Best Travel Rewards Credit Cards: How You Can Travel for Free!

Just so you know: Life Before Budget has partnered with CardRatings for our coverage of credit card products. Life Before Budget and CardRatings may receive a commission from card issuers. Also, the content of this article as well as comments from users are not meant to be professional financial advice and have not been reviewed by the advertisers. Please read our disclosures page for more details.

This article has been modified from a previous version to reflect the best travel rewards credit cards for 2020.

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As you are looking to save money on travel, be sure to check out my three best travel rewards credit cards for 2020. I have used each of these cards to save thousands of dollars on my travel over the past few years and you can too. Enjoy all of your free travel!

~Nathan

Card #1: Chase Sapphire Preferred Card

Earn a bonus of 60,000 points after you spend $4,000 on purchases on the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card within the first 3 months of account opening.

This equates to $750 towards travel when redeemed through Chase Ultimate Rewards!

You will also earn 1 point per dollar spent on general purchases and 2 points for every dollar spent on travel and restaurants.

In my opinion, this is the best travel rewards credit card in 2020.

Card #2: Ink Business Preferred Credit Card

Earn a bonus of 80,000 points after you spend $5,000 on purchases on the Ink Business Preferred Credit Card within the first 3 months of account opening.

This equates to $1,000 towards travel when redeemed through Chase Ultimate Rewards!

You will also earn 1 point per dollar spent on general purchases and 3 points per dollar for the first $150,000 spent on travel and select business categories.

Card #3: Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card

Earn a bonus of 50,000 miles after you spend $3,000 on purchases within the first 3 months of account opening.

Use these miles to pay for $500 in travel expenses that have been put on this card.

You will also earn 2 miles per dollar spend on every purchase. Find out more about this card by clicking here.

And now … the rest of the article! How you can travel for free using travel rewards credit cards.

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I am going to make the claim that I can save you thousands of dollars on travel within the next few years.

And I’m going to be right!

Just by following some simple steps from this article, you will save thousands of dollars!

As a matter of fact, my family has saved over $30,000 on our travel during the past 4 years. 

Not too bad for learning a bit about travel rewards credit cards : ) 

So what are we waiting for? Let’s get started and figure out how to save money on some awesome trips!

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Table of Contents

SECTION 1: What is travel hacking? 

• Do credit cards really help?
• Travel rewards credit cards
• An example

SECTION 2: Who should travel with credit card rewards?

• It’s not for everyone
• Quick quiz to see if it’s right for you
• Do you like free stuff?

SECTION 3: Fixed value travel rewards credit cards

• This is the easiest way to start
• Look … you just made $500!

SECTION 4: Co-branded travel rewards credit cards

• Airline credit cards
• Hotel credit cards

SECTION 5: The best of both worlds 

• You should start with this card

SECTION 6: Business cards

• They can be used for any size business

SECTION 7: Action Steps: What should I do to start?

• Plan your travel in advance
• Get a quick win
• Get specific about your travel needs
• Beware of Chase’s 5/24 rule
• Double your travel rewards with your spouse

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SECTION 1: What is Travel Hacking?

Simply put, travel hacking is using various tips to travel for less.

As a matter of fact, you have already used “hacks” in many parts of your life. These may come in the form of coupons, using white vinegar to clean your dishwasher, or completing high intensity interval training when you work out.

We have all done a lot of “hacking” in our lives. 

You have probably even heard of travel hacking before in the form of airline miles. At least, that was how I first heard of it.

I thought that I would never be able to get free flights and trips because I don’t travel on airlines for work. Therefore, I would never have enough airline miles.

So no free trips for me!

But then I found out about travel rewards credit cards.

Travel Rewards Credit Cards

Without a doubt, reward credit cards are the easiest way to save money on your travel. Not only do you save money on your travel, but this money that you save is tax free.

For instance, if you save $500 on travel, it’s really like saving $750. This is because you would have needed to make around $750 before taxes are taken out to spend $500 on travel.

And travel rewards credit cards make it easy to save on travel. Let’s take a look at how easy it is to save using one of my 3 favorite travel rewards credit cards for 2020.

Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card

Here are some simple steps to sign up and save with a card like the Capital One Venture Rewards. You can find out more about this card here.

STEP 1: Sign up for the credit card.

