You can transfer your AmEx Points to Emirates and book their incredible First Class! Photo by: Evan Berman

I’ve talked about how I have used credit card points to book flights and hotels, for example flying business class from Santiago to Miami, and Premium Economy from New York to Santiago, as well as hotels in Santiago, Chile; Bergen and Oslo, Norway; and Fort Lauderdale, Florida. You might think, “Great, but what does that mean? How does this apply to me?”

This is the first in a series of posts about some of the best uses of each bank’s transferable points:

Best Uses of AmEx Membership Rewards Points (This Article)

Best Uses of Capital One Miles

Best Uses of Chase Ultimate Rewards Points

Best Uses of Citi ThankYou Points

How to Earn AmEx Membership Rewards Points:

AmEx Points are some of the easiest transferable points to earn. Here are the options to earn these points:

• Sign-up Bonuses
• Spend on AmEx MR Points-earning cards
• Shopping with the Rakuten Portal*
• Referral Bonuses
• Retention Bonuses

* In order to earn AmEx Membership Rewards Points from the Rakuten Portal, you must select that earnings option, in lieu of earning cash back.

Let’s talk about these in more detail.

Sign-Up Bonuses:

Sign-up bonuses are the easiest way to earn AmEx Points in large quantities quickly. These include the typical 75k points after opening and spending $4,000 in 6 months on the AmEx Gold Card or 100,000 (sometimes even 150,000) points after opening and spending $6,000 in 6 months on the AmEx Platinum Card.

Spending on AmEx MR Points-earning Cards:

Probably the most well-known option to earn AmEx Points is to spend on cards that earn these points. To be clear, not every AmEx card earns AmEx Membership Rewards Points. Here is the definitive list of cards that earn these points (as a reminder 4x points means that for every dollar spent, you earn 4 points. I.e. if you pay for a dinner of $40 on your AmEx Gold card, you will earn 160 AmEx points):

Personal Cards:

• AmEx Gold Card (4x points on Dining and US Grocery Stores, 3x on Flights, 1x on everything else)
• AmEx Green Card (apply) (3x points on Travel, Transit, and Dining, 1x on everything else)
• AmEx Platinum Card (review, apply) (5x points on travel booked via amextravel.com and airfare directly from airlines, 1x on everything else)

Business Cards:

• AmEx Blue Business Plus (2x points on everything)
• AmEx Business Gold Card (4x points on 2 categories including restaurants, gas, shipping, airfare, advertising, and tech providers, 1x everywhere else)
• AmEx Business Platinum Card (5x points on travel booked with amextravel.com, 1x everywhere else)

Referral Bonuses:

Whenever you refer someone to a card and they sign up and are approved using your link, you can earn points for doing so. This is true with all bank points (AmEx, Capital One, Chase, and Citi). The amount may vary based on the card that you own. For example, 15,000 AmEx Points is typical for a Platinum Card referral, compared with 10,000 AmEx Points for a Gold Card Referral.

Retention Bonuses:

I recently wrote about how I earned a 30,000 point retention offer from doing an online chat with AmEx. Read that post for more information about how this process works.

Transfer Partner Options:

Now with the basics on earning points out of the way, let’s switch to the fun side: redeeming for travel! Note that there are other options for redeeming points, though with AmEx, you are typically better off by transferring points to a partner airline. AmEx has the best collection of airline transfer partners, especially for booking international premium cabin flights. First, here are all of the transfer partners:

Airlines:

