I've got a large amount of points through Marriott Bonvoy, so I've got a hotel stay for a nice vacation covered. Now I'd like to look to get an airline rewards card to hopefully get airfare covered.

At this point I'm not necessarily looking to do an international stay, although that might be a fun option. We are primarily looking domestically and maybe to Costa Rica again. I got a very nice sign up with the Bonvoy card, so was hoping for a solid sign up miles bonus, as well.

What are the consensus better options out there??

This is usually a good resource for these types of questions

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/credit-cards/best-credit-cards/

You might have better luck with a general travel card (AmEx Platinum, Chase Sapphire, Capital One Venture X) as those cards use flexible points that can be transferred to a variety of airlines. Even if your airline isn't in the list, you might find one of their alliance members in the list (eg. Air Canada for United, Air France for Delta).

Chase sapphire reserve transfers points 1:1 to Hyatt,
Southwest , jet blue, virgin Atlantic, United and more (including Marriott - but not a good rate). Great card for flexibility. The transfers I have done can be used instantly for redemption.


Edit - just checked and chase is offering 70% bonus on Marriott points transfer for a couple weeks. I know they do these periodically with others as well.

If southwest flies to the places you want to go for the domestic trips it's a very good point system where I typically get 1.4 to 1.7 cents per point. The southwest cards aren't that good except to get the sign up bonus so going with a chase sapphire reserve or preferred let's you earn points and xfer them to swa for 1:1. You can combo it with a freedom flex card and move the points you earn in that to your sapphire account and xfer them out from there.

If you don't mind signing up for business cards, you could try to get the Southwest personal late in the year and have the sign up bonus on January then apply and earn the sign up bonus on the business card and likely gen enough points to qualify for the companion pass for the rest of 2025 and 2026. You would need both bonuses to hit in the same year for this to work so you would want to wait till November or December to start applying.

Cant go wrong with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, it transfers to a variety of airlines and hotels and has a low annual fee. Its the perfect card for a person getting their feet wet in the travel card game. I believe it has a 60k sign up bonus.

I've done the two (personal+ business) Chase Southwest Rapid Rewards cards since 2020. Pretty easy to rack up points at work. Easily earn the Companion Pass every year, tons of points, and A-List. I haven't paid for flights in 4.5 years for a family of four, and my wife and I take a short trip every quarter in addition to 1-2 family trips per year.

But to your point, even if you can't meet the spend to earn all of that every year, you can time the sign up bonus's to get the Companion Pass for 2 years.

I'm still figuring out the ins and outs of travel credit cards, but I'm very interested in how these signup bonuses work. I would love to learn more about strategies to maximize the use of these bonuses.

Petrino1 said:

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Cant go wrong with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, it transfers to a variety of airlines and hotels and has a low annual fee. Its the perfect card for a person getting their feet wet in the travel card game. I believe it has a 60k sign up bonus.

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Thanks will look into this.
Mostly looking for international travel to Asia, something that would make business class less expensive - will check it out

Thanks.....good info in here. Still trying to decide if I want to go for the Southwest card for a year to get the signup bonus and rack up points, since I feel like I'll likely fly Southwest for a big trip in a few years. Seems like that would maximize my points the most.

But on the chance I don't use Southwest and want to fly United or Delta or someone, then best bet seems to be one of the other cards mentioned here. Tough decision. I'm pretty clueless what the value of the points even means in terms of actual redemption value.

A 50k points bonus would translate to a couple round trip domestic tickets more than likely (obviously dependent on time of travel and location)?

deddog said:

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Petrino1 said:

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Cant go wrong with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, it transfers to a variety of airlines and hotels and has a low annual fee. Its the perfect card for a person getting their feet wet in the travel card game. I believe it has a 60k sign up bonus.

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Thanks will look into this.
Mostly looking for international travel to Asia, something that would make business class less expensive - will check it out

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seems like from what I've read in the past, American Express Membership Rewards points are better for international business/first travel.

The Points Guy and his ilk talk about those strategies quite a bit, but not something I'm into.

deddog said:

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Petrino1 said:

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Cant go wrong with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, it transfers to a variety of airlines and hotels and has a low annual fee. Its the perfect card for a person getting their feet wet in the travel card game. I believe it has a 60k sign up bonus.

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Thanks will look into this.
Mostly looking for international travel to Asia, something that would make business class less expensive - will check it out

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If you are looking for business class flights to Asia, then you'll need a lot more miles than 60k lol. The AMEX Business Platinum has a 250k sign up offer floating around out there. That might be more up your alley, but theres a 15k-20k minimum spend requirement you have to meet in 3 months.

seylen said:

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I'm still figuring out the ins and outs of travel credit cards, but I'm very interested in how these signup bonuses work. I would love to learn more about strategies to maximize the use of these bonuses.

