Elite status with a hotel chain can make travel much more comfortable, but you don’t necessarily need elite status to unlock extra perks during your next hotel stay.

After all, select credit card holders can get elitelike perks by booking through programs such as American Express’ Fine Hotels + Resorts program, Capital One’s Premier Collection and Lifestyle Collection, and Citi’s Hotel Collection and The Reserve (formerly Luxury Collection).

Likewise, Chase features a selection of luxury hotels called The Edit by Chase Travel℠.

Booking one of Chase’s The Edit properties can provide travelers with valuable perks. Plus, we’ve found that prices are pretty comparable when booking directly with the hotel versus via Chase Travel.

Let’s discuss the benefits of booking through this platform.

What is The Edit by Chase Travel?

The Edit by Chase Travel offers select Chase cardholders elitelike benefits at more than 1,000 hotels, resorts, lodges and spas worldwide. The premium properties bookable through The Edit program are a mix of branded and independent lodgings.

To make a reservation through the program, you must have a participating card.

Which cards are eligible for The Edit by Chase Travel bookings?

You must have one of the following cards to make a booking through The Edit by Chase Travel:

The information for the J.P. Morgan Reserve has been collected independently by The Points Guy. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.

The Edit by Chase Travel benefits and perks

The price when booking through The Edit by Chase Travel is usually the same as when booking directly, but sometimes it can be higher or lower depending on the property. The perks you receive when you book through the program and use your eligible Chase card to purchase your stay may offset any price difference. With every The Edit booking, you receive:

• Daily breakfast for two
• A special benefit worth up to $100 (unique to each property but often includes a lunch or dinner for two, a spa treatment, golf green fee waivers, a welcome gift or airport transfers)
• Complimentary Wi-Fi at properties that offer Wi-Fi
• A room upgrade at select properties (when available)
• Early check-in and late checkout at select properties (when available)

As you might expect, the daily breakfast and special benefits vary in quality and value. Although Chase provides various examples of the special benefit, most properties offer a $50 or $100 credit to use during your stay.

The Edit statement credit for Sapphire Reserve and Sapphire Reserve for Business cardholders

Chase Sapphire Reserve and Chase Sapphire Reserve for Business cardholders currently receive up to a $500 annual statement credit (up to $250 biannually) for prepaid The Edit bookings of two nights or more.

To use the credit, simply pay with your eligible Sapphire card at checkout on The Edit by Chase Travel. This credit could fully cover (or cover a portion of) a weekend getaway or staycation.

Note that Sapphire Reserve cardholders who applied before June 23 will not receive access to the new The Edit statement credit until Oct. 26.

Starting Jan. 1, 2026, The Edit credit will be even more flexible. Cardholders will automatically get a credit of up to $250 for each prepaid The Edit booking (of two nights or more), up to $500 annually. Instead of waiting to take advantage of your The Edit statement credit once between January and June and then once more between July and December, you’ll be able to use the full allotment at your leisure instead of biannually.

Related: Chase boosts Sapphire Reserve hotel perks with new and improved credits

For use in 2026, consumer and business Sapphire cardholders will receive an additional $250 statement credit for select prepaid Chase Travel hotel bookings (of two nights or more) with the following brands:

• IHG Hotels & Resorts
• Minor Hotels
• Montage Hotels & Resorts
• Omni Hotels & Resorts
• Pan Pacific Hotels and Resorts
• Pendry Hotels & Resorts
• Virgin Hotels

If you’ve never used The Edit by Chase Travel and are a Sapphire Reserve or Sapphire Reserve for Business cardholder, this credit can be a good way to try out a new hotel or return to an old favorite. The credit generally takes six to eight weeks to post to your account, but many TPG staffers have seen it post much faster.

Related: Chase Sapphire Reserve statement credits: What they are and how to use them

How to book The Edit by Chase Travel

To book through The Edit, log in to Chase Travel. To start a search, enter your destination, dates and number of guests in the search boxes at the top of the page.

Once you find a hotel you like, click on it to see all the benefits you will receive with The Edit. Here, you can see the listed benefits that are standard with The Edit properties. Then, you will select the room type you want.

Once you get to the payment page, you can pay with cash, points or a combo of the two. When you pay with your Chase Sapphire Reserve or Chase Sapphire Reserve for Business, you will earn 8 points per dollar spent.

To book your stay, you must use your eligible Chase card. While you can opt to pay later (aka at the hotel), you must prepay in order to use your Sapphire Reserve The Edit credit.