Airline	Transfer Ratio	Transfer Time	Notes
Aer Lingus AerClub	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Shares Avios currency with BA, Iberia, and Qatar. Useful for Business Class to Ireland.
Aeromexico Club Premier	1:1.6, minimum 1,000 points	~1-2 Days	Measures cost in km, rather than miles (offset by ratio). Confusing website, not a great value program.
Air Canada Aeroplan	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	More partners than any other airline, great for complex multi-stop itineraries.
Air France/KLM Flying Blue	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Can be valuable for monthly Flying Blue Promo flights to Europe. Has dynamic pricing levels.
All Nippon Airways Mileage Club	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	~2-3 Days	Can only book round-trip award flights (except intra-Japan). Exceptional value, though fees can be high.
Avianca LifeMiles	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Useful for Business/First Class flights on Star Alliance carriers or domestic United flights. Terrible IT glitches can make process annoying.
British Airways Executive Club	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Shares Avios currency with Aer Lingus, Iberia, and Qatar. Good for nonstop AA domestic flights.
Cathay Pacific Asia Miles	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Great for certain oneworld business flights. Fees can be high on certain routes.
Delta SkyMiles	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Excise Fee of $0.0006/ point (max $99). Use only to top off Delta balance for redemption. SkyMiles are frequently referred to as SkyPesos for their (lack of) value outside of short domestic flights.
Emirates Skywards	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Use for booking Emirates First Class (though beware of huge mileage requirements and fees!).
Etihad Guest	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Unfortunately, sweet spots were removed in March 2023. Use only for rare occasions when Etihad Business Class is priced appropriately.
Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Excise Fee of $0.0006/ point (max $99). Great for intra-Hawaii flights and some business class redemptions. Can be useful to fly First Class from Hawaii to the US.
Iberia Plus	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	1-3 Days, depends on day of week	Shares Avios currency with Aer Lingus, BA, and Qatar. Great for Iberia business class redemptions to Europe and short AA domestic flights.
JetBlue TrueBlue	250:200	Instant	Excise Fee of $0.0006/ point (max $99). Avoid this unless there is a unique redemption opportunity.
Qantas Frequent Flyer	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Use for domestic AA short distance flights with connection.
Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Only way to book Singapore First Class (Suites). Can be decent value for some Star Alliance flights including domestic United flights.
Virgin Atlantic Flying Club	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Use for ANA Business or First Class to Japan, as well as Skyteam members Delta and Air France/KLM flights to Europe. Must book non-stop except for Air France/KLM to get the best prices.

Hotels:

Hotel	Transfer Ratio	Transfer Time	Notes
Choice Privileges	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Great for Japan and Scandinavia. Transfer 1:2 from Citi instead if possible.
Hilton Honors	1:2, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Hilton points are usually such poor value that even with the transfer ratio this is still a poor choice. With a frequent 40% bonus, this becomes interesting.
Marriott Bonvoy	1:1, minimum 1,000 points	Instant	Decent value, though lower than airline partners. Use Marriott points acquired through other means if possible.

Best Uses:

“Best” is inherently subjective. If you live in New York and want to travel once a year to Florida in economy, your uses of points will be very different than if you want to be a globetrotter, visiting Asia and Africa in business class. That being said, there are great uses of points, no matter your travel goal.

Domestic Flights:

Most flights within the US (except for red-eye flights and those to Hawaii) are not long enough to merit paying more for a first class flight compared to an economy flight– even in miles. That being said, prices for flying up front are not outrageous.

Here are the best options, sorted by alliance:

oneworld:

• British Airways Executive Club
• Iberia Plus
• Qantas Frequent Flyer

BA and Iberia charge by segment, so you’ll want to use these programs for non-stop flights. Qantas is cumulative, but anything above 2,500 miles total distance becomes too pricey.

Star Alliance:

• Avianca LifeMiles

You can fly United within the US for 7,500 10,000 or 12,500 miles in economy depending on which zone you are in and where you are flying.

SkyTeam:

• Delta SkyMiles
• Virgin Atlantic Flying Club*

Delta SkyMiles sometimes has flash sales between cities that can be terrific deals. Otherwise, they are priced dynamically. Virgin Atlantic gives the best value for Delta flights, so long as they are non-stop routings at 6,500 miles for short flights.

For more information, read this article about the best ways to fly domestic on points.

International Flights:

Best Options:

As opposed to domestic flights, international flights are often long and overnight. Many people including myself look for extra comfort and book premium cabin travel. The price point with cash is often 7-8x as much for Business Class as Economy Class; however, the miles required are often only 2-3x as much for Business Class as Economy Class. With that out of the way, let’s look at the best options overall (both economy and premium cabin)

oneworld:

• Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
• Iberia Plus

Asia Miles offer extra availability to fly First Class on Cathay. Additionally, their pricing is competitive on oneworld partner flights, though they rarely offer more attractive pricing than American Airlines.

Iberia offers some great deals to get to Europe. For example, in low season, you can fly one-way in Business Class from the East Coast to Madrid for 34,000 points or in economy for 17,000 points!