STEP 2: Use this credit card for all of your spending. At the very least, make sure that you meet the minimum spend requirements for the card. For this card, it is currently $3,000 in the first 3 months of card membership. You should also continue to use this card after meeting the minimum spend requirements because it gives you the added bonus of 2X miles on every purchase made.

STEP 3: Buy a hotel room, flight, or other qualified travel expense with this card. This step can be done at the same time as step #2.

STEP 4: Since you have spent $3,000 or more in the first 3 months of card membership, that means that you have earned 50,000 bonus miles. You also earn 2X miles on every purchase or 600+ additional miles. All together, this is good for $560+ in travel! Use these miles to pay for your travel expense.

You just saved $560 on travel! All because you signed up for this one travel rewards credit card!

During the first year of having this card and just spending $10,000 on it, you would rack up 70,000 points. This would save you $700 in travel!

If this sounds cool, find out more about this card by clicking here.

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 Section 2: Who Should Travel With Rewards Credit Cards

Unfortunately, traveling using rewards credit card is not for everyone!

I absolutely hate saying this, but it may not even be for you.

Let’s do a quick quiz to find out if you should sign up for credit card rewards!

QUESTION 1: Do you have a low credit score? Unfortunately, some of the premium credit cards require FICO scores that are in the 700s before you can be approved.

If your score is not high enough, you can always try to improve your score first and then get a rewards credit card in the future. But right now, credit card rewards might not be right for you.

QUESTION 2: Will using credit cards cause you to go into debt? I’m a math guy, so let’s do a tiny bit of math.

Let’s say you get $500 in free travel for spending $3,000 on a credit card. That’s a 16.67% return on your spending, which is pretty awesome!

But … let’s also say that you don’t pay off this $3,000 for two years and pay an interest rate of 20%. Unfortunately, this is $1,200 in interest that you would have to pay, which would definitely negate $500 in free travel.

So if you don’t pay off your credit cards each month, then credit card rewards may not be for you!

QUESTION 3: Will getting a travel rewards credit card cause you to spend more money?

Let’s say that you get a credit card and get so excited about saving money on travel that you spend $1,000 extra, just to get the bonus miles. Oops … travel rewards credit cards may not be for you!

QUESTION 4: Can you be organized? You don’t have to be as organized and as nerdy as me with my “ultimate spreadsheet.” However, it’s a good idea to keep track of a few things.

• When did you apply for the card?
• How much is the minimum spend to get the bonus?
• What is the bonus?
• Is there an annual fee?

QUESTION 5: Do you like free stuff? 

OK … we all know that the answer to this is yes!

It looks like it is time to start traveling using travel rewards credit cards!

Now that we know we are ready to start, let’s find out about the best way to do it by looking at a couple of different types of rewards credit cards.

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SECTION 3: Fixed Value Credit Cards

One of the easiest ways to start getting travel rewards is by using fixed value credit cards.

It is really easy to sign up for a fixed value credit card and get $500 or more in travel rewards!

Since it is so easy, let’s take a look at exactly how these fixed value credit cards work.

How They Work

Just like almost any other rewards credit card, a fixed value credit card gives you points for spending. Many of them give you 2 points for every dollar that you spend. After you accrue points, you can use these points to pay for your travel expenses. It really is as simple as that! Accrued points are used to help save you money on travel.

For instance, let’s say that you spent $5,000 on one of these cards. This may give you 10,000 points, which typically equates to $100 in travel.

So just by spending what you normally would on a credit card, you instantly received $100 off of a flight, hotel room, or other travel expense.

Now that’s pretty cool, but we can do usually do better than $100 off! Let’s check out some simple steps to maximize the value on these fixed value credit cards!

STEP 1: Sign up for a travel rewards credit card. Preferably do this 5-6 months or more before your trip, but you may even be able to do this 1-2 months before. Typically, good planning can save you a lot of money with these credit cards.

STEP 2: Spend at least the minimum amount to get the initial spend bonus. Often, this minimum spend amount ranges between $1,000 and $5,000 over a 3-6 month time span.

After you spend this amount, you will get an initial spend bonus that can be around 50,000 points! Also, by continuing to spend on this card, you will continue to accrue more travel reward points.

During this time period, it is best to stop all of your spending with cash and just focus on using this credit card. This will allow you to easily meet the minimum spend requirements.

STEP 3: Pay for a “travel expense” with this credit card. This step is the easiest one because you have probably already done it before.

