Japan Travel with Points in 2025: What Changed (and What Still Works)
Tl;dr: 2025 was a great year for Japan travel, with falling cash prices and new ways to earn and redeem points—even with a few devaluations along the way. Plus, you can read about how we flew to Japan twice this year and follow our travels on Instagram!
Japan has long been one of those bucket-list destinations that feels just out of reach for many travelers. While flights to Europe can often be booked for around $500, getting to Japan can be meaningfully more expensive—costs that compound with each additional traveler. I’ve spoken with many friends and relatives this year who want to go to Japan but aren’t sure how to make it work.
In 2025 we did it with points—twice. If you want to travel to the land of the rising sun with points, 2025 was a great year. Airline mergers, new credit cards and transfer partnerships, loyalty program updates, and changes in the travel market all made Japan more accessible to points travelers. In this post, I’ll walk through what changed for Japan travel with points this year, what’s still working going into 2026, and how we actually booked flights and hotels for our two trips.
What Changed for Japan Travel in 2025
For the past few years, my favorite way to travel to Japan with lazy points redemptions has been to fly with American or Alaska Airlines points thanks to their solid award chart value and availability, to snag an award sale rate (usually with Delta SkyMiles) thanks to a Thrifty Traveler alert, and to stay at one of Choice Hotels’ many properties available in Japan for just 8,000 points per night.
The good news (there’s a lot of it)
All those options worked for me in 2025, and, at least for now, look like they will continue working into 2026. And beyond these, Japan points travel has gotten even better, with new opportunities arriving or expanding, and more positive changes for 2026 announced this year.
Alaska makes major changes post-merger. Alaska has had a very eventful 2025, completing its merger with Hawaiian Airlines, rebranding its loyalty program to Atmos Rewards, and launching a new premium credit card. And a lot of these changes have big ramifications for Japan travel:
New credit card opportunities. Atmos Points are a great way to get to Japan, and now you can earn a lot in a hurry with sign-up bonuses. The airline currently offers four credit cards: three from Bank of America (the premium Atmos Summit, mid-tier Atmos Ascent, and a business card) and one from Barclays (the mid-tier Hawaiian cards).
The Atmos Summit. The $395-fee card comes with a 25k-point discount for a companion on a global award flight and offers a 100k-point companion discount after spending $60,000 in a cardmember year. It earns triple points on foreign purchases, making it a powerful earner in Japan (or any other foreign country). It allows you to share points with up to ten other members, to pool points more efficiently for Japan redemptions. And with the 10,000 Status Points it offers on renewal, a single flight to Japan from the U.S. mainland would be enough to earn elite status, or very close to it (Seattle comes up just short). The card can also help boost you to higher-level status that comes with access to OneWorld lounges like the Japan Airlines (JAL) Sakura Lounge.
Alaska now flies directly to Japan. With the acquisition of Hawaiian Airlines, Alaska now flies to Japan from Seattle and Honolulu, meaning additional redemption options and, in some cases, lower award pricing.
Elite international upgrades. Those who earn Alaska’s top-tier Titanium status can even get upgraded to lie-flat business class seats when available on those international Alaska flights. (Titaniums aren’t really our target audience, but it’s cool!)
Citi launches Strata Elite, AA points transfers. In July, Citi released a new premium credit card and added American Airlines as a transfer partner. Citi already had Choice as a 1:2 transfer partner, meaning it only took 4,000 Citi points to book an 8,000-point Choice hotel. The new Strata Elite offered the ability to earn a big sign-up bonus, plus solid points earnings on base spending, dining, and certain travel—points that are ideal for Japan travel.
Cash prices falling. One of the benefits of Thrifty Traveler is that I can keep an eye on trends in airfares, and after years of seeing few, if any flights on full-service airlines from our home airport to Japan under $800, this year we saw several, including one under $400.
When cash prices are more accessible, that makes it easier to use points to book without having to deal with points transfers. You can simply erase the purchase with Capital One or Chase points (1¢ per point), or book via your bank’s travel portal (usually 1¢ per point, 1.25¢ per point with Bilt) if the fare is available there.
Points transfers to Japan Airlines. JAL had never had a transfer partner among US banks, but at the end of 2025 they now have two: 1:1 transfer from Bilt, and 1:0.75 transfers from Capital One. JAL’s higher fees deter me from booking economy flights this way, but that may be less of an issue for premium cabins where a few hundred dollars in fees may be more palatable for a multi-thousand-dollar ticket.
