Everything you need to know about booking Hyatt hotels with Points

As you know, we have chosen to be members of the World of Hyatt since we consider Hyatt’s loyalty program to be one of the best in terms of award redemption value, as well as the perks that it provides to its elites. Plus, we are just big fans of Hyatt Hotels as Hyatt offers a wide variety of quality hotels and resorts all over the world.

Even though Hyatt is considered to have a smaller footprint than Hilton or Marriott, Hyatt keeps consistently adding more hotels and resorts into its network. For instance, Hyatt just recently purchased 102 resorts in the Caribbean and Europe under Secrets, Dreams, Breathless, and Zoetry brands, expanding the World of Hyatt program.

If you’re interested in getting started with World of Hyatt, want to learn more about earning and redeeming Hyatt Points, and explore other benefits the program provides, this post is for you.

Ways to earn Hyatt Points

Credit cards

First things first, where and how to get those points? In a nutshell — opening a credit card with a good sign-up bonus (read more about where to start if you want to travel on points here) would be a good start here. Usually, banks require you to spend a certain amount of dollars on the card within a certain period, and once you satisfy this requirement, you get signup bonus points transferred into your account.

Chase World of Hyatt Credit Card

Chase offers two types of co-branded World of Hyatt credit cards:

• Chase World of Hyatt Credit Card
• Chase World of Hyatt Business Credit Card

The signup bonus on the personal card right now is 5 Free Night Awards (at Category 1-4 Hyatt Hotels) after you spend $4,000 on purchases in your first 3 months from account opening. This card is a must-have for anyone who stays or is planning on staying at Hyatt properties regularly.

As a World of Hyatt Credit Cardmember, you will receive 5 qualifying night credits towards a tier Status with Hyatt when your card account is opened and every year after that. You can also earn 2 qualifying nights per $5,000 spent), and an annual Free Night Certificate that can be redeemed at one of the Category 1-4 Hyatt Hotels. Plus, if you spend another $15,000 on the card in a calendar year, you can get an extra Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate.

The card offers an impressive earning rate on dollars spent at Hyatt hotels and resorts (4 points per dollar). We value Hyatt Points at a minimum of 2 cents per each, so earning 4 points per dollar at a Hyatt property (spent on room and other charges) results in at least 8% in cashback equivalent.

You can also earn 2 points per dollar at cafes and restaurants or when you pay with your World of Hyatt credit card for airline tickets, gym membership, or local transit (including parking), and 1 point per dollar on all other spendings. The points will be deposited into your World of Hyatt account within 1-2 days after your statement closing date.

The business version of the card comes with a signup bonus of 60,000 Hyatt Points after you spend $5,000 on purchases in your first 3 months from account opening. Unfortunately, the card doesn’t give you a 5 qualifying nights jumpstart, unlike the personal version. Still, you can earn 5 qualifying nights per $10,000 spent (which can be compared at 2.5 nights per $5,000 to the personal card’s qualifying nights earning rate).

Chase credit cards earning Ultimate Rewards points

The following Chase credit cards can earn Ultimate Rewards (UR) points, which can be transferred into your World of Hyatt account at a 1:1 ratio:

Personal credit cards:

• Chase Sapphire Preferred
• Chase Sapphire Reserve
• Chase Freedom Flex
• Chase Freedom Unlimited

Business credit cards:

• Chase Ink Preferred
• Chase Ink Cash
• Chase Ink Unlimited

💡Good to know

You need to have a Chase Sapphire Preferred / Reserve or Ink Preferred card to be able to transfer your Ultimate Rewards points to your World of Hyatt account. Even though Freedom Flex, Freedom Unlimited, Ink Cash, and Ink Unlimited are marketed as simple cashback earning cards, in fact, they earn Chase Ultimate Rewards points that can be combined with your Sapphire Preferred / Reserve, or Ink Preferred card Ultimate Rewards points and subsequently transferred to your World of Hyatt account.

Buy Points

Usually, it’s not a good idea to buy points unless you have a specific redemption in mind. Anyway, you can buy up to 55,000 Hyatt Points per calendar year. Watch out for frequent sales that Hyatt runs a couple of times a year so that you can purchase points at a 25-30% or even a 40% discount.

Other ways to earn Hyatt points

When doing your online shopping, consider making a purchase through the Chase Ultimate Rewards Shopping Portal. This way, you can earn additional bonus points that will be deposited into your Ultimate Rewards points account once the store confirms the purchase.

And last but not least, you earn 5 Hyatt Points per dollar by simply staying at Hyatt hotels and paying the cash rate for your stay. Remember to charge food and drinks to your room so you can earn even more points!

How to transfer Ultimate Rewards points to World of Hyatt

So, now that you earned Chase Ultimate Rewards points and wondering how you can transfer points to your Hyatt account?

First, sign in to your Chase online banking and navigate to your Chase credit card account that supports transferring points to partners (you need to have Chase Sapphire Preferred, Reserve, or Ink Preferred for that) and click “Redeem.”

Select “Transfer to Travel Partners” in the sidebar.

Scroll down to World of Hyatt and click “Transfer Points”.

You’ll be asked to provide your World of Hyatt Member ID, and once you do that, you should be able to transfer points to your World of Hyatt account in 1,000 points increments. The transfer usually takes a few minutes, but in some cases, it may take a couple of hours.