Just go to the website that you would normally go to when you book a flight or pay for a hotel room. This could be Expedia, Priceline, Southwest, or any other travel provider.

When you get there, find the best possible deal and book it. This expense will go on your credit card. Don’t worry … we’ll take care of it in a second.

STEP 4: Use your accrued points to pay for your expense. 

If you’ve accrued 60,000 points, this will pay $600 towards your travel expense.

For instance, let’s say you spent $750 to book a hotel room for 5 nights on your credit card. Instead of paying for this whole expense with cash, you just login to your credit card rewards portal and pay for $600 of this expense with your accrued points.

Now your $750 hotel room only costs $150!

You just saved $600!

Sample Credit Card Specific Example

I know that the example I laid out above is kind of abstract, so let’s look at a very specific example using the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card that I mentioned before.

Here’s our example: Let’s say you live in Michigan (like me) and know that your daughter has a softball tournament in Kentucky in 2 months. You also want to take your spouse to Boston for your anniversary in 5 months. Here are your anticipated travel expenses:

• Hotel rooms for 3 nights in Kentucky: $360 total
• Flight to Boston for 2: $450 total
• Hotel rooms in Boston for 3 nights $540 total

After you apply for this travel rewards credit card, you have to make sure that you spend at least $3,000 on it within 3 months without increasing your overall spending. So you put all of your normal expenses on the credit card. Here are some expenses that you may want to put on the card:

Car insurance	$800
Groceries and general living expenses	$3,000
Prepaid gift cards	$300
Cell phone, cable, or energy bills	$500
Travel expenses	$1,350
TOTAL EXPENSES	$5,950

As you can see, there are a lot of expenses that you can put on a credit card. I have even put my mortgage on my credit card before (although most mortgages don’t allow this).

Just like that, you have spent $3,000 on the credit card and 50,000 bonus points are deposited into your account. You have also earned another 11,900 points from your spending (2X points per dollar spend). You will continue to accrue points as you use this card for your spending.

Here’s the fun part: Go into your credit card portal and redeem these 61,900 points for $619 worth of your travel spending! This was travel that you would have done anyways, but you got it for free!

This sounds pretty sweet and almost too good to be true, but it actually is.

Traveling using reward credit cards is one of the easiest ways ever to get thousands of dollars of tax-free money!

Spending $10,000 on this card, would earn you 70,000 points, or $700 worth of travel.

If the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card could save you some money on travel, just click here to find out more about it.

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SECTION 4: Co-Branded Travel Rewards Credit Cards

As cool as fixed value credit cards can be, co-branded travel rewards credit cards can be even better! Remember of course that you saved $619+ on your travel in the last section. What could be better than that?

Before we figure that out, let’s talk about what a co-branded travel rewards credit card is. Then we will discuss how you can benefit from it and potentially save $1,000-2,000 just by signing up for it. 

Airline and Hotel Cards

Two of the co-branded credit card types that are good for travel hacking are airline and hotel credit cards.

Let’s say that you usually fly Southwest. If that is the case, then you might want to take a look at the Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus Credit Card. Or maybe you usually stay at IHG properties like Holiday Inn. In that case, you may try to sign up for the IHG Rewards Club Premier Credit Card.

Basically, co-branded cards allow you to collect points that you can use to pay for airlines or hotels.

Co-branded cards require a little bit more work than fixed value cards because you have to use the points with the correct airline or hotel.

Let’s take a look at how you could use these cards to travel for less.

Sample Credit Card Example: Hyatt 

One of my favorite hotel chains is Hyatt. I’ve found their properties to be clean, comfortable, and just about perfect for my family of 5. I’ve also found that their hotel reward points go a long way when we are trying to book a stay at their hotels!

So let’s take a look at how we could save around $1,500 with a Hyatt credit card by using a specific example.

Let’s say that you live in Texas, about halfway between Dallas and Houston. You don’t travel much throughout the United States, but you enjoy getting away to places in Texas. Although you like getting away for nice weekends, you don’t like that it costs you $300 for 2 nights in hotel rooms every time that you go. So you decide to check out The World of Hyatt Credit Card.

Like many credit cards, this card offers a nice early spend bonus of 50,000 points after spending $6,000 within 6 months.

The best thing about this bonus is that it will allow you to get 10 nights at Category 1 Hyatt branded hotels.

