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Chase Ultimate Rewards points are one of the most valuable and flexible rewards currencies available. You can redeem points directly through the Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal, easily transfer points to one of Chase's 14 travel partners, use points to pay for purchases and experiences, redeem for statement credits, and more.
Here are 22 different ways to redeem Chase Ultimate Rewards points.
Ultimate Rewards-Earning Credit Cards
Chase offers a full slate of credit cards. The following earn Ultimate Rewards points:
If you have these cards, you can access Chase's transfer partners, as well as redeem points for things like gift cards, statement credits, or booking travel in the travel portal.
Interestingly, the following cards are promoted as earning cash back but actually earn Ultimate Rewards:
- Chase Freedom Flex℠
- Chase Freedom Unlimited®
- Ink Business Cash® Credit Card
- Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card
You'll need one of the cards from the first list to access transfer partners, then you can combine your cash-back earnings from these cards with Ultimate Rewards from cards on the first list.
Related: All of the Cards that Earn Chase Ultimate Rewards Points
After choosing the card or combination of cards to best suit your individual goals and spending habits, the next step is learning the best ways to redeem your Ultimate Rewards. Here are 22 different ways to redeem Ultimate Rewards.
Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal
One of the simplest ways to redeem Ulitmate Rewards is through the Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal, which works similarly to online booking agencies like Expedia or Orbitz. You can book flights, hotels, tickets, and tours by searching as you normally would. At checkout, you can opt to pay with points.
If you're using points linked to your Sapphire Preferred or Ink Preferred cards, your points are worth 1.25¢ apiece here. Using the Sapphire Reserve, points are worth an elevated 1.5¢ each. With all other cards, points are worth 1¢ apiece.
Air travel
Although we usually recommend transferring points out to Chase's fantastic list of travel partners as the best way to maximize the value of your points, the Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal can sometimes make more sense. Here's when you might want to book cash rates through the portal:
- Using airline miles can be restrictive if you need to travel on specific dates or want to fly during peak season. Using the travel portal, you are not limited to a particular airline, and there are no blackout dates.
- When you book air travel through the Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal, you will earn miles and credit towards elite status with your preferred airline (because these are considered cash fares, even though you paid with points).
While booking flights through the Chase portal might not provide the theoretical highest cent-per-point value, it can provide enormous value in the form of flexibility. It's up to you which you value more for any given redemption.
Remember that booking flights through the Travel Portal with premium Ultimate Rewards earning cards allows you to redeem points for 1.25¢–1.5¢ for travel, so 100,000 points will give you $1,250-1,500 to spend on flights, depending on which credit card you're using.
Hotels
Typically, we try to redeem Ultimate Rewards points for 1.7¢ per point or more. If that's the case, when would it make sense to redeem them for 1.25¢ apiece through the Travel Portal on hotels — especially when you could achieve higher values from transferring to hotel or airline partners?
Similar to booking flights above, there are occasions when you need to book a hotel when there is no award availability for or more of the nights you want to stay. Another reason to use the travel portal for hotel bookings is when you have a limited amount of points in your account, as you can book using a combination of points and paying with your Chase credit card. Another perfect example: You need a hotel in a destination where there are no chain hotels available for redemption stays.
If you have the Sapphire Preferred, you have an annual $50 hotel credit (issued as a statement credit). This can be supplemented with points; simply choose $50 to be paid as cash, and the rest can be paid with points.
Reminder: Hotel stays booked through the Chase portal are not likely to count towards elite status, nor are you likely to receive any elite benefits on the stay.
Rental cars
When booking a car rental using the Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal, you'll get your card's 1¢–1.5¢ value per point on travel redemptions. Again, that's below the return we are trying to achieve when you take it at face value. However, Chase often has some of the best rental car rates around, meaning you will often find a discounted price that can offset the lower redemption value.
And if you are redeeming points from your account, you'll also be eligible for one of the most valuable benefits to come with your Sapphire Preferred, Sapphire Reserve, or Ink Preferred: Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver. You can find more details about the excellent benefits that come with the Sapphire Preferred. Review the Guide to Benefits for your particular card for full information on these rental car insurance benefits.
Cruises
It's possible to redeem your Chase Ultimate Rewards for cruises within the portal. Search and book as you would with other travel, filtering by things like departure port, cruise length, and destination. You'll have the option to pay with points, a credit card, or a combination of the two.
