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All information about the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card has been collected independently by MileValue.
Hilton Honors is currently offering three co-branded personal credit cards, all of which are issued by American Express. And all three of these cards are offering impressive welcome offers for new cardmembers that could translate to a ton of free nights at Hilton hotels with minimal spending required.
While credit card welcome offers can change at any point, the current offers on the following cards are worth considering.
The Hilton Honors American Express Card (see rates & fees) is Hilton’s no-annual-fee beginner card. The Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card (see rates & fees) is Hilton’s $150-annual-fee middle-tier card. And The Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card is Hilton’s top-tier card with an annual fee of $550.
If you’re looking to rack up a large sum of Hilton Honors points quickly, we’d recommend applying for the Hilton Honors Amex Card and the Hilton Honors Surpass Card because you’ll only have to spend $150 in annual fees for both cards, and at the time of publication, you can earn at least 200,000 Hilton points for spending just a few thousand dollars between both cards.
Here are the current welcome bonuses on these cards:
Hilton Honors American Express Card
Earn 100,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points after you spend $2,000 in purchases on the Card in the first 6 months of Card Membership. Offer ends 1/8/2025.
Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card
Earn 165,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points after you spend $3,000 in purchases on the card in your first 6 months of Card Membership. Offer ends 1/8/2025. See rates & fees.
So, by applying for these two cards, you can quickly rack up more than 200,000 points. And, since Hilton award stay redemptions start at just 5,000 points per night, you could technically redeem these points for 40+ free nights at Hilton hotels.
However, the vast majority of Hilton award stays cost more than 5,000 points per night. So, in this article, we’re going to cover some of the best Hilton properties where you can stay for free with these welcome offers. But before we do, we’re going to take a look at all three personal Hilton credit cards and their respective features.
Hilton Honors Co-Branded Credit Cards
As previously mentioned, Hilton currently has three co-branded personal credit cards, all of which are issued by American Express. The following table includes each of these three cards and their respective features:
Card name |
Annual fee |
Spending bonuses |
Other notable benefits |
Hilton Honors American Express Card |
$0 |
|
|
Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card |
$150 |
|
|
Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card |
$550 |
|
|
You’ll also receive the benefits that come along with Hilton Honors elite status. For instance, Hilton Honors Diamond status, which is automatically granted to all Hilton Honors Aspire cardholders, comes with complimentary space-available room upgrades, executive lounge access, a 48-hour room guarantee and the ability to gift Gold status to another Hilton Honors member.
If you frequently stay at Hilton properties, then you may want to consider applying for the $550 annual fee Hilton Aspire Card. However, if you just want to rack up a large number of Hilton points quickly and cheaply, then we’d recommend applying for the Hilton Honors Amex Card as well as the Hilton Surpass Card. Again, with these two cards, for a combined annual fee of $150 and a few thousand dollars worth of spending in three months, you could wind up with over 200,000 points.
Best Hilton Properties to Spend Your Welcome Offers At
With the 200,000+ Hilton points that you could earn from applying for the Hilton Honors Amex Card as well as the Hilton Surpass Card and earning both welcome offers since Hilton free night awards start at 5,000 points per night, you could technically book 40+ free nights at the lowest-end Hilton properties.
However, we’d recommend looking for higher-end redemptions that will provide you with a better experience and help you get the most out of your points. We’d also recommend taking advantage of Hilton’s “fifth-night free” feature. Whenever you book a standard room reward for five or more nights, the fifth night is free. While this feature is only available to members with Silver elite status or higher, since the Hilton Honors Amex card comes with automatic Silver elite status, you should have access to this benefit.
Another nice aspect of the Hilton Honors program is that resort fees are always waived on award stays (whereas they’re typically between $40 and $100 on cash bookings). So, if you’re factoring resort fees into your value-per-point calculations, resorts tend to provide more value. Also, high-end luxury properties tend to provide more value per point.
So, with that in mind, let’s look at a few ways we’d recommend using your welcome offers from the Hilton Honors Amex Card and the Hilton Surpass Card.
1.) A Night at the Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills (120,000 Points)
If you want to enjoy a single night of opulence and also maximize the value of your points, you may want to consider booking a room at the Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills. Rooms at this property start at 120,000 points per night. However, when we compare this to the cash rates, this redemption provides outsized value compared to other Hilton redemptions.
You can redeem 120,000 points for a Superior Two Queen Room with Terrace (which, yes, is the most affordable option at this ultra-luxury location) for a single night. This same room would cost you $995 per night in cash. Thus, this redemption provides a value of slightly over 0.8 cents per point, which is high for Hilton points.
The Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills is a 5-star hotel located in the heart of world-famous Beverly Hills where Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards meet. This hotel features amenities such as a 5,000-square-foot spa, an elegant rooftop that overlooks Beverly Hills and Hollywood, a rooftop pool, a fitness center and a salon. The Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills also has an on-site restaurant headed by renowned French chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten.
Yes, there are probably more practical things that you can do with the Hilton points you earned from your welcome offers, but who doesn’t want to live like a celebrity for a night?
