Why We Think Bilt Points Are the Best
Tl;dr: With a high ceiling and floor for value, the strongest portal redemption option, the best overall transfer partners, and some uniquely powerful upside opportunities, Bilt points are about as good as it gets.
Welcome to our first LazyPoints breakdown of transferable points currencies. In 2026, we plan to review all the points options to turn your everyday spending into travel. Because it’s time for people to choose whether and how to engage in Bilt 2.0, I’m publishing my review of Bilt points early.
This is always subjective, We rank Bilt as the best points currency overall based on three criteria: value, upside, and—crucially—laziness. Let’s dive a bit deeper.
Bilt’s Transfer Partners
🟩🟩🟩🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧🟥🟥🟥
🟩 Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards (1:1)
🟩 Bilt Portal (1.25¢/pt)
🟩 Hyatt World of Hyatt (1:1)
🟨 Accor Live Limitless (3:2)
🟨 Air Canada Aeroplan (1:1)
🟨 Japan Airlines Mileage Club (1:1)
🟨 Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards (1:1)
🟨 Spirit Airlines Free Spirit (1:1)
🟨 TAP Portugal Miles&Go (1:1)
🟨 United MileagePlus (1:1)
🟧 Avios: British Airways, Aer Lingus, Iberia, Qatar (1:1)
🟧 Avianca LifeMiles (1:1)
🟧 Cathay Pacific Asia Miles (1:1)
🟧 Emirates Skywards (1:1)
🟧 Flying Blue (1:1)
🟧 Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles (1:1)
🟧 Virgin Red (1:1)
🟥 Hilton Honors (1:1)
🟥 IHG One Rewards (1:1)
🟥 Marriott Bonvoy (1:1)
Value
Bilt points shine here, offering a fixed minimum value of 1.25¢ per point when redeemed through Bilt’s travel portal. That’s mostly true value—you choose the flight or hotel you want and pay 8,000 points per $100.
Portal pricing doesn’t always perfectly match Google Flights, so I usually check there first and then book through Bilt if prices are close. Even so, this is a meaningful advantage: Chase and Capital One offer more flexibility (book any travel you want, cover it with points later), but only at 1¢ per point. A $500 flight would cost 50,000 Chase or Capital One points using that method. But even if that flight cost $550 in the Bilt Portal, it would only take 44,000 Bilt points to book it that way.
But if that’s not good enough, you can stretch those points even farther with transfer partners. Bilt’s best partner, Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards, still has award chart pricing, meaning great, reasonably predictable deals across the ocean. Plus, you use those points to earn elite status, and stretch them further by taking advantage of Alaska’s recurring award flight sales, Global Getaways.* Hyatt also offers very solid value, especially at the low and high ends of the price spectrum.
*Note: In my experience, Citi transfer partner American Airlines tends to have slightly cheaper redemptions than Alaska in general, and quite a bit cheaper specifically from the West Coast to Europe (although as a West Coast traveler I still prefer Alaska points). Amex transfer partner Delta has flash sales that can often offer the cheapest redemptions, but their everyday pricing tends to be higher, and the best prices are reserved for Delta cardholders.
And with the most transfer partners in the business, opportunities abound to take advantage of convenient domestic networks (Alaska, United, Southwest, and Spirit), snag an easy and low-cost ticket to Portugal (TAP), book business class tickets at steep discounts (Aeroplan, JAL), or do some bargain hunting (most of those in orange above).
Not content to stop there, Bilt often offers “Rent Day” transfer bonuses. The other competitors offer intermittent 20-30% bonuses, and usually on trickier-to-use programs like Avios or Flying Blue. Bilt, meanwhile, has been known to throw out bonuses of up to 100% or more (the best bonuses are usually reserved for Bilt elite members)–sometimes even to the good programs.
Oh yeah, Bilt also has its own status tiers, letting you wring even more value out of the program.
Laziness
Bilt points are easy to redeem, starting with their Expedia-based travel booking portal. Just pick what you want and book, the same as if you were booking in cash. You just use points instead. At solid value.
Bilt also has the best collection of partners for stress-free redemptions:
Alaska: predictable award pricing, good availability if you plan in advance.
Hyatt: predictable award pricing, value up and down the value chain.
United: predictable award pricing, decent value for fully refundable international tickets, solid business class pricing if you also have a United co-branded card.
JAL: predictable award pricing, great value on premium tickets to Japan.
TAP: predictable award pricing, massive availability, solid access to Europe with Portugal stopovers.
Southwest: modest value but wide availability and super convenient for regular SWA flyers.
If you want to get fancy and complicated with it, you’ll have more options with Bilt than with any other program–but you don’t need to.
How to earn Bilt points
Not only are Bilt points the best once you have them, they might also be the easiest to earn from everyday spending, too. The Bilt Obsidian earns 3x on dining, 2x on travel, and 1x on everyday spending, with up to 1.3 points per dollar on housing (rent, mortgage, and HOA fee payments), depending on your spending (if you don’t get any points on housing, you’ll get 4% “Bilt Cash”). The Bilt Palladium earns 2x on all purchases with the same potential Bilt Cash or points on housing. Even the no-fee Bilt Blue card offers 1x on all purchases with housing or Bilt Cash rewards on top.
Plus, if you use your Bilt points mostly with Alaska Airlines, you can pair it with arguably the best airline card out there, the Atmos Summit, or add other Atmos cards for points via sign-up bonuses.
And that’s just everyday spending. The Bilt points universe offers a slew of ways to earn extra points beyond credit card spending, like neighborhood rewards, rent day bonuses, and lease bonuses at Bilt-affiliated properties. Plus, at time of writing, you can earn a 50,000 point sign-up bonus, plus $300 Bilt Cash on the Bilt Palladium after spending $4,000 on non-housing expenses in the first three months.
Lazy Take 🦥
For me, Bilt is all about Alaska. I can turn my daily spending on a Bilt card into a flight to Japan via Atmos rewards. And that flight to Japan will get me more than halfway to Alaska elite status. Amazing. Alaska also has great deals to South America and Europe, though the distance-based award chart can make prices a bit high if you’re crossing the US to get to your destination.
If you want to keep it even simpler, you can just accumulate points and then book whatever travel you want via the Bilt portal. Easy as you like. Still great value. Hyatt and all those fancy options are always there if you need them or want to experiment.
No matter what your approach to points is, Bilt has you covered.
Although everyday earning is great, getting tens of thousands of points with a sign-up offer can be great, too. Each week we highlight the most elevated bonus offers in our once-weekly newsletter, LazyPoints Weekly.