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The key to successful rewards travel is flexibility. Flexible rewards points enable you to transfer points to a variety of travel partners and provide access to dozens of different rewards programs. When you transfer points to partners, you can book award travel to your chosen destination across a huge array of airlines and hotel brands while extracting maximum value from your rewards.
Determining the best flexible rewards points for travel, however, is highly subjective. It's dependent on your travel goals, where you live, how you spend your money, and — maybe above all — how you travel.
If you stay primarily in Airbnb properties and hostels, for example, collecting points that transfer to Hilton and Hyatt is unlikely to provide a good return, because you can't redeem them for these stays. However, if you're considering more high-end accommodations, then earning a currency that transfers to luxury hotels — and several airlines — will provide the best value and the most flexibility for your travel goals.
Flexible rewards points are not created equal, so before you start to earn points in one currency over another, keep reading to learn what makes each one stand out.
Page Contents
What Are Flexible Rewards Points?
Flexible rewards points or currencies take a few different forms:
- Cash back
- Fixed-value points/miles
- Transferable points
Cash back is a flexible rewards currency, but it's not the most valuable. You can’t leverage a cash back card for higher value; it’s a straight 1%–2% cash back on everything you spend, plus additional cash back on bonus categories if the card features them.
Fixed-value points and miles like those earned with the U.S. Bank Altitude™ Reserve Visa Infinite® Card are very flexible. They can be redeemed for almost any travel purchase. But, again, points are only worth 1.25¢ each when redeemed for travel purchases. The Altitude Reserve earns 5X points prepaid hotels and car rentals booked directly in the Altitude Rewards Center, 3X on eligible travel purchases and mobile wallet spending, and 1X on all other purchases, and points are perfect if you’re staying in a hotel that doesn’t belong to a rewards program or purchasing transit tickets like a Eurail Pass. But there are more valuable options.
Related: Back to Basics: An Introduction to the Types of Reward Points
Transferable rewards points offer the highest value of all the flexible rewards currencies. That's because you can transfer them to select travel partners to redeem within those loyalty programs, allowing you to book with fewer points or redeem for travel you'd never pay for with cash. Transfer times vary, so be sure to reference transfer times page to learn how long to expect.
Here are five rewards programs that offer high-value flexible rewards currencies:
- American Express Membership Rewards
- Capital One Rewards
- Chase Ultimate Rewards
- Citi ThankYou® Rewards
- Marriott Bonvoy
These programs offer flexible points, a variety of high-value transfer partners, and a diverse range of earning options — including credit cards, online shopping and dining programs — or, with Marriott, via regular stays and promo opportunities.
Let's look at which credit cards earn each currency, what their transfer partners are, and a few best-value redemptions for each one.
The Best Flexible Rewards Currencies
American Express Membership Rewards
Amex offers members great options for earning points. Whether it’s 5x points on airfare with The Platinum Card® from American Express (on up to $500,000 of airfare purchases per calendar year booked directly with airlines) or earning 2x at U.S. supermarkets on up to $6,000 per year in purchases, then 1x with the Amex EveryDay® Credit Card, there's a huge stable of cards that earn Membership Rewards. Credit card options range from no-annual-fee cards for everyday purchases to ultra-premium cards that offer the best elite perks and lounge access in rewards travel.
Membership Rewards points transfer to 18 different airline partners and three hotel partners. One of the better redemption strategies for Amex Membership Rewards can be found with The Business Platinum Card® from American Express. Cardholders get a 35% rebate on points when using Pay with Points on their selected airline or when booking first- or business-class flights with any airline booked through the American Express Travel® website. This could potentially save thousands of dollars over the long haul, offering up to one million points back per year. Enrollment is required for select Amex benefits.
But you don't have to pay hundreds of dollars in annual fees for a premium card to get positive value out of Membership Rewards. Thanks to the breadth of transfer options offered by Amex, you have no shortage of options. You even have access to point transfers with The Blue Business® Plus Credit Card from American Express, which has no annual fee (Rates & Fees), though Citi and Chase require you to have a card with an annual fee to access the full list of transfer partners.
