Chase Ultimate Rewards review: Credible Amex Membership Rewards competitor

Ulitmate Rewards a credible new competitor

You’ve seen the splashy Chase Ultimate Rewards television commercials, with scenes of delight as cardholders redeem points for every whim and fancy. The program is available on the Chase Sapphire, Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase Freedom, and ink for Business cards, but is Chase Ultimate Rewards anything remarkable?

Our view, after close comparison with its closest competitor American Express Membership Rewards, is it is a fair program, and in some respects superior to Membership Rewards. It offers similar flexibility and in some cases broader opportunities. Cards that earn Ultimate Rewards carry lower annual fees than comparable American Express cards. In some cases, there are no annual fee. The Chase Sapphire Preferred is one of our favorite airline mile credit cards. Here are some of the new features from Ultimate Rewards:

- More gift card options than American Express

- Cash back flexibility

- Lower annual fees than comparable American Express cards

- Optional airline mile transfer to Continental / Unitd Airlines, British Airways, Amtrak, Hyatt, Marriott, and Priority Club hotels. Continental is one of our favorite airline mile programs because it allows easy redemption on over 30 airlines via its Star Alliance and other partners. British Airways offers redemption on another 20+ more via its One World partners.

Side by side comparison

See below for a detailed comparison of three major universal point programs — Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards, and Starwood Preferred Guest. All offer the option of ‘anytime, anywhere’ travel rewards along with airline mile transfer flexibility with select cards. To find out a precise value of cards for you, try using our mile credit card value calculator, which factors in signing bonuses and the type of reward you would like to redeem.

Who is Ultimate Rewards right for?

If redeeming for air travel in a hassle free way with good flexibility is your goal, we think Ultimate Rewards with the Chase Sapphire Preferred is one of your best bets. You get airline transfer into one of our favorite air miles programs — Continental OnePass — soon to be part of United — along with British Airways and Korean Airlines, and hotels Hyatt, Marriott, and Priority Club. This is in addition to basic ‘any airline, anytime’ universal redemption.

Who is Starwood Preferred Guest right for?

If you are willing to see the light on the value of hotel points, then the Starwood Preferred Guest credit card from American Express offers great deals on hotel nights for relatively few points, and the flexibility to convert points into airline miles with most carriers, though with a lag of a few days.

Who is American Express Membership Rewards right for?

American Express Membership Rewards linked cards are particularly useful for 1) people who work at companies that use Amex corporate credit cards, and want to build on points earned there, 2) high spenders who can take advantage of the annual point bonuses offered by the Gold credit card, and 3) people who value the airline lounge access offered by the high annual fee Platinum card as well as upgrades at luxury hotels. It’s also helpful if you are a Delta airlines flyer and want to top off balances there. Ultimate Rewards does not offer transfers to Delta.

Apply for cards with Ultimate Rewards

Chase Sapphire Preferred: $95 annual fee waived first year, airline and hotel point 1:1 transfer features, 50,000 point intro bonus

Chase Sapphire: No annual fee

Chase Freedom: No annual fee, $200 cash back intro offer, 5x points per $1 in rotating categories — use our Mile Credit Card Value Calculator to see how it compares to other cards

More detail from the side by side comparison…

Any airline, anytime rewards

All of the major universal points programs offer the ability to use points on any airline at any time by ‘purchasing’ the ticket using your points. The difference is what value the program places on those points per dollar of airfare you want to purchase. Starwood offers a bracketed scale offering a value of $0.01 to $0.0150 per point. Chase Ultimate Rewards offers a consistent $0.0125 per point if you are a holder of its $95 annual fee Sapphire Preferred card. The no annual fee versions get a standard $0.01 per point value. American Express Membership Rewards, despite carrying annual fees, offers the standard $0.01 per point value

Gift cards

The programs generally offer a similar $1 in gift card value per 100 points redeemed, though Starwood offers up to $1.07 in value. However gift card redeemers generally value flexibility highly, and Chase Ultimate Rewards delivers with the highest number of gift card merchants.

Auctions

Chase has an aggressive online auction program with some unique high value rewards for your points at attractive point values. Click here to see our discussion of some of the auction items. Membership Rewards doesn’t offer this.

Cash back

We generally avoid cash back rewards because they limit your return potential to about 1% unless you use one of these cash back credit cards. However many people like the flexibility to turn some points into cash as peace of mind. Chase Ultimate Rewards lets you do it, while American Express Membership Rewards and Starwood don’t.

Transferring points to air miles

One of our most valued mile credit card features is the ability to transfer your points directly into the miles of several airline programs. This gives you the most ways to book a flight at attractive rates.

On the surface, Starwood Preferred Guest offers the most compelling offer. You can transfer to any of over 30 airline programs at 1:1 or better, with a nice 5,000 mile bonus for every 20,000 points you transfer. The catch is…the mile transfer can take several days. Most air miles programs will hold a mile reservation for about 3 days, so you may be in a bit of limbo waiting for your Starwood miles to post.

Chase Ultimate Rewards offers instant transfer to its partners like Continental / United Airlines, British Airways and Korean Airlines. Continental will hold your mileage reservation for 3 days, so you can always be sure your miles will post in time. While Ultimate Rewards only offers three airline programs for transfers, these airlines offer you redemption opportunities on every major airline in the world via the Star Alliance (Continental), SkyTeam (Korean Airlines), and One World (British Airways). If a standard award seat is available on one of their partners, it’s available to you.

You’re not sacrificing much by having only these three partners vs the 30+ on Starwood, particularly since we have high regard for the Continental OnePass program. When the merger with United is complete it will be the largest program in the United States.

Hotel point transfer

We still like the Starwood Preferred Guest program for hotel points – it offers the most value for your points – hotel rewards cost fewer points with Starwood than with most other hotel programs. 7,000 – 10,000 points will get you a night at a premier property often worth $250 or more with no capacity restriction. These include nearly all Sheraton, Westin, W, and Le Meridien hotels worldwide.

Both Ultimate Rewards and Membership Rewards offer transfer options to other hotel programs like Marriott, but these programs aren’t as well geared to people who earn via credit cards, carrying higher point requirements for a free night. Hyatt is the exception via Ultimate Rewards — its point requirements are modestly higher than those for Starwood for comparable hotels..

Annual fee

We think you should seriously consider a card with airline mileage transfer for maximum flexibility. In that case you will need to pay an annual fee. Starwood’s American Express offers the lowest — $60. American Express Membership Rewards eligilble cards are the highest — starting at $95 for the stanard green card with no major signing bonus. The Chase Sapphire Preferred with Ultimate Rewards comes in at $95 per year, waived the first year with a large sign on bonus.

However if you want the major features of Ultimate Rewards without airline mile transfer you can choose one of two no annual fee credit cards: the Chase Sapphire and Chase Freedom. Again, your redemption value will be maximized if you choose a credit card with point transfer flexibility, but for more casual users it is an option.