Marriott and SPG transfers to airline miles

18

the wing of an airplane with the sun shining through it

Thanks to the Marriott and SPG program merger, details regarding point transfers to airline miles have changed.  Accordingly, I’ve updated our transfer guide with all of the latest and greatest information:

Click here to see the updated guide: Marriott and SPG Transfer Partners

Three to one, but still the same

The newly combined Marriott / SPG program offers a huge number of airline transfer partners.  In most cases, the transfer ratio is 3 to 1.  For example, you can transfer 3,000 rewards points into 1,000 airline miles.  And when you transfer 60,000 points at a time, you’ll get 25,000 airline miles (in most cases — see “Exceptions” below).

Those who were used to the old SPG program may think that this is a devaluation, but it’s not.  Previously, we could transfer 1 Starpoint to 1 airline mile, or 20,000 Starpoints to 25,000 airline miles.  With the Marriott Rewards merger, Starpoints were tripled into rewards points.  So, the same transfer ratio applies: 20,000 Starpoints = 60,000 rewards points = 25,000 airline miles.

The real devaluation was with the SPG credit card’s earning rate.  Previously, the card earned 1 Starpoint per dollar, but it now earns 2 rewards points per dollar.  That’s a 33% devaluation.  On the other hand, when earning points for stays, most members will earn more points in the new program than they did before.

New Partners

SPG already had a huge list of airline partners, but now the list is even longer since they’ve combined the SPG and Marriott partners into one giant list.

Exceptions

There are three exceptions to the 60K to 25K transfer ratio…

United 10% Bonus

When you transfer points to United Airlines miles, you get a 10% bonus.  So, 3,000 rewards points becomes 1,100 United miles; and 60,000 rewards points becomes 27,500 United miles.

JetBlue 50% Penalty

JetBlue points aren’t super valuable, but for some reason the transfer ratio to JetBlue points is poor.  Instead of 3 rewards points to 1 mile, JetBlue requires 6 rewards points to get 1 milePlease, please, please don’t do this transfer.

Air New Zealand Airpoints

I don’t know anything about the Air New Zealand program, but obviously their points aren’t valued anywhere near airline miles.  I say this because the standard transfer ratio is: 200 rewards points to 1 airpoint.

Much more in our guide

Please check out our transfer guide for tips, and a list of our favorite transfer partners.

Click here to see the updated guide: Marriott and SPG Transfer Partners

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