Here are some great ways to redeem Amex Membership Rewards points:
- Take advantage of ANA sweet spots for business-class flights to Europe or ANA's around-the-world award tickets.
- Transfer miles to Singapore Airlines Krisflyer to score tickets to Hawaii on partner airlines like United Airlines or Alaska Airlines.
- Book short American Airlines flights using British Airways Avios for a cheaper price.
Related: Complete Guide to American Express Membership Rewards Transfer Partners
Capital One miles
Capital One launched its transferable rewards more recently than the others on this list, but the issuer has quickly made up for lost time by adding new partners and improving transfer ratios. Although you can transfer Capital One miles to 19 different airline and hotel transfer partners, a lot of the value from Capital One credit cards can be found when booking in the Capital One travel portal or when redeeming Capital One miles against travel purchases where you couldn't use a transfer partner. Plus, Capital One has a growing list of lounge locations.
For example, cardholders of the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card can earn 2 Miles per dollar on every purchase, every day. 10 Miles per dollar on hotels and rental cars booked through Capital One Travel. 5 Miles per dollar on flights and vacation rentals booked through Capital One Travel. In comparison to earnings within the Chase and Amex travel portals, Capital One beats them by a long shot when paying cash for travel. Moreover, you'll have access to all of the Capital One transfer partners with the no-annual-fee Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card — something that can't be said for Citi or Chase.
You can redeem Capital One miles for infield baseball tickets. But there are tons of other ways to get incredible value with the best Capital One transfer partners. Here are just a few examples:
- Transfer miles to Etihad and fly from the U.S. to Europe in American Airlines Flagship First or Business.
- Use Wyndham Rewards for hotel stays as low as 7,500 points per night.
- Book with Turkish Airlines Miles & Smiles to fly on United to Hawaii for 10,000 miles per person.
Related: How To Maximize Capital One Miles for Flights Within North America
Chase Ultimate Rewards
Chase Ultimate Rewards is an especially valuable flexible rewards currency. Chase offers a variety of credit cards that earn Ultimate Rewards points, with well-thought-out bonus categories and stellar benefits. These cards can be useful for any type of spending, including drug stores and everyday spending with the Chase Freedom Flex℠ or premium travel with the Chase Sapphire Reserve® (Rates & Fees). And you can't forget about Chase's business cards, including the Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card (Rates & Fees).
Thanks to so many credit card options, it's easy to build a substantial amount of points in a relatively short amount of time. These points are both flexible and valuable, whether you choose to redeem directly via the Chase travel portal or utilize Ultimate Rewards transfer partners.
But what sets Chase Ultimate Rewards apart is that you can earn them with personal and business cards, plus you can pool all of your points together — including cash-back earning cards — and use them for one redemption or transfer out to travel partners if you have an Ultimate Rewards card with an annual fee.
You can redeem Chase Ultimate Rewards points for great travel experiences, including:
- Transfer to World of Hyatt to redeem for 5-star hotel stays, such as the Park Hyatt Paris Vendome, or budget hotels for as little as 3,500 points per night.
- Transfer to Air Canada Aeroplan where you can redeem your points and miles with dozens of additional airlines at competitive rates without high taxes and fees.
- Utilize United Airlines sweet spots like the Excursionist Perk to add a free flight to your next award.
Related: Different Ways To Redeem Ultimate Rewards
Citi ThankYou Rewards
Citi ThankYou Rewards might not be as popular as others on this list. But, if you have the right card — or a trifecta of Citi cards — you can do a lot with ThankYou points. Citi Prestige® Card (no longer open to new applicants) and Citi Strata Premier℠ Card cardholders can transfer their ThankYou Points to all of Citi's 21 transfer partners. Other cards that earn ThankYou Rewards only offer transfers to Choice Privileges, JetBlue TrueBlue, and Wyndham Rewards.
Some great ways to use Citi ThankYou Rewards include:
- Transfer rewards to Avianca LifeMiles to book United flights in the U.S. for less than what United charges.
- Transfer to Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer to take advantage of the airline's monthly Spontaneous Escapes offers.
