With more than 7,000 hotels spread over 124 countries under 19 brands, Hilton most certainly has a property fit for your needs when you are planning travel. You could want to look at signing up for a hotel loyalty program like Hilton Honors to improve your trip.
You can get elite status and accumulate significant points that can then be used for free nights at Hilton hotels if you keep staying at Hilton properties or use Hilton cobranded credit cards.
Here is what you need to know about the Hilton Honors program, including a summary of its elite status and point-earning and redemption policies.
Hilton Honors Program Overview
One of the biggest hotel chains worldwide, Hilton, offers a reward program called The Hilton Honors.
Hilton Honors has a solid argument for being among the finest hotel rewards programs when you mix the outstanding amount of establishments across the globe engaged in this program with attractive Hilton Honors credit cards and quite simple points to earn and redeem.
Hilton Honors Elite Status
Within its Hilton Honors loyalty program, Hilton has four tiers.
Hilton Honors Member
Everybody who registers for the Hilton Honors program automatically earns Member tier status from Hilton. Here are the benefits:
- At Tru and Home2 brands, five base points for every dollar spent; at all other Hilton hotels, ten base points for every dollar spent
- No resort fees are charged for award stays.
- Free Wi-Fi
- Access to exclusive Hilton Honors experiences
- Select one of the available rooms up to 24 hours in advance.
- Use a digital check-in/checkout and a digital key.
- Points toward free nights, travel partners and more
Hilton Honors Silver
After four separate stays, ten nights or 25,000 base points in a calendar year, you can gain Hilton Honors Silver status.
Apart from the advantages shared by every Hilton Honors member, Hilton Honors Silver members also get the following ones:
- Fifth night free on award stays booked by just using points.
- At most facilities, get a 20% bonus on base points gained on every stay means 2 extra points per dollar spent (12 points total); at Home2 Suites and Tru brands, 1 extra point.
- Elite rollover nights.
- Two water bottles per stay at some properties (Hampton, Homewood Suites, Home2 Suites and Tru are not included).
- 15% off spa discounts at Hilton’s all-inclusive brands.
For a no-annual-fee card, Hilton grants Silver status (membership required) to Hilton Honors American Express Card holders, therefore offering a tremendous advantage. See rates and fees.
Hilton Honors Gold
After 20 different visits, 40 nights or 75,000 base points accumulated in a calendar year, you will gain Hilton Honors Gold status.
In addition to the advantages Hilton Honors Silver members get, Hilton Honors Gold members also get the following:
- Daily meal and beverage credit—U.S. hotels only alternatively a continental breakfast (non-US hotels)
- Space-available room enhancements, all through the executive level (at select Hilton hotels)
- Every ten nights after 40 nights spent in a calendar year, earn 10,000 bonus points.
- 80% bonus on base points acquired on stays, equivalent to 8 points per dollar spent (18 points total) or 4 extra points at Home2 Suites and Tru brands.
For as long as the card account is open, the following American Express cards automatically grant Hilton Honors Gold status (enrollment is required):
- Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card: $150 annual fee
- The Hilton Honors American Express Business Card: $195 annual fee
- The Platinum Card® from American Express: $695 annual fee
- American Express’s Business Platinum Card®: $695 annual fee
Spending $20,000 on the Hilton Honors American Express Card in a calendar year (Jan. 1 to Dec. 31) will also allow card holders to qualify for an upgrade to Hilton Honors Gold status.
Hilton Honors Diamond
After 30 different stays, 60 nights or 120,000 base points accumulated in a calendar year, you can obtain Hilton Honors Diamond status.
Apart from Gold advantages, Hilton Diamond members also enjoy the following ones:
- Space-available room enhancements (up to a one-bedroom suite)
- Executive lounge access is available for one other guest booked in your accommodation as well as for you.
- Premium Wi-Fi
- If you reach out at least 48 hours before your visit, you have a 48-hour room guarantee.