2.) 10 Nights at the DoubleTree by Hilton Phuket Banthai Resort (192,000 Points)
If you want a longer-lived luxury experience and you’re willing to travel to Southeast Asia to get it, then you might consider booking 10 nights at the DoubleTree by Hilton Phuket Banthai Resort. This redemption takes advantage of two of the best features of the Hilton Honors program: waived resort fees and a fifth night free. In fact, if you choose to stay for 10 days, you’ll be using the “fifth night free” feature twice (you can use this feature up to four times per booking).
A standard room at the DoubleTree by Hilton Phuket Banthai Resort costs 24,000 points per night, which means it would cost you 192,000 points to stay at this location for 10 nights (with the two free nights). Alternatively, if 10 days sounds like too long to you, then you could stay for 5 nights for 96,000 points.
If you were to book this room with cash, it would cost you $94 per night, and a 10-night stay would cost you $940 (not including resort fees). Resort fees at the DoubleTree by Hilton Phuket Banthai Resort are around $9 per night, which means that the total cost for this stay would be around $1,030. So, this redemption would yield a value of about 0.5 cents per point.
While the value per point on this redemption isn’t overly impressive, it’s still amazing the welcome offers from the Hilton Honors Amex Card and the Hilton Surpass Card could buy you a 10-night (or 11-night) stay at a 4-star resort on the gorgeous Thai island of Phuket. This resort is located a short walk from Patong Beach, one of the best beaches on the island, and Bangla Road, the notorious heart of Phuket’s nightlife.
If you’re less concerned with getting the most value out of your points and you’d rather have a long stay at an amazing resort, then you should check out the DoubleTree by Hilton Phuket Banthai Resort.
3.) 5 Nights at the Hilton Taghazout Bay Beach Resort & Spa (176,000 Points)
The nation of Morocco is often heralded for its fascinating culture, delicious food and gorgeous beaches. With the welcome offers from the Hilton Honors Amex Card and the Hilton Surpass Card, you could enjoy all three by booking a 5-night stay at the Hilton Taghazout Bay Beach Resort & Spa for 176,000 points.
Rooms at this location start at 44,000 points per night, meaning that you could book a 5-night stay at the Hilton Taghazout Bay Beach Resort & Spa for 176,000 points with the “fifth night free” feature. The cash rate for a standard room at this property is $201, meaning that a 5-night stay would cost you $1,005. So, the value per point of this redemption would be around 0.6 cents per point, which is pretty average.
This resort is amazing for beach lovers who want to walk out of their rooms and straight into the water. The Hilton Taghazout Bay Beach Resort & Spa has its own private beach as well as four outdoor swimming pools. The resort also has private tennis courts and is located just two kilometers from Golf Tazegzout, an amazing golf course overlooking the ocean, for any sporty travelers.
If you’re interested in visiting the culturally rich country of Morocco and experiencing luxury on cheap, booking a 5-night stay at the 5-star Hilton Taghazout Bay Beach Resort & Spa with the Hilton points from your welcome offers is a great way to do so.
The Bottom Line
If you’re interested in racking up a large sum of Hilton points quickly to redeem for free hotel stays, a good way to do so is by applying for both the Hilton Honors American Express Card (no annual fee) and the Hilton Honors Surpass American Express Card ($150 annual fee). Currently, these two cards are offering the following welcome offers:
Hilton Honors American Express Card
Earn 100,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points after you spend $2,000 in purchases on the Card in the first 6 months of Card Membership. Offer ends 1/8/2025.
Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card
Earn 165,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points after you spend $3,000 in purchases on the card in your first 6 months of Card Membership. Offer ends 1/8/2025. See rates & fees.
By applying for both of these cards, paying a $95 annual fee and spending a few thousand dollars on the two cards in the first three months after account opening, you can quickly rack up 200,000+ Hilton points.
If you’re wondering whether you can apply for two Hilton Honors cards at the same time, consumer reports say that you can be approved for two Hilton cards on the same day.
With those 200,000+ points, you can book some seriously amazing stays and get great value out of your points, especially when you take advantage of the “fifth night free” feature and the fact that Hilton waives resort fees on award bookings.
Just getting started in the world of points and miles? The Chase Sapphire Preferred is the best card for you to start with.
With a bonus of 60,000 points after $4,000 spend in the first 3 months, 5x points on travel booked through the Chase Travel℠ and 3x points on restaurants, streaming services, and online groceries (excluding Target, Walmart, and wholesale clubs), this card truly cannot be beat for getting started!
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I applied for the card couple of weeks back and got approved when the offer was 40K. I called into Citi to upgrade the offer to 75K but was told their marketing department will look into this and I will be notified via mail in the next 7-10 business days if the upgraded offer was put on my card. I had done similar thing with Citi Prestige few months back and was able to match to the higher offer of 50K. I’m hoping the same. Do you know if anyone was able to upgrade to the higher offer?
Haven’t seen reports either way.
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Is there a link for the 100,000 Hilton Surpass Amex? I am not seeing it in the link. Is that offer gone?
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