- ThankYou Points are excellent for travel in and around Asia-Pacific, counting Qantas, Singapore, and Cathay Pacific as transfer partners.
Related: Best Uses of Citi ThankYou Points for Flights Within North America
Marriott Bonvoy
Marriott Bonvoy is the only hotel loyalty program on our list, but its points can be considered flexible, thanks to the ability to transfer Marriott points to a whopping 40 airline partners. Though not the best use of points, you can transfer at a rate of 3:1 to all partners except for Air New Zealand AirPoints, where the transfer ratio is 200:1. You'll also get a 5,000-point bonus when you transfer 60,000 Marriott Bonvoy points to most of these airline partners.
If you'd like to earn Marriott Bonvoy points to transfer to airline partners or top off your airline loyalty account, many different Marriott credit cards earn Bonvoy points.
The other rewards currencies on this list are most valuable when transferred to partners, but that's honestly not the case with Marriott Bonvoy points. For that reason, even though it's possible to transfer points to airlines, this isn't the best way to use Marriott points. Instead, consult the following to learn more about using your Marriott points for hotel stays:
- Best Marriott Points Redemptions for Luxury Stays
- Saving Money With Marriott Bonvoy Cash + Points Stays
Redemption costs with Marriott can seem high, but a 90,000-point redemption night at the St. Regis Bora Bora saves you the $1,500 nightly cash rate. When booking a stay like this with points, you get over 1.6 cents in value for your Marriott Bonvoy points — a much better value than transferring points to Marriott's airline partners.
Comparing Flexible Rewards Points
When it comes to flexible rewards points, it's clear that not all currencies are created equal.
The first and most important thing to know when choosing a currency to earn is where you can transfer points to and thus get the most value from your rewards. Amex, Capital One, Chase, and Citi all offer partners within the major airline alliances and cards to help you access these transfers. Depending on the credit cards you have, you also might get additional perks like elevated earnings for bookings made through a travel portal, annual spending credits, lounge access, and more.
Marriott Bonvoy's point transfers are the most restrictive and therefore the least valuable in the transferrable points conversation. That said, topping off an airline account with hotel points to enable a valuable flight booking is a nice tool to have if you need it.
Related: Chase Ultimate Rewards vs. American Express Membership Rewards: Which Is Better?
Final Thoughts
Flexible rewards points provide one of the best methods of maximizing rewards travel. The points offer travelers the chance to leverage sweet spots across multiple programs and the flexibility to change airlines or hotels when award availability is slim or in the case of a program devaluation.
Different travelers will have a different view of which program is best. It will depend on your travel style and travel goal, as well as which airlines and hotels you frequent.
What's your favorite flexible rewards currency? Let us know why you love it in the comments below.
For rates and fees of the cards mentioned in this post, please visit the following links: The Blue Business® Plus Credit Card from American Express (Rates & Fees), Chase Sapphire Reserve® (Rates & Fees), and Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card (Rates & Fees)
The comments on this page are not provided, reviewed, or otherwise approved by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
I have 13, 357 Flying Blue KLM airmiles, which I will never use.
They are valid until December 2022.
I would like to transfer them to my Virgin Atlantic Airmiles account.
Or can I sell them ?
Is this possible, and how do I do it.?
No, you can’t transfer Flying Blue miles to Virgin Atlantic (or other mileage programs). And we don’t recommend selling them (it’s against the rules and you might be permanently shut down). However, you can transfer Flying Blue miles to Accor Live Limitless: https://awardwallet.com/blog/accor-flying-blue-partnership/
I have just converted 3000 Marriott Bonvoy points into 1000 AAdvantage miles. It seems that one must convert a minimum of 3000 Marriott points for such a transaction.
I haven’t had the best experiences with Marriott. Their customer service often leaves much to be desired. It also takes way too long for points to credit and redeem.
I love seeing the competition. I think Chase is the easiest to use and has the best redemption rates. Capital One has very unique partners that come in handy in Europe. Amex has the most options, but I don’t like that they charge to transfer.
Best option, collect all three!