Some of The Edit properties may have cancellation policies, so be sure to double-check when booking. Also note that the price you see may not show additional hotel charges, such as resort fees. Take the time to understand what types of fees the hotel might impose before you book.

Finally, carefully read the details of specific benefits at the property you book. Some complimentary breakfast perks are limited to certain restaurants or subject to a maximum dollar amount. Additionally, some of these may be temporarily unavailable.

Related: What’s the difference between Chase’s The Edit properties and Points Boost?

Will I earn elite status or loyalty benefits?

Chase Sapphire Reserve, Chase Sapphire Reserve for Business and J.P. Morgan Reserve cardholders who book through The Edit may have their hotel loyalty benefits honored. You may be eligible to earn elite night credits and receive benefits associated with your elite status.

When searching for hotels, it will be noted if the property is eligible for loyalty benefits. For example, when looking at the Thompson Central Park New York, this property states it is “World of Hyatt eligible.”

Related: Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card review: Luxury perks coupled with valuable rewards

Is The Edit by Chase Travel worth it?

The Edit by Chase Travel resembles Amex’s Fine Hotels + Resorts program, but when you book with Fine Hotels + Resorts, your late checkout is guaranteed and the experience credit is often more valuable because it covers more options.

Other card-related hotel programs include Capital One’s Lifestyle Collection and Amex’s The Hotel Collection. However, when compared with The Edit by Chase Travel, the benefits from these programs aren’t as extensive or valuable. They do offer the opportunity to book some less expensive hotels, though.

Finally, booking directly will usually provide more rate options, including AAA, AARP and corporate rates. When booking directly, you can also click through a cash-back portal and know with more certainty that you’ll get elite nights and benefits (if that matters to you). If you already get breakfast included as a brand amenity or elite benefit, it may make sense to book directly, especially if you can do so at a lower rate.

Booking through The Edit by Chase Travel is generally worth it. However, we recommend comparing other booking options when planning a trip to ensure you get the best value and benefits for your stay.

When to use The Edit by Chase Travel

Even if the rates aren’t the lowest, booking through a program like The Edit by Chase Travel can be a good idea in some instances.

Short stays

One of the most significant selling points of The Edit by Chase Travel is the property credit. However, most properties provide this benefit per stay, not per night. So, the shorter your stay, the better value this represents.

As such, it may be worth booking a property linked to The Edit for only one night at the beginning or end of your trip to squeeze the most value out of this perk.

Boutique and nonchain hotels

Booking through The Edit can give you elitelike benefits at nonchain hotels. Some luxury hotels aren’t part of a hotel loyalty program, so booking through The Edit by Chase Travel can be an excellent way to get more benefits and recognition.

Someone else is paying

If your company or a client is paying for your stay, it may not matter how you book. So, you may be able to book through The Edit by Chase Travel, even if it isn’t the least expensive option, so you can benefit from the program’s perks when traveling for business.

Travelers without elite status

Booking through The Edit by Chase Travel provides many of the same perks as elite status. Booking through The Edit can provide more value when you’re staying at a brand for which you don’t have top-tier elite status. The breakfast benefit alone is enough to offset any difference in rates at some properties.

Bottom line

Using your hard-earned points for hotel stays can be a great way to keep money in your pocket. That said, using points may not be the best option — or an option at all — in some cases. Not to mention, for some trips, you might want elitelike perks even though you don’t have elite status. In these cases, it may make sense to book your hotel stay through a program like The Edit by Chase Travel.

Related: Enjoy luxury perks at our favorite hotels that are part of The Edit by Chase Travel

Hilton Honors free night certificates are among the most valuable hotel perks available, letting you save hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars at top properties worldwide.

Unlike most programs that restrict free nights to certain categories or point values, Hilton certificates can be used almost anywhere — even at the brand’s most luxurious resorts.

These certificates are issued through select Hilton cobranded credit cards, either on your card anniversary or after meeting specific spending thresholds.

In this guide, we’ll show you how to earn these certificates, redeem them and maximize their value.

Related: The best Hilton hotels in the world

Overview of Hilton free night certificates

Let’s start with the basics. Hilton free night certificates come with some simple rules and features:

• Standard award rooms only: They can’t be used for upgraded “Premium Room Rewards.”
• No blackout dates: If a standard award room is available, you can use your certificate.
• Valid for 12 months: Certificates expire one year from the date of issuance.
• Any night of the week: There are no weekend-only restrictions.
• Easy to track: You can view unused certificates (and those redeemed in the last 12 months) in your Hilton Honors account.