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Honestly, theres not much to it. For example, lets say you sign up for a United card with Chase that has a 60k sign up bonus with a 4k minimum spend in 3 months. You get approved for the card, spend the $4k on the card, collect 60k United miles from the bonus, then use those miles for United flights. 60k-70K miles is typically enough for a roundtrip economy flight to Europe, or two domestic roundtrip flights within the US.

Of course, it always depends where you want to go and when, the mileage rates vary.

FDXAg said:

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Thanks.....good info in here. Still trying to decide if I want to go for the Southwest card for a year to get the signup bonus and rack up points, since I feel like I'll likely fly Southwest for a big trip in a few years. Seems like that would maximize my points the most.

But on the chance I don't use Southwest and want to fly United or Delta or someone, then best bet seems to be one of the other cards mentioned here. Tough decision. I'm pretty clueless what the value of the points even means in terms of actual redemption value.

A 50k points bonus would translate to a couple round trip domestic tickets more than likely (obviously dependent on time of travel and location)?

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If your Southwest trip is not happening for a few years, I would not sign up for the Southwest card now. It will provide you no specific benefits unless you plan on flying some between now and then, and will be flying SW to get the additional miles using their cc. Even still, you get 60,000 points for the Chase Sapphire cards, as opposed to only 50,000 for SW right now, and can transfer them 1:1 to SW if you want/need to between now and your big trip. But they can also be used in other ways as well. Additionally, if you are not locked into flying SW for other flights before your big trip, you could sign up for another airline's card and possibly be able to use their signup bonus and have free flights that way. Then within a year of your big trip, sign up for the SW card and get their bonus and then be able to take advantage of other perks the card may offer for your flight. Just my thoughts, but if it were me, I would probably sign up for something else if the big trip is 2-3 years away. And another reason is SW had a promotion for 85,000 miles that ended in June, so if you can wait on that one, then maybe they will run the same promotion next year.

If you decide to sign up for a Chase Sapphire (Preferred or Reserve), Chase United, or Chase Southwest card right now, I can send you a referral code. I know I would get additional points, but I think you do as well if you meet their bonus spend. Don't hold me to that though.

Thanks for taking the time to explain that. That makes sense. Especially about waiting for a better bonus offer. With a card like that, do you have to use the Bonus miles or the miles within the 12 months after signing up? Or do the miles all continue to stack up and rollover as long as you continue to use the card.

I've been stacking up points now for almost 2 years on my Marriott Bonvoy card and it continues to extend the date the points are valid, so in theory I could just continue to accumulate for many years as long as I'm still spending something and using the card each month.

Awhile back a got the AMEX Delta Reserve card. I fly delta 90% of the time for work, so the reserve card gets me into the delta lounge which I have grown really accustomed to. However when flying personally, it won't always be delta. However, a nice lounge experience is now something I like and want. Is there a better card for me from that perspective? (Sorry to hijack the original question)

permabull said:

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If southwest flies to the places you want to go for the domestic trips it's a very good point system where I typically get 1.4 to 1.7 cents per point. The southwest cards aren't that good except to get the sign up bonus so going with a chase sapphire reserve or preferred let's you earn points and xfer them to swa for 1:1. You can combo it with a freedom flex card and move the points you earn in that to your sapphire account and xfer them out from there.

If you don't mind signing up for business cards, you could try to get the Southwest personal late in the year and have the sign up bonus on January then apply and earn the sign up bonus on the business card and likely gen enough points to qualify for the companion pass for the rest of 2025 and 2026. You would need both bonuses to hit in the same year for this to work so you would want to wait till November or December to start applying.

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Last time I signed up for a SW card, I recall the sign up bonus points specifically did not count towards companion pass, though maybe that has changed. I am tempted to jump on the 120k point business sign up bonus offer currently running.

Howdy Dammit said:

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Awhile back a got the AMEX Delta Reserve card. I fly delta 90% of the time for work, so the reserve card gets me into the delta lounge which I have grown really accustomed to. However when flying personally, it won't always be delta. However, a nice lounge experience is now something I like and want. Is there a better card for me from that perspective? (Sorry to hijack the original question)

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A few thoughts:

• You should realize that Delta mostly requires that you show a valid Delta boarding pass on the day you want to use their lounge. So, when you use other airlines for leisure travel, you might be outta luck.
• If you are using another method for entry (i.e. American Express Platinum, PriorityPass or something like that), they often restrict the use to only the cardholder, and have varying rules for paid admittance for others in your traveling party.
• If you go with another credit card (like Capital One) who has their own lounges, they're often quite limited as to number of locations.
• Depending on how much you travel non-Delta, it might be worth it to just pay the day pass rate (if your layover is long enough to justify it) for a non-Delta club to maintain multiple lounge brand flexibility without further commitment.