I have owned Chase Ultimate Rewards Cards (Sapphire and Freedom) and for building points, these are definitely the easiest cards to use. I really wish they had more US Domestic Airlines attached to their points system but having United, Southwest and Marriott attached provides more than enough options. I also have a Capital One Venture Card that is more of a dollar reward than miles reward but for someone who travels a lot, was super easy to claim the initial $500 card opening reward as you basically deduct $500 from your credit card statement on travel related purchases. I just opened a Bonvoy card and look forward to the benefits that come with it!
I’ve been happy with both Capital One and Bank of America’s mile redemption system. Although I’m interested in switching to a card with lounge access perks.
Anyone have any tops on getting to Mykonos from NY with one stop, flying 1st class using points? Right now I have 500 UR, 500k Bonvoy, 100k BA.
Any advice would be great!
A little disappointing to not see any major financial institutions.card providers described in this article partnering with American Airlines…
I like Citi TY points.
Always difficult to compare apples to apples. Thanks for the great writeup!
I love UR from Chase, the only thing missing was transfer bonus like American Express had but now they got that too!!! Now they just have to have Chase offers have a possibility of earning UR instead of cashback
I hope that the BA transfer bonus is the start of a trend. I’d love to see Chase continuing this.
In my opinion Chase UR points has the best transfer deals and partners. Having a Chase Sapphire Reserve card also allows the flexibility of redeeming those points at 1.5 cents each which is an amazing 50% premium.
Hands down Chase points are the best of all I can think of.
I am from Canada, and unfortunately our credit card deals are not as competitive as the Americans. From the rewards described above, only AMEX Membership Rewards is applicable here. However AMEX is not widely accepted as it charges a higher fee on the merchants. I did manage to collect a good sum of AMEX points, but must carry as Visa or Mastercard as backup if encountered a merchant who refuses to take AMEX.
The best thing to do is not to accumulate too many points. These points are good but they are not gold – they will not appreciate in value!
Well said. Quite the opposite in fact. Points depreciate and get devalued constantly.
We have loved our UR points. We just used them for a few nights in Portugal and it was totally worth it!
I’ve been really pleased with UR points and have transferred them to some amazing Business Saver awards. 80k in Business from Chicago to Adelaide with a long enough layover in Singapore that I was able to check out the city. Worth it!
My favorite is the chase ultimate reward points they always seem to be the best transfer deals for me
Ulimate Rewards and Membership Rewards have both been pretty good to me.
I really like UR points. Best use is for luxury Hyatts around the world. You can use extra points for club lounge access and really up your experience.
great breakdown of the different flexible programs. I think most are in favor of UR but I can see utility in having others too.
I can transfer points only from American Express and Marriott even though with the new travel package offer the conversion from Marriott is not as favourable as it was in the past.
Regrettably we have limited opportunities for flexible rewards programs in Australia compared to those in the US. We have Amex but the devaluation has kicked in and Citi doesn’t seem like a value for money proposition over here.
I somehow figured out that the Chase UR were really good, but until I found Abroaders to help me figure out how to use them, I was using the Chase site to book flights….. Not the best thing!! So glad I found these folks!
Sometimes I think of my citicashback card as “travel currency”. I simply use my 2% cash back to offset the price of travel. Probably the most flexible way to go.
True but don’t you miss finding opportunities for outsized value?
It is great to have lots of transfer options as it leaves you less at risk of a sudden change or devaluation in a particular program.
UR points are clearly the best, as I’ve been able to get crazy good value from Hyatt. I once booked a room at a Hyatt Place in Ann Arbor, MI on a football weekend for 8,000 points a night. The rooms were going for $449 a night (plus taxes!). I’ve also transferred to Hyatt to book the Park Hyatt Maldives for 20,000 points a night (villas go for $1200 a night!). Also, if you happen to be fortunate enough to have earned a Southwest Airlines Companion Pass, you can get amazing value from transfers to Southwest as well.
That’s a really good point. Getting the companion pass doubles the value of your UR points. It could be good to stockpile UR points if you want to make a run at SW CP.