How to calculate Points value

When booking a room with Points, you need to do some basic math to determine if the redemption makes sense for you. For instance, in some cases, you may be better off paying with cash or buying points to cover the costs.

Usually, Hyatt points provide an outstanding value; on the screenshot below, you can see that a Ranch Suite with Double Beds at Carmel Valley Ranch can be as high as $1,173 per night, even before taxes and fees, but only 48,000 points per night if you’re booking with Hyatt Points. So, how would you calculate the value? Take the dollar amount, divide it by the number of points needed, and then multiply by 100.

In the example below, $1,173 / 48,000 points * 100 equals to 2.34 cents per point. Furthermore, this doesn’t take into account that there could be resort fees, obligatory taxes, and other fees that can further increase the cents per point value of this redemption.

You need to establish a baseline for yourself to figure out whether the redemption makes sense. For example, currently, Hyatt is running a promotion where you can buy points with a 30% discount. Let’s take the dollar amount needed to purchase 5,000 points as an example ($84) and use the same formula to figure out their value: $84 / 5,000 * 100, which equals 1.68 cents per point. This is the value that Hyatt assigns to these points.

So, now, if you look at the Carmel Valley Ranch room redemption that we looked at above, you can still beat the base value by 0.66 (2.34 – 1.68) cents per point by simply purchasing the points needed for that stay. The consensus on various blogs is that Hyatt Points are valued at 1.5 cents per point, but we value them at 2 cents per point because it’s really easy to find redemption for 2+ CPP.

Points Calendar

In 2021, Hyatt introduced a Points Calendar, slightly devaluing their Award Chart. Before that, you could simply look at the hotel category, and you would instantly know how many points you would need for an award stay. Now Hyatt has transitioned to a different system where each hotel has Standard, Peak, and Off-Peak pricing based on the location and specific dates, with a standard, higher, or lower amount of Hyatt Points you redeem accordingly. Of course, weekends and high season dates tend to be more expensive as those days are the most desirable. If you are flexible with your travel dates, you can save some Points by booking Off-Peak nights.

Hyatt Hotel Award Category

Currently, Hyatt has 26 brands and different collections. You’d be surprised how many hotels are actually within the Hyatt hotel chain. Hyatt has over 1,100 destinations in over 65 countries. Whether you are looking for an all-inclusive experience on a resort or a quiet stay at one of the Small Luxury Hotels, Hyatt has got you covered!

When booking a stay at a Hyatt hotel, you will notice that all those hotels and resorts have an assigned award category that goes one through eight (Category 1-8). If the name of a specific Hyatt Collection or Hyatt Brand sets certain expectations of the quality of your stay, a hotel Category tells you what could be the price per night whether you’re booking with cash or redeeming your Points.

A Hyatt hotel of the same category as another Hyatt hotel would require the same amount of points needed for redemption. Below is a Hyatt Award Chart with the Standard, Peak, and Off-Peak amount of the points needed to book a standard room. Note that All-Inclusive Resorts and Miraval Resorts have their own Award Chart.

	Off-peak rate	Standard rate	Peak rate
Category 1	3,500	5,000	6,500
Category 2	6,500	8,000	9,500
Category 3	9,000	12,000	15,000
Category 4	12,000	15,000	18,000
Category 5	17,000	20,000	23,000
Category 6	21,000	25,000	29,000
Category 7	25,000	30,000	35,000
Category 8	35,000	40,000	45,000

As you can see that the higher the category the higher the amount of Points you spend per night on your stay.

Free Night Certificate

A Free Night Certificate is literally what you think it is – a Certificate issued on your account to be used for one free-of-charge night stay at a Hyatt hotel.

There are several ways to earn a Free Night Certificate:

1. When you stay 30 nights at Hyatt, you get a Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate that must be redeemed within 180 days of its issuance.
2. When you stay 60 nights at Hyatt, you get a Category 1-7 Free Night Certificate that must be redeemed within 180 days of its issuance.
3. When you stay 100 nights at Hyatt, you get a Category 1-7 or Category A-D all-inclusive resort Free Night Certificate that must be redeemed within 180 days of its issuance
4. When you stay 150 nights at Hyatt, you get a Category 1-8 or Category A-F all-inclusive resort Free Night Certificate that must be redeemed within 180 days of its issuance
5. If you have a Chase World of Hyatt Credit Card, you receive a Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate annually, usually within 60 days after your account anniversary. Valid for 1 year.
6. You can earn a Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate when you spend $15,000 on your Chase World of Hyatt Credit Card in a calendar year. Valid for 1 year.
7. And finally, when you stay at five different Hyatt brands (such as Hyatt Regency, Andaz, JdV, Grand Hyatt and others) you get a Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate. Valid for 1 year.

A guide to Hyatt’s Free Night Award: How to Earn and Redeem in 2024

Bottom Line

If you are planning on staying at Hyatt properties on Hyatt Points always book in advance, as the award rooms fill up quickly.

Hyatt has lucrative member appreciation tiers that allow you to receive perks ranging from late checkout on the basic Discoverist tier to free room upgrades (upon availability), complimentary breakfast, and free parking and/or valet on award stays with the highest Globalist tier.

Earn and redeem Hyatt Points towards your free stays or room upgrades, achieve a higher tier status with Hyatt, and enjoy your stay!