This will allow you to travel to cities like Houston, Austin, Dallas, and San Antonio and to do it for significantly less than you have paid before. Instead of spending $150 or so per night, now you get 10 or more nights for free!

This credit card just saved you $1,500!

It also gives you a free night at a Category 1-4 hotel room every single year after you pay the $95 annual fee. Other co-branded cards offer similar benefits. Just by using the cards, you can save thousands of dollars on travel!

Perhaps you are getting pretty excited about all this free travel, but you’re not sure exactly where you should start.

Free travel is awesome, but how exactly do I begin? Should I use a fixed value card or a co-branded card to get started?

Well, let me tell you that the answer to this is that you should actually do both! You can get fixed value cards and co-branded credit cards at the same time to maximize your benefits!

But for your first credit card, there is one specific card that offers the best of both worlds!

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SECTION 5: The Best of Both Worlds

Currently, there is one credit card and one set of rewards that stands above the others. It offers the ease and convenience of fixed reward credit cards along with the value of a co-branded credit card.

As you can probably guess based on the credit card shown below, this card is the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card.

First off, this credit card offers a bonus of 60,000 points after you spend $4,000 on purchases within the first 3 months of account opening.

Spending $10,000 within your first year of having the card would provide you with 70,000 total points. Not bad at all, but it kind of sounds similar to the other cards that I have discussed so far.

The power of this credit card is in the flexibility of the Chase Ultimate Rewards points that you earn from it. Here are 3 simple ways that you can use these points.

OPTION 1: Redeem them for cash or gift cards. Since each point is worth 1 cent, 60,000 points is worth $600.

This is the easiest way to redeem these rewards, but it may not actually be the best way. Typically, we can get more than 1 cent in value for these rewards by redeeming them for other things.

OPTION 2: Redeem them for travel through the Chase Ultimate Rewards travel portal. Each point is worth 1.25 cents when redeemed through this site. This gives 60,000 points a value of $750.

Just like option 1, this is a convenient way to redeem the rewards. All that you have to do is book your travel through the Chase site. This may sound sketchy, but the deals that you will find on the Chase site are ultra-competitive and usually similar to the deals that you will find elsewhere.

OPTION 3: Transfer your Chase Ultimate Rewards to a travel partner. This is where it gets interesting and potentially where we can get the most value from these rewards.

There is a list of over 10 travel partners that we can transfer our Chase Ultimate Reward points. These partners include Southwest, Hyatt, United, and British Airways. So if we find a deal on Southwest for 20,000 points, we just need to transfer 20,000 Ultimate Reward points to Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards and book our airline ticket through Southwest.

This can easily increase the value of each point from 1 cent to 2 cents or even more.

One important thing to recognize is that we cannot transfer points back to Ultimate Reward points after they are transferred to a partner. So it is really important to make sure that there is travel availability before we transfer these points.

Can you see why I think that this is the best credit card out there? It has the ease and convenience of a fixed value travel rewards credit card coupled with the saving power of a co-branded travel rewards credit card. 

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SECTION 6: Business Cards

I know that you might be tempted to skip over this section completely, especially if you don´t have a business that buys a lot of inventory. However, you don´t need an LLC, business ID number, or even a huge business to open a business credit card.

If you have an Etsy shop, sell stuff online through Amazon, or even mow lawns for your neighbors, you might be a perfect candidate for a business credit card.

The reason that you might want to apply for a business credit card is because the rewards are so awesome. Like many other cards, you can get amazing travel rewards as well as cash back bonuses.

An Awesome Business Card

One of my favorite credit cards that I use for my business is the Chase Ink Business Preferred Credit Card.

Currently, this card offers an 80,000 Chase Ultimate Reward point bonus after spending $5,000 within 3 months of opening. It also offers 3 points for every dollar spent in travel and certain business categories as well as 1 point for every other dollar spent. If we spent $10,000 in the travel and business categories, this card would provide us with 110,000 Ultimate Reward points!

As I discussed in section 5, these Chase Ultimate Reward points can be some of the best points for travel because of their flexibility.

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SECTION 7: Action Steps: What should I do to start? 

After reading this article and finding out about travel rewards, you might want to sign up for a bunch of travel rewards credit cards in order to maximize these travel reward points.

Or you might want to start real slow like I did and just see how these travel reward cards work.

Honestly, either option can be real smart. However, if we are going to get maximum value for our travel, then it helps to be strategic when signing up for these credit cards.