Book JAL via JetBlue. JetBlue also launched a partnership with JAL, making flights bookable with TrueBlue points. Although the cash cost is high, the points cost is solid, so it might be a decent option if you have JetBlue points or can transfer points to them (although I would only consider Chase points, transferable to JetBlue at a 1:1 ratio, for this approach). Unfortunately, this partnership is ending in March 2026.
ANA offers one-way awards. I have historically avoided ANA redemptions due to hefty fees and the requirement to book a round trip (and thus pay those fees on each leg). However, the Japanese airline now offers one-way redemptions for a little extra flexibility. Amex is a 1:1 transfer partner of ANA, but transfers usually take some time, which can make it difficult to reliably book points deals when they are available.
Choice opens its booking window, announces positive changes. In the past, you couldn’t book Choice hotels with points more than 100 days out, making planning a bit of a challenge. That booking window expanded to 50 weeks in 2025. Choice also announced updates to its loyalty program for 2026, including the ability to earn elite status after just five nights. That’s very valuable: many Japanese hotels have relatively early checkout times (10 AM is common) and charge extra for late checkout, but elite status can get you late checkout for free with Choice Hotels in Japan.
Bilt cards to become Wells Fargo Autograph cards. As part of Bilt’s issuer transition from Wells Fargo to Cardless, cardholders who do not close their Wells Fargo accounts will have their cards replaced with Autograph cards. Like Citi, Wells Fargo points transfer at a 1:2 ratio to Choice. The Autograph earns 3x points on restaurants, gas stations, transit, and certain streaming and phone plans, so it could be a powerful earner for Choice Hotels stays in Japan.
Doors That Closed (or Narrowed)
Unfortunately, it wasn’t all good news. The AA Aviator closed to new applicants, so you can now no longer open an American Airlines card with two different banks and earn two different sign-up bonuses. The redemption rate went up at some Choice Hotels properties in Japan, and award flight costs to Japan also went up (in my experience) when redeeming United miles. There was also a brief opportunity to transfer Amex points to Alaska, but it closed in June. And the JAL–JetBlue redemption partnership will be ending in March 2026.
Two Japan Trips in One Year: How We Traveled
It wasn’t our plan when we started the year, but we ended up visiting Japan twice this year (not complaining). Here’s how we got there and got around.
Flights
For our spring flight, we originally booked a Delta flight for 51k SkyMiles per person each way, but decided to trade it in for a nonstop JAL flight for 75k Alaska miles (before they got renamed to Atmos Points). By the time we decided to take our fall trip, all the nice JAL flights were sold out, so we redeemed 75k Atmos Points for an American Airlines flight connecting in LA.
Each trip was over 5,000 miles each way, so we each earned over 20,000 Status Points, earning Atmos Silver and OneWorld Ruby status for 2026. I had some domestic travel and Summit Card spending this year, so I ended up with Atmos Gold/OneWorld Sapphire status.
Hotels
Thus far, we have used three main strategies for our stays in Japan:
Choice hotels. We used Capital One and (occasionally) Amex points to book the small but clean and conveniently-located hotels for 8,000 points per night. The cash value of these stays ranges from $60-120, so it’s not necessarily the best value, but it can be a solid value, especially considering the convenience of free cancellation. We are hoping to have more Citi and Wells Fargo points next year for double the value on these redemptions.
Airbnb. We have had good luck finding affordable Airbnbs in Japan, and usually get some Delta and United miles for our troubles.
Capital One miles and credits. We both have Venture X cards. We tend to use our annual $300 travel credit on hotels, especially near the airport, and use our miles to erase travel purchases like car rentals and Japanese hot spring hotels that aren’t always directly bookable with points or through U.S. online travel agencies or booking portals.
Our Travel Highlights
After we got back from our spring trip, I wrote about some of the highlights, featuring some of the affordable and off-the-beaten path places we visited on our trip. I’m not going to do a full roundup of our trip this time, but if you want to see some of the cute restaurants and coffee shops, cheap attractions, and hidden small towns we explored, you can check out our new Instagram account, Lazy Travel Notes.
Lazy Take 🦥
Getting to and around Japan with points has only gotten easier this year, and the outlook is promising for 2026, so if Japan is the destination of your dreams, there are ways to get there with points. Keep following us next year for the latest developments and strategies to maximize your points—and use them to fly to Japan. For weekly lazy points news and opportunities, subscribe to our newsletter.