Best ways to spend American Express points

If you love having reward redemption options, then the American Express Membership Rewards program delivers, giving you a long list of ways to spend your points and use your credit card rewards. But some redemption methods pack a bigger punch than others.

With a few exceptions, airfare redemptions deliver the best value on your Membership Rewards points. And, if you want to go the extra mile (or thousands of extra miles), then consider transferring your points to one of American Express’ travel partners. You can get values of 2 cents per point or more by finding sweet spots in the redemption tiers.

What is the best way to use your American Express points?

The most valuable way to use your American Express Membership Rewards points is to transfer them to a partner loyalty program. Depending on which airline you transfer to, you’ll be able to stretch the value of a single Membership Reward point far beyond the standard 1 cent. Plus, you can take advantage of periodic transfer bonuses to specific partners, which can get you even more free travel.

If you have the Business Platinum Card® from American Express, you’ll get a 35 percent rebate if you use your Amex points to redeem all or part of an eligible flight booked through Amex Travel, up to 1,000,000 points per year. You can receive the rebate on any eligible flight, including business and first class fares. Note: You can choose only one qualifying airline whose tickets you’ll receive the rebate for, so this is best for any frequent flyers of one particular airline company.

However, if you don’t want to research point values and the flights of the issuer’s travel partners, redeeming your American Express points for award flights is the easiest way to redeem your points, while still maintaining great value.

We’ll examine the top redemption options more closely below.

Redeem points for hotel bookings

The American Express Travel portal is a full-fledged travel site that lets you book all kinds of travel, including hotels, vacation packages and cruises. When you book travel through the American Express Travel portal (besides airfare) you’ll get a rate of 0.7 cents per point. This makes it a relatively unattractive option for using your American Express points.

Nonetheless, using your Membership Rewards points to book hotels could be worthwhile thanks to American Express’s lowest hotel rates guarantee. Essentially, if you book a hotel with Amex Travel and then find the exact same room at the same hotel with the same dates and the same number of people, all at a lower price (before taxes and fees), American Express will refund you the difference. There are some exceptions to the guarantee, such as any bookings made through the Fine Hotels + Resorts and The Hotel Collection.

Redeem points for airfare

Like most travel sites, Amex Travel lets you search for airfare within a date range and from a variety of airlines. You can book any available flight with your rewards starting at 5,000 points. The average value per point for airfare is 1 cent, and there are no blackout dates or restrictions, as long as the flight itself is available.

To the airline, tickets you book through American Express Travel appear as cash tickets, so you’ll earn miles and elite status on your rewards flight. This is another factor you should consider when determining the overall value of your ticket.

Airfare prices on American Express Travel are generally competitive compared to other travel sites. However, you’ll need to subtract booking fees from the overall value of the ticket. There’s a $6.99 fee for domestic airfare and vacation packages, $10.99 fee for international airfare and vacation packages and $39 fee for phone reservations. Before you make a booking, you should compare with other travel sites to ensure that you’re getting the most bang for your buck.

Another travel option is the Upgrade with Points program, which American Express introduced in 2019 and allows you to bid for upgrades using Membership Rewards points. With 20 different airlines, you can use your points, at a value of 1 cent per point, to upgrade an economy cash ticket to a premium cabin ticket. With the program, you bid an upgrade for an eligible reservation then find out within five days of your flight if the offer was accepted.

Transfer points to partner airlines

If you’re willing to spend a little time and effort, you can find transfer redemptions worth two or three times the value you get through the travel portal.

This is especially true if you’re interested in taking a special trip in a premium airline cabin. Using points for this can get you outstanding value. American Express has 20 travel partners — including 17 airlines that can take you practically anywhere you want to travel — and your points transfer at a 1:1 rate to most of them.

The value per point varies wildly by each program. You also need to consider that American Express charges an excise fee of 0.06 cents for each point you transfer (up to $99) when you transfer to a U.S.-based airline or hotel chain. This excise fee is relatively small, but it’s important to consider when calculating your value.

If you aim for the best value for your Membership Rewards, it’s really all about airfare.

American Express airline partners

*The estimated point value for each of American Express’ airline partners are from Bankrate’s 2022 valuations and The Points Guy’s current valuations. 

Transfer points to partner hotels

Only three of the Amex travel partners are hotels, and they’re not quite as lucrative as the best airline transfer options. However, those partners happen to be Hilton, Choice and Marriott — major chains with thousands of hotels around the world.

Though the value of points drops below 1 cent for all the hotel chains, it can still be worth it to transfer your Amex points to these hotel partners if you’re already a loyal customer to one of them and just need a few thousand points for your next free stay. Here’s how hotel transfers measure up:

**The estimated point value for each of American Express’ airline partners are from Bankrate’s 2022 valuations and The Points Guy’s current valuations.

Use points for gift cards and cash back

American Express lets you redeem your points for various gift cards including travel, restaurants and retailers. Gift cards are a decent redemption option — most of the gift cards will give you a value of 1 cent per point, which is on par with Membership Rewards. Watch out for lower-value gift cards, however. American Express brand gift cards go for only 0.5 cents per point.

You can also redeem your Amex points as statement credits for charges on your credit card account (a minimum of 1,000 points is required to make a redemption). Unfortunately, statement credits are only worth 0.6 cents per point, so they’re a poor use of points.

Redeem points for shopping

American Express has many shopping partners — including Amazon, Walmart, Grubhub and Best Buy — that allow you to link your account to their sites and apply your points at checkout with a single click.

Additionally, you can use your Membership Rewards points via PayPal anywhere that accepts the service. These options are convenient, but they’re also a poor use of points since you only get a value of 0.7 cents back for each point. Still, if you have no vacations planned on the horizon, this option could prove attractive.

The American Express shopping portal gives you an even worse value on your points. Though you will find a bevy of merchandise through the portal, your rewards are worth 0.5 cents per point. If you’re determined to use your Membership Rewards points for online shopping, visiting one of American Express’s shopping partners may be your best bet.

Use points for charity and concerts

You can also use your Amex points to support your choice of thousands of different charities. Simply choose a charity that you want to donate to, and you can use your points at a value of 0.7 cents per point.

You can even use your points to purchase tickets for concerts and events through Ticketmaster and AXS, but this is ill-advised. Points are worth 0.5 cents apiece when redeemed for event tickets.

Bottom line

You have many different ways to earn American Express points, so it’s smart to understand which ones give you maximum value. While it’s easy and convenient to use them for gift cards or shopping partners like Amazon, these tend to provide poor value and are generally not recommended.

Most cardholders would get the best value from their points by either transferring to airline or hotel partners or booking airfare directly through Amex Travel. Which one is right for you depends on what type of travel you’re looking for and how much effort you want to put in. It can pay to spend some time comparing the cost in cash via Amex Travel to the cost in points if you transfer to a partner to see which one makes sense for you.