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Many “no-frills” hotel brands offer clean rooms, free breakfast, and a lower price at checkout than full-service hotels. Avid Hotels, part of the
Here's our guide to the Avid hotel brand.
Basics of the Avid Hotel Brand
IHG sorts its 21 brands into five “collections,” based on their luxury and service levels. Avid belongs to the Essentials Collection alongside Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, and Garner. The collection focuses on practical, affordable stays with the essentials travelers need.
IHG announced the brand in 2017, with the first property opening in Oklahoma City in 2018. The brand now has over 80 Avid hotels, with another 100-plus in the development pipeline, across the United States, Canada, and Mexico.
Avid Hotels are built from the ground up. That means many rooms will skew newer than those at other efficient property brands.
What To Expect From an Avid Hotels Stay
An Avid hotel stay is designed around a comfortable visit with modern conveniences. Rooms are compact, but focus on quality bedding, blackout roller shades, and a sound-reducing headboard. TVs are typically 55-inch, with casting ability for your own streaming accounts.
Storage is open shelving and hooks instead of an enclosed closet, and most rooms include a mini-fridge. A microwave is available downstairs in the market.
Outside the room, features across the brand include:
- Free hot breakfast every morning, with rotating hot items
- Free coffee available 24 hours a day
- Complimentary Wi-Fi
- A fitness room
- A 24/7 market
Avid hotels do not offer on-site restaurants or bars beyond breakfast and items sold in the market. The brand also does not offer meeting space. Some properties may feature pools, but that's not a brand standard of Avid.
Earning and Redeeming IHG One Rewards Points at Avid Hotels
Avid participates fully in IHG One Rewards. Base members collect 10 points per dollar on qualifying spend, and IHG elite status adds a bonus — all the way up to a 100% bonus for IHG Diamond Elites. Qualifying stays also count toward elite status.
Some elite perks like suite upgrades and free breakfast are less meaningful at a limited-service brand like Avid. The perks that may be useful at Avid are the points multipliers, 2 pm late checkout (upon request), early check-in when available, and Platinum Elite and Diamond Elite guaranteed room availability with 72 hours' notice.
On the redemption side, Avid can also be a relatively affordable way to use IHG points. Like other IHG properties, redemptions are dynamically priced. IHG advertises Reward Nights starting at 10,000 points, though the amount required at a particular Avid hotel can change daily based on factors such as cash rates, demand, location, and date.
Stacking a promotion on a paid stay raises your effective return. IHG runs global and regional bonus offers throughout the year, and AwardWallet keeps a running list on our current IHG promotions page. Just make sure to register before check-in.
Credit Card Earning at Avid
IHG
The new IHG One Rewards Premier Select Credit Card (Rates & Fees) is the most premium option, with a $350 annual fee and automatic Platinum Elite status.
It earns up to 28X total points on IHG stays, including 12X points from the card itself. Cardholders also earn 6X points on dining and other travel and 3X points on other purchases. Other perks include an anniversary Free Night with a 60,000-point redemption cap, the ability to add points for more expensive stays, 20 Elite Night Credits each calendar year, and a fourth night free on eligible four-night award stays.
For travelers who stay with IHG often enough to use its annual credits and benefits, those perks can make Avid stays even more rewarding.
- Earn up to 17X points spent when you stay at IHG Hotels & Resorts
- 3X points per $1 spent on dining, at grocery stores, and gas stations
- 2X points per $1 spent on all other purchases
The earning for spending at IHG hotels breaks down as follows:
- Earn 5X points for being a IHG One Rewards Card member
- Earn up to 2X points from IHG® with Silver Elite Status, a benefit of this Card
- Earn up to 10X points from IHG® for being an IHG® Rewards Club Member (Being a cardholder is not required to earn this bonus for participating in the IHG®
loyalty program
$150Rates & Fees
- Earn up to 24X points total per $1 spent when you stay at IHG Hotels & Resorts
- 5X points per $1 spent on flights booked directly, car rental agencies, at gas stations, grocery stores, and restaurants
- 3X points per $1 spent on all other purchases
The earning for spending at IHG hotels breaks down as follows:
- Earn 10X points for being a IHG One Rewards Premier Card member
- Earn up to 4X points from IHG® with Gold Elite Status, a benefit of having this card
- Earn up to 10X points from IHG® for being an IHG® One Rewards member (Being a cardholder is not required to earn this bonus for participating in the IHG® loyalty program)
$350Rates & Fees
- Earn up to 28 points total per $1 spent when you stay at an IHG hotel
- 6X points per $1 spent on dining and all other travel, including rideshare
- 3X points per $1 spent on all other purchases
The earning for spending at IHG hotels breaks down as follows:
- Earn 12X points for being an IHG One Rewards Premier Select Credit Card member
- Earn up to 6X points from IHG® with Platinum Elite Status, a benefit of having this card
- Earn up to 10X points from IHG® for being an IHG® One Rewards member (Being a cardholder is not required to earn this bonus for participating in the IHG® loyalty program)
How To Book an Avid Hotel
To book, search Avid properties through IHG.com or the IHG One Rewards app, where you can toggle between cash rates, points, and Points & Cash on one results screen. Sign in first so member rates appear.
Be sure to book direct as well. Reservations made through third-party travel sites earn no IHG One Rewards points and carry no elite benefits at check-in.
Are Avid Hotels Worth It?
Avid properties make sense when the reason to stay is functional: convenient overnight driving stops, a place to crash for a sporting event or wedding, or a few nights near a job site.
Look elsewhere when the hotel needs to do more. Travelers who want a larger breakfast spread or more places to hang out should consider other brands. In the IHG family, those who need meeting rooms or a restaurant should move up to Holiday Inn properties. Families settling in for a week are better served by the full kitchens at Staybridge Suites or Candlewood Suites.
Bottom Line
Avid is a dependable, reasonably priced midscale brand with over 80 open properties and many more to come. It earns and redeems IHG One Rewards points just like other IHG properties.
Just make sure to set your expectations accordingly: a clean room, hot breakfast, and a fair price are the main draw.
For rates and fees of the cards mentioned in this post, please visit the following links: IHG One Rewards Premier Select Credit Card (Rates & Fees), IHG One Rewards Credit Card (Rates & Fees), and IHG One Rewards Premier Credit Card (Rates & Fees)
