Our “Famous Card Explorer”

Aeroplan does not pass along any fuel surcharges, making this a great program for Star Alliance flights. Two huge additional benefits are a stopover on your trip for just 5,000 miles and a lap infant (under 2) is just $25 CAD. One small negative is that they do have fees for cancelling an award ticket.

Instant Transfers as well as solid transfer partners. The value would go up if they had any hotel partners with a fair exchange rate. ANA (an exception to instant transfers), Virgin, Air Canada and Avianca are top airline partners for maximizing your points. They can also transfer to Delta if you wish and while the rates aren't ideal, they can transfer to Marriott and Hilton as well.  ANA provides almost unbeatable value for booking a Round the World flight all in Business Class. The stated value also assumes you will take advantage of transfer partners rather than book via their booking portal, where they are only worth between 1 and 1.5 cents. We've also created a Guide to American Express Membership Rewards.

They have a similar network to AA in terms of reach via the Star Alliance and also (unlike Delta) allow for booking First Class international awards in the Star Alliance network, but they charge noticeably more for Partner Awards and the rates keep (stealthily) rising. United partner Lufthansa tends to have good availability to Europe making it somewhat easier to use to Europe than American, which relies heavily on British Airways and BA charges incredibly steep surcharges on those awards.

Instant Transfers as well as solid transfer partners. The value would go up if they had any hotel partners with a fair exchange rate. ANA (an exception to instant transfers), Virgin, Air Canada and Avianca are top airline partners for maximizing your points. They can also transfer to Delta if you wish and while the rates aren't ideal, they can transfer to Marriott and Hilton as well.  ANA provides almost unbeatable value for booking a Round the World flight all in Business Class. The stated value also assumes you will take advantage of transfer partners rather than book via their booking portal, where they are only worth between 1 and 1.5 cents. We've also created a Guide to American Express Membership Rewards.

Hyatt award rates range from 3,500 to 45,000 points per night at their regular hotels and resorts. At all-inclusive resorts and Miraval, the prices can reach as high as 58,000 points per night, Almost without fail, during even remotely peak times, we can find roughly 2 cents per point in value. You can even book Suites for incrementally more points (Premium Suite costs twice as much as a room, for example). I tend to find these are one of the best ways to spend Chase Ultimate Rewards points which transfer 1:1. They are the only major hotel program in the US with fixed award charts making it a great program to be able to set goals for your redemptions..

The Sapphire Reserve, Sapphire Preferred, and Ink Preferred all have the ability to transfer to airline and hotel partners. We use an average value that you can expect to get by utilizing your points for these transfer partners. If you do not have at least one of these cards, Ultimate Rewards are worth exactly 1 cent per point. Also keep in mind that when you redeem your points, you can elect to book travel through the Ultimate Rewards portal where the Sapphire Preferred and Ink Preferred have a point value of 1.25 cents per point and the Sapphire Reserve has points worth 1.5 cents each. You can move points freely between your Ultimate Rewards cards, i.e. from a Chase Freedom Unlimited to a Chase Sapphire Reserve. You can also read our Guide to Chase Ultimate Rewards points.

Since Hilton moved to a variable pricing model, on average you'll be offered roughly a 0.5 cent value per point. What is nice is that although the pricing is mostly variable, they still cap the "standard" redemption rate on all properties. With the 5th night free on all award stays and resort fees waived on award stays, it's very possible to well exceed this value - even getting 1-2 cents per point - when used wisely.

While Marriott Bonvoy dropped all award charts in favor of a dynamic pricing system, it hasn't gotten out of hand and the 5th night free on awards can still provide outsized value. It's also hard to beat the breadth of Marriott Bonvoy properties all over the world.

While Marriott Bonvoy dropped all award charts in favor of a dynamic pricing system, it hasn't gotten out of hand and the 5th night free on awards can still provide outsized value. It's also hard to beat the breadth of Marriott Bonvoy properties all over the world.

Since Hilton moved to a variable pricing model, on average you'll be offered roughly a 0.5 cent value per point. What is nice is that although the pricing is mostly variable, they still cap the "standard" redemption rate on all properties. With the 5th night free on all award stays and resort fees waived on award stays, it's very possible to well exceed this value - even getting 1-2 cents per point - when used wisely.