Star Alliance:

• All Nippon Airlines (ANA) Mileage Club
• Air Canada Aeroplan
• Avianca LifeMiles

ANA almost has too many sweet spots to mention! A few highlights are: roundtrip Business Class to Europe for 88,000 miles, to Asia starting at 75,000 miles, and to Africa for 104,000 miles. Additionally, fly around the world in Star Alliance carriers for reasonable mileage requirements (Round the World Itinerary is an advanced technique that provides incredible value. Stay tuned for a full article on this.).

Air Canada Aeroplan has more airline partners than anyone else. As such, this program is great for complex itineraries with multiple long layovers. How about flying from San Francisco to Bali via Tokyo, Seoul, Bangkok, and Singapore for 87,500 miles one-way? These connections would have to be less than 24 hours, but that gives plenty of time to explore! Additionally, you are entitled to 1 stop-over in each direction. For 5,000 miles, you can stay as many days as you want in one of the cities where you connect (ex. 3 days in Tokyo in the above route).

Avianca LifeMiles offers lower miles required and fees required on most routes to Europe and Asia than other programs. Additionally and somewhat counterintuitively, the more connections that you have, the fewer miles required. How does New York to Frankfurt in Lufthansa First Class for 87,000 miles sound?!? Or Chicago to Zurich for 63,000 miles in Business Class. Or Washington D.C. to Vienna for 30,000 miles in Economy Class! Unfortunately, the website is a bit clunky and will not always show the availability for a route that you have identified, requiring an email or phone call to book.

SkyTeam:

• Air France/KLM Flying Blue
• Delta SkyMiles
• Virgin Atlantic Flying Club*

Air France/KLM Flying Blue has Flying Blue Monthly Promos, whereby you can find prices as low as 40,000 miles one-way to Europe in Business Class or 14,000 miles one-way to Europe in Economy Class. These are for specific routes (i.e. New York to Paris is not normally a discounted one), but can offer terrific value. Outside of those, Flying Blue often provides the best value for Delta Economy Class flights to Europe and can sometimes be the best for Virgin Atlantic Upper Class (their Business Class) flights as well. Finally, if you can find award availability, the first band of pricing on Air France or KLM flights to Europe is only 55,000 miles one-way. That being said, it is not uncommon to find prices in the 500,000 miles or more range!

Delta has 1 remaining sweet spot, though it’s safe to assume it is on borrowed time. If you book a route that Delta does not operate, the award price is much lower than the outrageous prices Delta usually wants. Case in point: Delta’s non-stop from LA to Sydney, Australia is usually priced at 440,000 SkyMiles one-way. That being said, if you were to start from Mexico City and fly to Sydney, you can sometimes find flights for 90,000 miles one-way. Astute readers will see the pattern here: you must fly Aeromexico to LA before taking the Delta flight to Sydney. This trick also works from Africa (95,000 miles one-way), Europe (90,000 miles one-way), and Asia (95,000 miles one-way).

Virgin Atlantic just raised the prices on the best redemption in travel, though it’s still a great deal! Flying ANA First Class to Japan from the West Coast costs 72,500 miles one-way and from the Midwest or East Coast it is 85,000 miles one-way. Additionally, Business Class on ANA to Japan from the West Coast is 45,000 miles one-way and from the Midwest or East Coast is a mere 2,500 miles higher at 47,500 miles one-way. On the rare occasions that Delta has award availability, you can fly in Delta One Business Class to Europe for 50,000 miles each way.

Other Airlines:

• Emirates Skywards

If you want to try Emirates First Class, booking through Emirates is often the best way. I recently flew Milan to New York for 85,000 miles one-way, though the price now is 103,000 miles each way. If you want to go all the way to Dubai, you are looking at more than 130,000 miles one-way. That could be worth it for you, though!

Summary:

AmEx is one of the most popular points programs out there. If you sign up for an AmEx Gold or Platinum Card and are wondering what to do with the points, this article should give you some ideas of how to use them. In the coming weeks and months, I will do a deep dive into each of the programs and highlight their best uses but for now, I recommend transferring to ANA for Business Class to Asia, Avianca LifeMiles for Business or First Class to Europe, Virgin Atlantic for either Delta One Business Class to Europe or ANA Business or First Class to Japan, or Iberia for cheap Business or Economy Class awards to Europe. Very important: once you transfer to a program, you cannot get those points back to AmEx. Do not transfer until you’ve found a use for the points!

As always, let me know if you have any questions. What’s the best redemption you’ve ever had?