- Elite status gifting: Should a Diamond member spend 60 nights in a calendar year, they can gift Gold status to another member; following a 100-night stay in a calendar year, they can grant Diamond status.
- 100% bonus on base points acquired on every visit, equivalent to 10 extra points for every dollar spent (20 points total) or 5 extra points for the Home2 Suites brand.
- Diamond members who have maintained their three-year status and earned 500,000 base points will be eligible for a one-time status extension for an additional year.
Any member who has maintained Diamond level for ten years (the years do not have to be consecutive) and completed 1,000 nights at Hilton locations (maybe a mix of paid and reward nights) or earned at least 2 million base points is eligible for Lifetime Diamond status.
Certain Hilton Honors credit cards let you spend your way to Hilton Honors Diamond status in addition to offering complimentary Hilton Honors Gold status. Specifically, when you spend $40,000 on your Hilton Honors American Express Surpass Card or Hilton Honors American Express Business Card, you will upgrade to Hilton Honors Diamond status at the conclusion of the next calendar year.
As long as you keep the card account active, the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card grants complimentary Hilton Honors Diamond status.
Status Match to Gold and Challenge to Diamond
Hilton Honors typically provides a status match to Hilton Honors Gold, with the challenge of maintaining Gold or upgrading to Hilton Honors Diamond status.
Requesting a status match to Hilton Honors Gold will allow you to experience how members of the program travel for the next 90 days. Should you spend eight nights within your 90-day trial period, you can keep the Gold status through March 31, 2025. Should you spend 14 nights within your 90-day trial period, Hilton will mark your status as Diamond through March 31, 2025.
You should, however, time your status match wisely since the terms and conditions usually specify that only members who have not completed a status match challenge before are qualified. Furthermore, reward stays are not counted toward the status match qualification.
Unless you book directly with a hotel brand, you typically won’t have access to top benefits and profits.
Hilton Honors Transfer Partners
American Express Membership Rewards points can be a 1:2 ratio transferred to Hilton Honors. Sometimes, the program provides transfer bonuses.
However, Hilton Honors points are valued at 0.6 cents per point, and Amex points at 2 cents per point. Thus, transferring during a bonus period would not be logical.
How To Earn Hilton Points
Hilton points can be earned in numerous different ways. While Hilton Honors partners might help you earn some points, many guests find that staying at Hilton hotels or using credit cards generates most of their points.
Hotel Stays
Though you’ll only get 5 base points per dollar spent at Home2 Suites and Tru by Hilton, you will get at least 10 Hilton Honors base points for every dollar you spend at most Hilton brands. On up to four rooms each stay, you can accrue base points; all qualified charges made to these rooms will count toward this total.
Your Hilton Honors status will also determine additional points. Promotions from Hilton Honors sometimes let you accrue bonus points for hotel stays.
Credit Card Spending
Using Hilton Honors cobranded credit cards allows one to swiftly accumulate Hilton points between large welcome bonuses and high-category benefits.
- Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card: Earn 130,000 Hilton Honors bonus points after spending $3,000 on purchases in the first six months of card membership ($150 annual fee).
- Hilton Honors American Express Card: Earn 80,000 Hilton Honors bonus points after spending $2,000 on purchases in the first six months of card membership (no annual fee).
- The Hilton Honors American Express Business Card: Earn 130,000 bonus points after you spend $6,000 on purchases in the first six months of card membership ($195 annual fee).
- Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card: Earn 150,000 Hilton Honors bonus points after you spend $6,000 in purchases on the card within your first six months of card membership ($550 annual fee).
Partners
Hilton Honors has partners from which you may earn and redeem Hilton points.
Riding with Lyft can help you to accumulate Hilton Honors points. Linking your Hilton Honors account with your Lyft account will let you accumulate 2 points for every dollar spent on shared Lyft rides and 3 points per dollar spent on Lyft rides (economy, luxury and extra seats). On some Alamo, Enterprise, and National car rentals, you can also accrue Hilton points.