Howdy Dammit said:

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Awhile back a got the AMEX Delta Reserve card. I fly delta 90% of the time for work, so the reserve card gets me into the delta lounge which I have grown really accustomed to. However when flying personally, it won't always be delta. However, a nice lounge experience is now something I like and want. Is there a better card for me from that perspective? (Sorry to hijack the original question)

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If you like lounges, then the AMEX Platinum is probably the best card for lounges out there. You get access to Centurion lounges, Priority Pass, and Delta Sky Club (only when flying Delta). If your home airport has a Centurion Lounge, and you travel a lot, then the card is definitely worth it. The main drawback is the hefty annual fee, $695.

Petrino1 said:

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Howdy Dammit said:

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Awhile back a got the AMEX Delta Reserve card. I fly delta 90% of the time for work, so the reserve card gets me into the delta lounge which I have grown really accustomed to. However when flying personally, it won't always be delta. However, a nice lounge experience is now something I like and want. Is there a better card for me from that perspective? (Sorry to hijack the original question)

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If you like lounges, then the AMEX Platinum is probably the best card for lounges out there. You get access to Centurion lounges, Priority Pass, and Delta Sky Club (only when flying Delta). If your home airport has a Centurion Lounge, and you travel a lot, then the card is definitely worth it. The main drawback is the hefty annual fee, $695.

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FYI, active military can get the Platinum for free. My son, 1st Batt Ranger, has it & got a 2nd card that his sister uses. No love for his parents.....

Been AMEX Gold forever, can't really justify paying for the Platinum & was disappointed they wouldn't upgrade a 30+ year member for a reduced rate.

Petrino1 said:

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Howdy Dammit said:

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Awhile back a got the AMEX Delta Reserve card. I fly delta 90% of the time for work, so the reserve card gets me into the delta lounge which I have grown really accustomed to. However when flying personally, it won't always be delta. However, a nice lounge experience is now something I like and want. Is there a better card for me from that perspective? (Sorry to hijack the original question)

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If you like lounges, then the AMEX Platinum is probably the best card for lounges out there. You get access to Centurion lounges, Priority Pass, and Delta Sky Club (only when flying Delta). If your home airport has a Centurion Lounge, and you travel a lot, then the card is definitely worth it. The main drawback is the hefty annual fee, $695.

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The delta card is 650 so not much worse.

A good starter card for lounge access is the capital one venture x. It gets you into their capital one lounges and priority lounges. Unlike the platinum you can bring guests with you and the card allows you to add free authorized users that get loung access as well with there cards. Amex charges $195 for each authorized user (I believe the Morgan Stanley variant still gives you 1 free AU). The venture x is $300 cheaper annual fee at $395 but you receive 10k points every year that offsets the fee by $100 plus a $300 travel credit for using their portal... So if you can take advantage of their travel portal once a year then card more than pays for it self with a lot less hoops to jump through than trying to extract value out of a platinum card.

permabull said:

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A good starter card for lounge access is the capital one venture x. It gets you into their capital one lounges and priority lounges. Unlike the platinum you can bring guests with you and the card allows you to add free authorized users that get loung access as well with there cards. Amex charges $195 for each authorized user (I believe the Morgan Stanley variant still gives you 1 free AU). The venture x is $300 cheaper annual fee at $395 but you receive 10k points every year that offsets the fee by $100 plus a $300 travel credit for using their portal... So if you can take advantage of their travel portal once a year then card more than pays for it self with a lot less hoops to jump through than trying to extract value out of a platinum card.

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The only problem with the Capital One lounges is that theres only 3 in the US. In comparison, there are 14 Centurion lounges in the US and 14 overseas. The priority pass lounges aren't very good in the US compared to Centurion and Capital One lounges. So the only way it makes sense to go for the Venture X is if you live near an airport that has one of the three lounges like DFW.

Alot of these cards are dependent on where you live, who you fly with the most, whats your main airport hub etc.

I'm not sure how that's a sustainable model as far as number of "free" guests vs lounge occupancy.

the last time we tried to go to the Capital One Lounge at DFW, they were on a 45 minute wait, so that makes more sense now.

FDXAg said:

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Thanks for taking the time to explain that. That makes sense. Especially about waiting for a better bonus offer. With a card like that, do you have to use the Bonus miles or the miles within the 12 months after signing up? Or do the miles all continue to stack up and rollover as long as you continue to use the card.

I've been stacking up points now for almost 2 years on my Marriott Bonvoy card and it continues to extend the date the points are valid, so in theory I could just continue to accumulate for many years as long as I'm still spending something and using the card each month.

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points don't expire at all for some brands (united), and for those that do expire, they only do if you don't have 'activity' for a set amount of time, say 12 months.
However, 'activity' is generally defined as redeeming points or accumulating points.

If you have and use a branded card regularly, you don't have to worry about expiring, since you are accumulating points monthly which extends the expiration if there is one. 'Bonus points' are just regular points, they aren't treated differently.


United explorer has 50k now, with 0$ intro fee.

https://www2.theexplorercard.com/rewards-cards