Activities
While not the most talked-about redemption option for Ultimate Rewards, it's worth looking at the Activities tab before booking any excursions in your chosen destination. Whether you are looking for a guided tour, tickets to a museum, or a sightseeing cruise on the harbor, you might find a deal within the travel portal. This is a good way to keep your out-of-pocket costs low, even though points are usually redeemed for flights and hotels.
Travel Partners
Chase Ulitmate Rewards transfer to travel partners at a 1:1 ratio, meaning 1,000 Ultimate Rewards points will convert to 1,000 points/miles in your chosen currency. Let's start with hotels then move to airlines.
Marriott Bonvoy
The PointSavers program gets an honorable mention here. You'll also get more out of your points by redeeming for five nights or more, as the fifth night is free. For a hotel that charges 20,000 points per night, a five-night stay will set you back 80,000 points instead of 100,000.
While not the best way to redeem Ultimate Rewards points, transfers to Marriott are a handy option if you need to top your account off with a few thousand points for a specific redemption.
IHG One Rewards
Transferring your Ultimate Rewards points to IHG at a 1:1 ratio is only advisable if you find an incredible deal or if you need to top off an account with a few points before making a redemption. Typically, you will get better value by redeeming your points for the minimum 1¢ per point cash back or booking through the Chase Travel Portal for the 20% discount on travel redemptions.
World of Hyatt
Often considered the sweet spot for transfers from Ultimate Rewards, World of Hyatt offers some fantastic value on points redemption. Transferring 40,000 Ultimate Rewards points to World of Hyatt would get you a night at the Park Hyatt Sydney (based on availability). In the example below, this Category 8 hotel would cost you $899 for a night, providing a value of 2.25 cents per point.
You can transfer and redeem Ultimate Rewards with 11 airlines. They don't all provide the same value, though.
Air Canada Aeroplan
If you ask most members of the points and miles community to choose their favorite Chase airline partner, we think a large percentage would say Air Canada Aeroplan. As a Star Alliance member, you can book flights to almost anywhere in the world, and most award bookings can be completed online, saving you time and effort. Plus, you can book stopovers for an additional 5,000 points, allowing for trips to multiple destinations without much extra cost.
Air France–KLM FlyingBlue
Flying Blue, the joint program of Air France and KLM, adds additional flexibility for redemptions within SkyTeam along with Air France's extended partner network outside of SkyTeam. You can find fantastic value when booking Flying Blue Promo Awards, a rotating list of destinations offering award bookings for up to 50% off. Additionally, Flying Blue offers 25% off standard award rates for children aged 2-11.
British Airways Executive Club / Aer Lingus AerClub / Iberia Plus / Qatar Airways Privilege Club
Avios are another great option to redeem points from Ultimate Rewards. As Oneworld alliance airlines, you can get excellent value flying transatlantic on Iberia or Aer Lingus. Alternatively, if you live on the West Coast, you can fly non-stop in economy class from several airports (including Phoenix) to Hawaii on American Airlines or Alaska Airlines for a cool 13,000 Avios.
Astute readers will notice that Qatar Airways isn't a Chase transfer partner. However, you can move Avios freely and instantly between all four of these programs, providing access to Qatar Airways Privilege Club bookings.
Emirates Skywards
Emirates Skywards may not be the first program many people think of when they want to redeem Ultimate Rewards, but our post highlighting the best Emirates Skywards sweet spots shows you can get outsized value from this program if you are happy to put in a little legwork. You'll also need to watch out for high surcharges on these bookings, so plan strategically to reduce your out-of-pocket costs.
JetBlue TrueBlue
Points are worth a fixed value with TrueBlue, and this isn't the most valuable transfer partner. Typically, points are worth less here than what you can get redeeming through other airline programs. However, many people love this program for how easy it is and the fact you can book any seat with points, as long as it's for sale with cash. This redemption option is most valuable if you're just shy of the points needed for an award booking and can make it happen by transferring a few Chase points to JetBlue.
Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
This is longtime favorite transfer partner for any frequent flyer. While KrisFlyer is stingy with its first- and business-class award space on long-haul flight awards booked via partner airline miles, Singapore Airlines makes that space available to its KrisFlyer members using KrisFlyer miles. One of the best promotions Singapore Airlines offers is its monthly Spontaneous Escapes, which can offer incredible savings on short-notice bookings.
Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards
As Southwest Rapid Rewards is a revenue-based loyalty program, it won't provide outsized value for your points. However, travelers with a Companion Pass can get excessively good value with “buy one, get one free” tickets — a feature unique to Southwest.