I really wish you all would stop promoting the Arrival Plus. It’s not a good card for the long term and the only reason to get it is for the sign up bonus. Beyond that, virtually everyone would do better with a no annual fee 2% cash back card.
Thanks for the feedback, Robert. We do our best to cover cards that appeal to different types of goals. For folks that like simplicity, the Barclay Arrival is 5% better than a 2% cash-back card for travel, and the welcome bonus is far better than what you’d find with most cash-back cards.
It has an $89 annual fee if I’m remembering correctly though right? So an extra .1% (that’s 0.001) for $89? You have to spend $89,000 a year to come out ahead of a no annual fee 2% cashback card.
The one and only perk is that it has no foreign transaction fees so if you live overseas, you would them compare to the Quicksilver or a 1.5% cashback card so that’s a difference of .6% (0.006) which would then be a breakeven point of $14,833 of overseas spending.
Not my cup of tea but situations do theoretically exist where this is a good card for someone.
I have them all. The instant transfers are the best.
Do you have the Capital One? How are those airlines/transfers?
Recently added Arrival Plus for for more flexibility.
Amex seems to have the best transferable points program nowadays.
Chase really needs to add new partners to stay competitive.
Chase should also look to do bonuses like with what they’re doing with BA right now. It’s not been done before but hopefully it continues.
i don’t trust Marriott Bonavoy. Maybe because they gutted SPG.
I personally think UR is the best: I use to move my points either to Southwest or British Airways Avios, which I’ve already used a couple of times to reach Hawaii from the West Coast for 25k (two-way)!
I am also a flexible points convert. Since I like to have status with airlines, I tend to “buy” my flights through the travel portal with those points: not the best value on the surface, but when I have status and can change my flights without fees and get home earlier…that is worth a lot. An upgrade to business class here and there isn’t bad either. Since I earn points from my flights, I use those for the expensive long haul business class seats.
Same, or similar. It doesn’t make sense to have the United card and earn crap miles when you can have CSP or CSR and transfer your miles if you so choose but you earned more miles on those two cards than the United card would have.
Gosh! Excellent summary. I have to get on the Arrival Plus card and maybe a Chase card too.
Arguments can be made either way, but I do prefer Ultimate Rewards for flexibility.
I think Chase is the one! Able to transfer mostly instant to most airline.
That’s a good point. Transfer partners are important but timeliness of the transfer is also valuable.
I just got the Amex Everyday. I’m still waiting on my points to come in. I hit the 20 charges and I am eager to see how many points I’ll earn.
I’m hoping to earn points faster with Amex instead of Chase. Has anyone come across that they earn points faster with Amex than Chase?
I have the freedom card and sapphire with Chase and my points increase fairly well but need more for a trip I’m planning. I’m hoping that Amex will make up some difference.
Use both but use the card that nets the most points ie groceries vs dining.
Citi needs more partners. Amex MR and UR are way better to use than Citi TYP
Chase points are great!
Chase UR and Amex MR for the win
Excellent for European travel, especially when you’re staying in a hotel that doesn’t belong to a rewards program or purchasing transit tickets like a Eurail Pass. Works for me.
UR for the win!
yes transferable points are the way to go
Agreed. The value is in the versatility and not being locked into one program.
I agree that Chase is the best. I get outsized value just from Hyatt transfers, but when there is no Hyatt I can turn to IHG or Marriott. United’s program has also enabled me to garner huge value with Business class partner flights but that is somewhat of a thing of the past now. Losing Korean Air was a bit of a bummer though. I was able to transfer enough UR points to fly them Business to São Paulo for the 2014 World Cup, which was a huge score.
The loss of Korean was a bummer indeed. Still Chase retains the greatest number of loyalty programs that I actively engage with, that’s why they generally remain my first choice when pulling a card out of my wallet.
Huge score indeed… both the Business seats and the particular event your trip took you. You got to see the team that’s good enough to have earned the nickname “The Team” win yet another.
The best advice is always to diversify one’s portfolio, even when it comes to flexible points. I personally prefer UR and AmEx MR points.
I totally agree with you.
Definitely agree but holding two high cost cards has to make sense too.