Each Hilton credit card awards certificates differently, which we’ll cover next.

Related: The best hotel credit cards that come with an annual free night

How to earn Hilton free night certificates

The following two Hilton credit cards offer ways to earn valuable free night certificates.

Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card

With the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card, you’ll receive one free night upon opening the card and then one each year after your account renewal.

The information for the Hilton Aspire Card has been collected independently by The Points Guy. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.

You can earn a second annual free night by spending $30,000 on the card in a calendar year and a third night when you spend $60,000 in a calendar year.

TPG director of content for credit cards and points and miles, Carly Helfand, is a big fan of the Hilton Aspire:

“I’ve maximized free night certificates from the Hilton Honors Aspire to stay at some of Hilton’s top properties worldwide, including the Conrad Maldives, Conrad Bora Bora, Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos, Waldorf Astoria Grand Wailea and Conrad Punta de Mita. The fact that they’re not capped at a certain number of points makes it easier to get immense value from them and means they’re unaffected by the devaluations we’ve seen from Hilton twice in the last year.”

The card comes with a $550 annual fee but also includes benefits like complimentary Hilton Honors Diamond status and up to $200 biannually (up to $400 each calendar year) in statement credits for eligible purchases at eligible Hilton resorts.

Current welcome bonus: Earn 175,000 bonus points after spending $6,000 on purchases on the card in the first six months of card membership. Offer ends Aug. 13.

Hilton Honors American Express Surpass Card

Both new and existing holders of the Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card can earn a free night certificate after spending $15,000 on eligible purchases on the card in a calendar year.

The card also provides complimentary Hilton Gold status, plus up to $50 back each quarter (up to $200 per calendar year) on Hilton purchases.

Current welcome bonus: Earn 130,000 bonus points after spending $3,000 on purchases in the first six months of card membership. New cardholders will also enjoy a $0 introductory annual fee for the first year, then a $150 annual fee (see rates and fees). Offer ends Aug. 13.

Related: Hilton Surpass vs. Hilton Aspire: Do you want Gold or Diamond status?

Where can Hilton free night certificates be redeemed?

While each certificate is valid at virtually any property in the worldwide Hilton portfolio, just over 60 are excluded, including many Hilton Grand Vacations properties and other “distinctive properties.” You can see the full list of these excluded properties on Hilton’s website.

Still, the vast majority of Hilton Honors properties, including aspirational hotels and resorts in places ranging from Bora Bora and the Maldives to Kyoto, Japan, and Park City, Utah, accept these certificates.

This makes Hilton free night certificates more valuable than comparable ones offered by IHG One Rewards, Marriott Bonvoy and World of Hyatt, which generally restrict certificates to certain hotel categories or points redemption values.

When will you receive your Hilton free night certificate?

Hilton free night certificates are sent electronically to your email address on file.

The Hilton Aspire’s terms and conditions indicate that your initial free night certificate should arrive within eight to 14 weeks after opening the card. Then, your annual certificate should arrive within eight to 14 weeks of your card anniversary date.

For certificates earned through spending, you’ll receive them eight to 12 weeks after reaching the spending requirement.

However, we’ve found the process to be much quicker in practice. That said, your experience may vary, so don’t plan on using these certificates too soon after you earn them.

How to use Hilton free night certificates

Once you’ve earned one (or more) of these certificates, the process to redeem them is straightforward. Historically, this had to be completed over the phone, but you can also do it by online chat. Either way, we’ve found the booking experience to be relatively hassle-free.

However, before you even pick up the phone, you’ll want to verify that your desired property has standard award inventory available for your desired dates. If standard rooms are sold out or you would rather book premium rooms, you must either pay out of pocket or redeem Hilton points.

To check availability, go to the Hilton website, enter your search criteria (be sure to check the “Use Points” box) and then look for any property with “Standard Room Reward” listed in the results.

In this example, for a one-night stay in Los Angeles, you couldn’t use your free night certificate for the first property (the DoubleTree) because it only has Premium Room Rewards availability. Conversely, you can use your certificate at any of the other three hotels shown.

Some hotels may have multiple room types under the “Standard Room Reward” designation, so be sure to look at each individual property to confirm the available rooms.

Once you’ve verified that standard awards are available, call Hilton at 800-446-6677. Let the agent know that you would like to make a reservation using your free night certificate(s) from your American Express card(s).

Each free night should be associated with your account, but the email you received will have the certificate number in case the agent has trouble locating it.