At selected restaurants, you can ultimately earn between 2 and 8 points per dollar spent by registering an account and linking a credit or debit card to Hilton Honors Dining. Select benefits call for enrollment.
Purchase Hilton Points
Usually selling points for one cent apiece, Hilton lets you buy up to 160,000 points for $1,600 a calendar year. On select Hilton promotions, though, you could be able to buy more points for as little as 0.5 cents apiece.
How To Redeem Hilton Points
Usually, free nights at the program’s participating hotels are the easiest way to redeem hotel points. This is most definitely true when redeeming Hilton Honors points.
Free Night Awards
Although Hilton does not provide an award chart, the Points Explorer tool allows you to search for properties depending on location and point value for your allocated nightly budget. You can sort your results depending on the brand after first looking by location and point count.
Award night bookings on the Hilton website are simple. From the homepage, enter your destination, dates, and guest count. Click “Special Rates” first, then “Find a Hotel,” and then tick the “Use Points” box. The award rates for your visit will show in the search results once you click “Find a Hotel.”
Click on a certain property to view pricing for every kind of room. Then, you can make a snap judgment on whether redeeming points is worth it.
The flexible date search lets you quickly view a month at a time as well. Choose “Shop by price” when entering the dates of your hotel stay to get a calendar showing the daily cost of a stay of your selected length for every check-in date.
Redeeming your Hilton points for a free night will provide different values. Let’s investigate, for instance, the booking price for the new Conrad Orlando. I checked randomly, and the price is 90,000 Hilton Honors points each night.
For a night in Orlando, 90,000 Hilton points is a lot to spend; nevertheless, you would get 0.7 cents for each point. You would still be getting more than our valuation since Hilton points at 0.6 cents apiece are valued highly.
You can also use your points for upgraded accommodations. Looking at Pay with Points choices for a room, you will often find that some rooms cost more than others.
For individuals looking for a larger room or desiring an upgraded view, redeeming for a premium room can be a wonderful choice, even if it usually won’t offer exceptional value.
Fifth Night Free on Awards
Members of Silver, Gold, and Diamond get access to an extra night free for award stays. For standard room reward stays of five or more consecutive award nights, this bonus is offered.
Although Hilton will not grant you more than four free nights per stay, there is no restriction on how many times you may use this benefit annually.
Points & Money Rewards
Redeeming for a free night award with Points & Money lets you stretch your points. You can mix cash and points instead of spending all points for a free night. Starting with 5,000 points, you can even change the ratio in increments of 1,000 points, unlike other programs.
Travel Rewards
Your points can be transferred to 14 airline partners; however, often, you will have to transfer at least 10,000 miles concurrently, and the transfer ratios are not very good.
Your Hilton points can also be redeemed for car rentals, and Shop with Points at Amazon and Lyft trips. However, you will typically only get roughly 0.2 cents per point on these redemptions. I thus advise against using any of these trip incentive schemes.
Hilton Honors Experiences
Hilton Honors Experiences allows you to redeem points for a non-hotel prize with significant value from several events. For instance, for under 20,000 Hilton points, you can pay for a four-course dinner and a sixty-minute couples massage.
Donate
PointWorthy lets you contribute your points to a charity. Every 3,500 Hilton points you donate will pay $10 to a selected charity.
Bottom Line
Basic members of the Hilton’s Honors program pay nothing to join. It will also enable you to accumulate points to be used on your next visits to the Hilton portfolio. Hilton makes point earning and redeeming quite easy.
A Hilton cobranded credit card can help you optimize your capacity to earn points, which you may redeem for award stays if you stay (or intend to stay) at Hilton locations at least a few times a year.
When redeeming, your Hilton points will be most valuable if you redeem for award nights and, occasionally, Hilton Honors Experiences. When staying in increments of five nights, I typically use Hilton points since members of Hilton Silver, Gold and Diamond get every fifth night free on award stays.