How Much You Need to Spend on Credit Cards to Fly Using Points & Miles

HOW MUCH DO YOU NEED TO SPEND ON CREDIT CARDS TO TURN YOUR SPEND INTO FLIGHTS USING POINTS AND MILES?

Most people earn points and miles through credit card spending, and unless you earn points and miles by paying cash to fly often, credit card spending is easily the best way to earn points and miles. By far the cheapest way to turn credit card points and miles into flights is by transferring them to airline loyalty programs and then using these airline loyalty program points and miles to book the flights.

With that in mind, have you ever given thought to how much you need to spend on credit cards to take that dream flight using points and miles?

POINTS AND MILE EARNING JOURNEY WHEN USING CREDIT CARDS

Before delving into that, firstly consider the points and miles journey when using credit cards.

Looking at this journey, there are 3 influences on how many airline loyalty programs points and miles you will earn to pay for those dream flights:

• Spend - How much you spend on your credit card

• Credit card loyalty program earn rate – How many credit card loyalty program points and miles you earn for every $1 you spend on your credit card

• Airline loyalty program transfer rate – how many airline loyalty program points and miles you earn for every 1 credit card point and mile you transfer

By knowing all these, you can calculate how many airline loyalty program points and miles you will earn for every $1 spend on your credit card. Conversely, you can calculate how much you need to spend on your credit card to earn enough airline points and miles for your dream flight.

Not surprisingly, the answer is completely different depending on what credit card you use and what airline loyalty program you transfer to. And the difference can be big, very big.

HOW MUCH DO I NEED TO SPEND ON CREDIT CARDS TO EARN 10,000 AIRLINE POINTS AND MILES?

Let’s look at a few examples of how this can play out, using real-life credit cards and airline loyalty programs. The table below shows you how much you need to spend on certain credit cards to earn 10,000 airline points and miles across different airline loyalty programs. It also shows you how many airline points and miles you would earn on $1,000 credit card spend.

As you can see, there are vast differences between different credit cards and also airline loyalty programs. After taking into account credit card loyalty program earn rates and airline loyalty program transfer rates, with some credit cards and some airline loyalty programs, you need to spend only $8,889 to earn 10,000 airline loyalty program points and miles.

However, with some credit cards and some airline loyalty programs, you need to spend $40,000 to earn 10,000 airline loyalty program points and miles. That’s 4.5 times as much!

To put this another way, with the best credit card and best airline loyalty program, if you spend $40,000 you would earn 45,000 airline loyalty program points and miles. With the worst credit card and worst airline loyalty program, if you spend $40,000 you would earn only 10,000 airline loyalty program points and miles. This can be the difference between flying economy and business class or flying once a year or four times a year! To make sure you’re the one flying business, or even first class, instead of economy, or four times a year instead of once a year, check out our Earn More “Best Credit Card” Pointrs now!

EFFECT OF CAPPED VS UNCAPPED CREDIT CARD LOYALTY POINTS AND MILES

Many credit cards cap the number of credit card points and miles you can earn. This capping can take a variety of forms and can be per statement period, per year, and more. Capping can include earning no points and miles after certain spend or points and miles earned, or it can take the form of reduced earn rates of points and miles after certain spend or points and miles earned.

Uncapped credit cards allow you to earn an infinite number of credit card points and miles and at the same rate regardless of credit card spend or points and miles earned.

Capping can have a significant effect on your points and miles earning ability and hence can greatly increase the credit card spend required to earn the same number of airline points and miles. Hence, capped credit cards should be avoided, unless they have no effect on your points and miles earning.

LOYALTY PROGRAM PROMOTIONS

Apart from using the best credit cards, you can make use of promotions that provide bonuses when transferring points and miles from credit cards to airline loyalty programs. With bonuses up to 40%, these promotions can greatly reduce the credit card spend required to take that dream flight using points and miles. For example, a transfer bonus promotion in August 2024 gave 30% bonus on transfers from American Express Membership Rewards to Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer. As shown in the table below, this meant you needed to spend only $10,256 on your credit card to earn 10,000 Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer miles instead of $13,333 – 23% less.