If you have two or more Hilton free night certificates, you should be able to apply them to a single reservation, like in the following example.

Even though this confirmation listed the regular award cost (100,000 points for a two-night stay), those points weren’t actually used since two free night certificates were attached to the reservation.

Note that these certificates can’t be combined with Hilton’s fifth-night-free perk, so you don’t want to use them on a five-night stay, as you must redeem points for all five nights to get one free. However, you could use a certificate for a sixth night, which can be a great option to extend your stay at a luxury resort.

Finally, it’s worth mentioning that the automatic Hilton elite status provided by credit cards is honored on all stays booked directly with Hilton, including reservations using free night certificates.

Related: When you should redeem free night certificates instead of hotel points

How to maximize Hilton free night certificates

Now that you know how to redeem your certificates, here are some strategies we’ve used to maximize the value of these credit card perks.

Redeem them at higher-tier properties

Your priority should be to redeem Hilton free night certificates at higher-tier properties. That’s because these certificates are valid at virtually all properties around the world, even those pricing as much as 200,000 Hilton Honors points per night.

When you’re deciding how to use these free nights, our advice is to aim for properties that cost 120,000 points or more per night. Since Hilton points are worth 0.5 cents apiece based on TPG’s August 2025 valuations, and since these certificates are essentially substitutes for using points, you’d get $600 of value on a 120,000-point stay.

You can often get far more than that, though.

For instance, the night below at the Waldorf Astoria Seychelles Platte Island costs an eye-watering $2,059. But since this is a standard room reward, bookable with 150,000 Hilton Honors points, you could pay for it with a free night certificate and save yourself over $2,000.

You won’t get that sort of value from most World of Hyatt free night certificates, IHG One Rewards free night certificates and Marriott Bonvoy free night certificates.

Here are some terrific properties that normally require a high number of points per night:

Related: Is the $100 property credit for select Hilton cardmembers worth using?

Look for high paid rates

Another strategy to maximize the value of your certificates is to look for properties with high cash prices. High paid rates tend to correlate with high award rates, but that’s not always the case.

Upscale hotels may have surprisingly low prices in the offseason, while you’ll often see low- to mid-tier properties charging sky-high room rates during special events, even though the number of points you’d need to redeem for a free night isn’t unreasonable.

For example, TPG contributing credit cards editor Matt Moffitt used a free night certificate at the Motto by Hilton New York City Chelsea. While it’s a lower-tier property compared to other Hilton hotels in the city, its convenient location made it the perfect fit, and the certificate helped offset steep cash rates.

Although Hilton dynamically prices its stays, its Points Explorer tool can help with your search.

This resource will highlight the maximum number of points a property can charge and the lowest award rate a member has booked.

Generally speaking, if you find a weekend night when the property is charging the maximum award price, that’ll correlate to high paid rates. So, you’ll receive solid value for your Hilton free night certificate.

Combine with other reservations

If you only have one or two Hilton free night certificates and are planning a longer stay, consider combining them with a paid stay or a regular award stay. While these might need to be booked separately, it does provide some additional benefits:

• It allows you to redeem an award for more expensive nights: There are many times when a weekend night costs significantly more than a weeknight — for instance, in Las Vegas, we’ve seen properties go for 50,000 points on a Saturday night but only 34,000 points on a Sunday night. By combining a free night certificate with a standard booking, you can pay for the cheaper night with cash or points and attach the certificate to the pricier one.
• It can be combined with card perks: Many cards offer perks for hotel stays, and some of these can be leveraged with a free night. For example, you could combine a free night with a separate reservation through a program like American Express Fine Hotels + Resorts via The Platinum Card® from American Express.
• You could talk your way into an upgrade: A final possible strategy for scoring an upgraded room would be to combine a free night certificate (or two) with a premium room reward at the end of your stay. As long as the premium room type you booked is available at check-in, you might have luck convincing the agent to bump you right into the upgraded accommodations for the entire stay. Just be aware that this plan could backfire, forcing you to switch rooms halfway through your stay.

Bottom line

You can redeem free night certificates at most properties in the Hilton Honors portfolio, giving you a multitude of ways to maximize their value.

The Hilton Surpass Card and the Hilton Aspire Card provide a wealth of opportunities to earn these valuable certificates.

So, whether you’re a Hilton loyalist or you only stay at Hilton properties occasionally, it could be worth adding one of these cards to your wallet.

For rates and fees of the Hilton Surpass Amex card, click here.