Related: When Should You Transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards to Southwest?
United Airlines MileagePlus
While United recently devalued its loyalty program, it can still present great value — especially with partner airlines. For example, short-segment, intra-European flights on Star Alliance partners can be redeemed for as few as 6,500 United miles.
This flight from London to Brussels on Brussels Airlines would yield a 3.08¢ per point value when redeeming 6,500 United miles and $47.70 — instead of paying $245 in cash.
Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
Although you may find better value and more flexibility in transferring Ultimate Rewards points to United MileagePlus or British Airways Avios, Virgin Atlantic can provide value. While flights to and through Virgin Atlantic's hubs in England can add significant cash fees to your booking, there are incredible sweet spots in this program. Those include Delta One flights to Europe and premium cabins on ANA.
Purchases and Statement Credits Using Ultimate Rewards
Cash back
You can redeem Ultimate Rewards as a statement credit at a flat rate of 1 cent per point, but that is one of the lowest redemption rates available. That said, if you are not a traveler and have an account full of Ultimate Rewards, redeeming 60,000 points as a statement credit is still a cool $600 cash back and is worthy of consideration.
Gift cards
Similar to the statement credit option, redeeming for gift cards is not on our list of top redemptions. You'll typically receive a value of 1¢ per point. You'll sometimes find gift cards on sale for a 10% or 20% discount, but you'll still find better redemption value elsewhere on this list.
Chase Experiences
A different — and often memorable way — to redeem Ultimate Rewards points is through Exclusive Cardmember Events. The value of these is often hard to pin down, as Chase curates these events and you may not have other ways to access them. The list of events and experiences changes, so check back often. Redemptions for these events fetch 1¢ per point in value.
Apple products
As a frequent flyer, my first impression was that I could get better value with airlines than using my Ultimate Rewards to pay for Apple purchases. But that depends entirely on your goals for using your points. If your goal in applying for a card like the Sapphire Preferred had nothing to do with travel and instead was to ease the financial strain of an upcoming holiday shopping season, then using your Ultimate Rewards points for Apple products makes perfect sense. The standard redemption rate for Apple purchases is 1 cent per point, but Chase has offered promotions to boost this rate in the past.
Pay Yourself Back
Launched during the onset of the pandemic and extended several times since, Pay Yourself Back allows you to redeem Ultimate Rewards at elevated rates for certain purchase categories. The eligible categories have changed multiple times, but this presents better value than other options discussed here.
Final Thoughts
There you have it — the ultimate list of 22 different ways to redeem Ultimate Rewards. There are numerous options for using your points (more than what we've covered here), and we haven't even touched on all the other benefits that go with the Sapphire Preferred, Ink Preferred, or the Sapphire Reserve.
As far as loyalty programs go, we rate Chase Ultimate Rewards in the top tier, due to the value of the points, how easily they can be transferred, and the flexibility offered in the fantastic list of available redemptions.
For additional information about Chase Ultimate Rewards, check out these articles:
- How to Maximize Chase Ultimate Rewards Points for Flights Within North America
- How to Combine Chase Ultimate Rewards Points Between Credit Cards
- Benefits of Booking Award Flights via the Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal
- Do Chase Ultimate Rewards Points Expire?
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 been searching and can’t find any articles on how Chase Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal does not give you any information on vendors when booking activities. I want to know the company before I book so that I can check them out and read their reviews. Do you have any experience with this?
Yes, in my experience it has been all opaque bookings, unfortunately.
Hi Howie…first of all, thank you for all of the great information and timely responses. I was a little confused by one of the statements in the section describing the Chase Freedom card. I have a Chase Sapphire Reserve card which I love but I would also like to access the 5x points per dollar on their rotating categories for the Chase Freedom Card. But in the section describing the Chase Freedom card I saw this statement, “If you’re also a cardholder of the Sapphire Preferred or Ink Preferred, you can combine the Ultimate Rewards earned on the Freedom Card with either of them for redemption on travel.” Does this mean that you can’t combing the Ultimate Rewards earned on the Freedom Card with the Ultimate Rewards earned on the Sapphire Reserve Card?
In your opinion would it be beneficial to have both the Sapphire Reserve and the Freedom, knowing I would only use the Freedom on the 5x monthly categories? Thanks!