It’s easy to get $500 worth of free travel. But if we do it right, we can save thousands of dollars on travel within the next 3 years!

STEP 1: Think about your travel needs over the next 1-2 years

With this step, it helps to be as specific as possible, but it’s OK not to be 100% sure about every place that you are going. 

For instance, I took my wife and 3 kids to Hawaii this summer. When we first started planning this trip, we didn’t know which islands we would stay on or exactly when we were going to go. However, we did know that flights from Michigan to Hawaii typically cost around $1,000 per person. We also knew that we did not want to pay $5,000 just to get there. 

So during the year leading up to the trip, we accrued American Airline points so that we can fly from Detroit to Hawaii for less. It wouldn’t have made much sense for us to accrue Southwest airline points because there aren’t too many Southwest flights out of Detroit.

Just by knowing where we were planning to travel a little bit in advance, I was able to book tickets to Hawaii and save a lot of money. As a matter of fact, we booked these $5,000 tickets for $56 total!

However, it wouldn’t do us any good to accrue a bunch of American Airline miles if I we were not planning on flying anywhere for the next few years. 

STEP 2: Sign up for a credit card that gives you a ¨quick win¨

As I mentioned earlier, a credit card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is a great way to start. You may trade your 60,000+ points for $600 in cash, $750 in travel, or transfer them to a travel partner. Whichever way you choose, you will definitely save some money by using this card!

STEP 3: Get more specific about your travel needs

Do you appreciate flexibility when you travel? It’s probably a good idea look into a fixed value card like the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card.

Do you like staying in a lot of hotels while traveling? You may want to look into a card that offers hotel points such as the The World of Hyatt Credit Card, the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless Credit Card, or the IHG Rewards Club Premier Credit Card.

Do you spend a lot of money on airlines? You may want to accrue some more of those Chase Ultimate Reward Points or look into a card that offers points towards a specific airline like the Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus Credit Card.

Do you just want to save money on gas while driving to your mom’s house? A cash back reward card such as the Capital One Savor Cash Rewards Credit Card might be a good card to use.

As you get specific about your travel needs, you can see exactly which cards will work the best for you and you can apply for those specific cards.

STEP 4: Beware of the ¨5/24 rule¨

As you begin to think about your travel needs and the 3-5 cards that you may want to apply for, it’s good to know about some rules that certain card issuers have.

One of the biggest “rules” is informally known as the Chase 5/24 rule. This rule is not explicitly stated by Chase, but it is known to be true by those of us who have a lot of credit cards.

Basically, this rule states that Chase Bank will not approve applications for credit cards if you have opened 5 or more credit card accounts within the last 24 months.

Keep in mind that Chase counts 5 credit cards opened from any bank or store, not just Chase. They also count many business cards as well as credit cards where you are an authorized user.

So you may want to prioritize opening Chase credit cards first over others if you are planning to open more than 1-2 cards.

STEP 5: Double your travel rewards by involving your spouse

One of the cool things that you can do if you are married is open a credit card for yourself and then have your spouse open the exact same credit card. This can allow you to get double the amount of points and rewards as you would have been able to get by yourself.

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Hopefully this article has been helpful to immerse you into the wonderful world of traveling using rewards credit cards. I know that my family and I have benefited immensely from this with our travel. I have also told many other people about this in person and through this website and we all agree that credit card rewards are awesome!

If you’ve found this useful, please use some of my links to compare the benefits of each individual card. The company that I have partnered with, CardRatings.com, is an industry leader who is able to offer the best credit card offers on its website.

Even though I may receive a commission when you sign up for a card through CardRatings, this does not affect the cards that I have presented to you. These truly are my favorite credit cards for travel in 2020!

Be sure to enjoy all of your free travel! Let us know about your favorite travel rewards credit card by checking out the comments below.

And thanks for reading!

~Nathan

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Let’s keep living a great life … with the help of money. So what’s next?

• You can get motivated and get out of debt.
• You can check out the next post or the previous post and continue to learn.

But no matter what you decide to do, let’s leave the ordinary behind and take action today!

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Just so you know: Life Before Budget has partnered with CardRatings for our coverage of credit card products. Life Before Budget and CardRatings may receive a commission from card issuers. Also, the content of this article as well as comments from users are not meant to be professional financial advice and have not been reviewed by the advertisers. Please read our disclosures page for more details.