.
Currently, you can make the following redemptions:
| Card Name | Annual Fee | Miles Required to Cover the Full Fee | Value Cents Per Mile) |
|---|---|---|---|
| The New United Club℠ Card | $695 | 45724 | 1.75¢ |
| The New United Quest℠ Card | $350 | 23,027 | 1.6¢ |
| The New United℠ Explorer Card | $0 intro annual fee for the first year, then $150 | 9,868 | 1.52¢ |
| The New United℠ Business Card | $0 intro annual fee for the first year, then $150 | 9,868 | 1.5¢ |
| United Club℠ Business Card | $695 | 30,000 | 1.5¢ |
| United MileagePlus® Awards Card (not open to new applicants) | $60 | 4,000 | 1.5¢ |
| United MileagePlus® Select Card (not open to new applicants) | $95 | 6,333 | 1.5¢ |
| United℠ Presidential Plus℠ Card (not open to new applicants) | $450 | 30,000 | 1.5¢ |
| United℠ Presidential Plus℠ Business Card (not open to new applicants) | $450 | 30,000 | 1.5¢ |
For comparison, AwardWallet users have redeemed United miles at the following rates:
- Overall average: 1.93¢
- Short-haul economy/premium economy awards: 1.3¢
- Short-haul business/first class awards: 1.76¢
- Long-haul economy/premium economy awards: 1.85¢
- Long-haul business/first class awards: 3.17¢
In other words, you can get competitive — but not outsized — value for your United miles by redeeming them towards your card's annual fee.
How to redeem United miles for your credit card's annual fee
To redeem United miles for your credit card's annual fee, follow these steps:
- Log into your account at chase.com.
- On your account page, click on “More” on the top right corner.
- Select “Rewards dashboard” from the menu.
- Click on “Use MileagePlus miles with Pay Yourself Back” on the top navigation bar.
Key terms
- You can use miles to offset a United credit card's annual fee that posted in the past 90 days.
- There is no end date listed for this redemption option.
- You can redeem miles for a partial payment of your card's annual fee. This can provide additional options for your redemption strategy.
- Redemption values may chang at any time.
Other Non-Flight Redemptions for United Miles
With MileagePlus miles, you have a few redemption options for things other than standard award bookings or putting your miles towards your card's annual fee.
For example, you can use United miles to pay for a United Club Membership or use miles to offset cash airfare paid with a United co-branded credit card. But neither of these presents a particularly compelling value.
For example, United Club membership redemptions only offer a value of 0.73¢–0.76¢ per mile:
That's why it is a pretty big deal that United MileagePlus members have a non-travel redemption worth 1.5¢ per mile (or more).
Our Take
Redeeming United miles for United credit card fees offers a consistent value between 1.5¢ and 1.75¢ per mile. This redemption method is simple; it requires little effort to take advantage of and can lighten the burden on your wallet every year.
However, it's possible to obtain better value for your miles by booking United sweet spots. So maybe you have no interest in redeeming them to offset your United credit card's annual fee. Clearly, other redemption methods require knowing where to look and patience to find saver awards in a program that uses dynamic award pricing with no fixed award chart.
In the end, the value you assign to this feature will depend on how you value United miles and how much work you're willing to put in to obtain that value.
Show me how
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