Ryan, thanks for the question and I’ve updated the post to specifically call out that the Sapphire Reserve is included as well. More on that here too: https://awardwallet.com/blog/combine-chase-ultimate-rewards-multiple-credit-cards/. In my personal opinion, the Freedom is a great addition with the 5x categories, especially as it has no annual fee. I have it along with a Freedom Unlimited and Ink Cash so I can max out on my bonus categories with no annual fee cards.
Hi Howie: I’m posting this to the UR page instead of the Chase Freedom page since it’s all about earning as many UR points as possible and there isn’t much activity on the Freedom page right now (feel free to move it if you’d like). The first quarter 5% bonus category on the Freedom card is gas stations, and checking the UR portal I see I’m only about half way to the maximum 7,500 bonus points with five days left until the category changes on April 1. To maximize the benefit, should I stop by my favorite gas station this week and charge a $500 gas gift card to my Freedom card? That’ll gain me 2,500 bonus UR points right there? If there are no restrictions against this strategy, it seems like something everyone with a Freedom card in their portfolio should be doing right now. Thanks!
That would absolutely work. Keep in mind, you’ve then got $500 in gas to work through and then need to compare the time value of your money. If you don’t need the cash now take the points now.
My husband and I are planning a trip to Europe in 2018. Typically, we travel domestically a few times per year (some flying, some driving) using hotel points and we also use Southwest Rapid rewards to fly our daughter home during college breaks. We currently use Hilton AMEX, Hyatt Visa and a Southwest card. We are considering getting the Chase Sapphire Reserve card to get the 100,000 bonus points (walk in branch to apply). Would you recommend this card for us, and if so which of the cards that we have should we eliminate? Also, does the CSR card allow for transfer of points to Hilton?
Maureen, the points earned with the CSR, Ultimate Rewards, do not transfer to Hilton.
As for which cards to eliminate — none? It really depends on how you’re using your cards now and what you’re using each of the earnings for. I guess if I were to eliminate a single card it might be the Southwest card. I’d keep the Hyatt for the free night certificate and the Hilton card if it is the one with no fee.
As far as recommending this card, its the #1 card I’ve recommended to all family and friends looking for $2000+ in value for travel from a single card.
hi, could you tell me if there is a way to use URP from chase to book a flight on Brussels airline thru ETIHAD airlines. As you know , you only need 36,620 points for round trip from JFK to BRU booking thru ETIHAD. THANK YOU charles f mccabe
You can, but not at the 36k redemption. You’d need to have miles in your Etihad account for that.
Traveling to Manila from Miami 2017. Thinking of opening a card to get lounge access for layovers, travel benefits and no international transaction. Will be paying for 4 other family members. is the Chase sapphire reserve the best card? if not, which is the best card of this?
It’d be the space I would start.
Of these 4 cards, which is the best for generating hotel and airline points: Starwood AMX, Marriott Rewards, Chase Sapphire Preferred, and Chase Sapphire Reserve?
I’d go with the Sapphire Reserve and the SPG Amex as a backup.
How do you think the Capital One Venture or Quicksilver compares to the Chase Sapphire?
Joanne, these card products are vastly different in their rewards structure. The Capital One Venture and Quicksilver cards are effectively cash-back cards. Their rewards are of a fixed-value and regardless of if you have 10, 100 or 1,000,000 points, each point is with the same amount on a fixed cash-exchange scale.
The Sapphire Preferred, while it does have a fixed-value if you book travel directly through the Ultimate Rewards travel portal (1.25 cents/point), but you can potentially receive exponentially greater value by leveraging transfer partners such as United or Hyatt, where the number of points required to secure a hotel room night or flight is not directly correlated to the cost of a hotel room — take a look here for more details: https://awardwallet.com/blog/different-ways-to-redeem-ultimate-rewards/
Happy to help steer you in the right direction here, the key that it all comes down to are knowing what your goals are. If you’re interested in international business/first class travel and staying at top hotels, you’ll likely get significantly better value from the Ultimate Rewards program.
In the next few years, my wife and I will be traveling
RT to/for Honolulu, either to Oak or Phoenix, because of our Alaska and HawnAir CC.
After that, are there other option? We want to traveling first class from the get-go instead of trying for an upgrade.
Nate, check out: https://awardwallet.com/blog/the-best-points-and-miles-to-use-for-free-flights-to-hawaii/
What about the UBS Visa that is offering 50,000 bonus points with “My Choice Rewards” are these transferable???
Ann, I’m not familiar with the particular offer from UBS, however, based on my understanding of their rewards program, their points are not transferrable to travel partners. Instead the points function as a currency that you can use within their rewards portal.