You can earn all the points in the world but you’re not really travel hacking unless you get good value for those points and miles. The problem is that they all have different values. Value is also really subjective so you’ll get different opinions from different people. Despite that, I’ll try to give you some baselines. As you get more experienced, you may adjust these on your own as you see fit. For example, consensus might be that points are worth 1.5 cents, but after numerous redemptions you have found that you can get 2.5 cents per point. Thus, you might view those points as being worth 2.5 cents per point.
Further complicating the matter is that you can’t look at two different points and decide that one is necessarily better than the other because of the value. For example, points A at 2.0 cents per points is not necessarily better than points B at 0.8 cents per point. That’s because the sign up bonus and the earnings rate of points B might be much better. Consider this example. You have two cards, with the same $95 annual fee, minimum spend for the sign up bonus is $500. The difference is that card 1 earns 20,000 A points and card 2 earns 80,000 B points. The value of card 1’s sign up bonus is $400 (20,000 x .02). The value of card 2’s sign up bonus is $640 (80,000 x .008). Note that this is just a hypothetical example but it demonstrates why you always have to do the math. To learn how to do the math, see this article.
Airline miles
| Air Canada Aeroplan | 1.5 cents. |
| Air France / KLM Flying Blue | 1.5 cents. |
| Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan | 1.4 cents. |
| American Airlines AAdvantage | 1.7 cents. |
| ANA Mileage Club | 2.8 cents. |
| British Airways Avios | 1.0 cent. |
| Delta Air Lines SkyMiles | 1.2 cents. |
| Emirates Skywards | 0.6 cent. |
| Frontier Miles | 1.1 cents. |
| Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles | 1.2 cents. |
| JetBlue TrueBlue | 1.5 cents. |
| Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer | 1.5 cents. |
| Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards | 1.5 cents. |
| Spirit Airlines Free Spirit | 0.8 cent. |
| TAP Portugal Miles&Go | 0.8 cents. |
| Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles | 1.1 cents. |
| United Airlines MileagePlus | 1.5 cents. |
| Virgin Atlantic Flying Club | 1.8 cents. |
Hotel Points
| Best Western Rewards | 0.7 cent. |
| Choice Privileges | .08 cent. |
| Hilton Honors | 0.6 cent. |
| Hyatt (World of Hyatt) | 2.0 cents. |
| IHG Rewards | 0.8 cent. |
| Marriott Bonvoy | 0.8 cent. |
| Wyndham Rewards | 1.1 cents. |
Credit Card Points
| American Express Membership Rewards | 2.0 cents. |
| Bank of America Travel Rewards | 1.0 cent. |
| Barclay Arrival Points | 1.0 cent. |
| Bilt Rewards | 2.0 cents. |
| Capital One Rewards | 1.8 cents. |
| Chase Ultimate Rewards | 2.0 cents. |
| Citi ThankYou Points | 1.8 cents. |
Transferring points
Understanding these value is very important when you are transferring points. If you have 100,000 Ultimate Rewards points and you want to transfer them to Marriott, you’ll be losing about 1.2 cents per point. That’s like giving someone two dollars and getting back eighty cents without even buying anything. Makes no sense right? Well that’s why Hyatt is so popular with travel hackers. This is why Marriott and some other transfer partners will have transfer bonuses but you still have to do the math to make sure it makes sense.
Conclusion
No matter how you value points and miles, the goal here is to get as much value out of your points as possible. In the end, this is a very personal decision. Just because everyone else is getting above 2 cents per point, doesn’t mean that you are doing something wrong if you are getting below that level. What matter is whether you feel good about it.