Introducing the New Chase United Quest Card

MileValue is part of an affiliate sales network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites, such as CreditCards.com. This compensation may impact how and where links appear on this site. This site does not include all financial companies or all available financial offers. Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more.

Note: Some of the offers mentioned below may have changed or are no longer be available. You can view current offers here.

---

The new Chase United Quest℠ Card is a new mid-tier card offering some unique new perks that you haven’t seen before on other cards.

Most of the times when we’re updating you on the latest credit card developments, it is about refreshes to current cards. I’m here to tell you that this time, we’re announcing the launch of a brand new card.

Introducing the Chase United Quest Credit Card.

This is a new United co-branded card from Chase that really fits an interesting niche in the points and miles world.  It offers United travelers some unique opportunities to earn more miles and enjoy some nice perks as well.

I’ll stop taking up your time with an intro and just dive into the juicy details.

Overview of the New Chase United Quest Credit Card

The Chase United Quest Credit Card is a new United cobranded card from Chase.

The card comes with a pretty reasonable annual fee of $250 which isn’t waived the first year.

Unique Details of the Card

Other than the $250 annual fee, which is fairly new territory for Chase, the new Chase United Quest Credit Card comes with some interesting features.

Annual United Purchase Credit

The first unique detail is the card comes with a $125 United purchase credit per year. While this is limited to charges just with United, it is a nice way to offset the card’s annual fee.

This purchase credit isn’t restricted like some other travel credits. You can use it to offset any purchases made with United. Whether that is for airfare, upgrades or in flight food, you can offset up to $125 per year.

What I really like about this credit is the potential to use it for positioning flights or to pay the taxes and fees on an award ticket.

Mile Reward Flight Credits

The most innovative benefit of the United Quest Credit Card is a first of its kind mile reward flight credits.

You’ll earn two, 5,000-mile award flight credits on every anniversary of holding the card.

These are credits worth 5,000 miles that you can use to redeem towards flights. If your flight costs more than 5,000 miles, you should be able to use these to reduce the total amount of miles needed to book your flight.

Some flights, especially domestic flights in the U.S., can be found for as low as 5,000 points. If your route has flights available for 5,000 points, you could use both certificates to fly round-trip, or you can use them to position for another flight for two people.

This is a really unique benefit that isn’t available on other cards that I hope to see coming to other cards. Benefits like the mile reward flight credit on the Chase United Quest Credit Card helps make your miles easier to redeem.

I’m really interested to see if you can stack these in a round-trip booking. This could be a very unique way to utilize the United Excursionist Perk.

Other than the $250 annual fee, which is fairly new territory for Chase, the new Chase United Quest Credit Card comes with some interesting features.

Earning Rates

The card comes with four bonus spend categories.

• 3X points on all United purchases
• 2X points on all other travel including airlines, hotels, car rentals and more
• 2X on dining, including eligible delivery services
• 2X on select streaming services

You’ll earn 1X mile on all other purchases.

Although some of these are standard (of course you expect to earn more on United purchases), one of the unique categories is the ability to earn 2X points on all other travel.

Typically, bonus spend on broad travel is limited to cards affiliated with bank award programs. The ability to earn bonus spend on all travel is a nice way to earn extra United points.

Other Benefits of the New Chase United Quest Card

There are some other benefits that come with the card that aren’t as unique. Here’s the run down of the other benefits that you will be eligible to use if you choose to open the new Chase United Quest Credit Card:

• 2 free checked bags for yourself and a companion
• Up to $100 credit on TSA Precheck or Global Entry
• Earn up to 3,000 PQPs per year toward premier status eligibility
• 25% back on United inflight purchases including Wi-Fi, food and beverages
• One-year complimentary DashPass, a membership for both DoorDash and Caviar that provides unlimited deliveries with $0 delivery fees and lower service fees on eligible orders.
• No blackout dates
• Priority boarding
• No foreign transaction fees
• Exclusive events with United Card Events and United MileagePlus events
• Exclusive cardmember benefits with Luxury Hotel & Resort Collection
• Travel and purchase protection benefits

How the Chase United Quest Credit Card Compares to Other United Cards

If you’re looking to pick up a United credit card right now, you’ll be comparing this card to the United℠ Explorer Card and the United Club℠ Infinite Card. Let’s take a look at how the United Quest Credit Card compares to your other options.

	United Explorer Card	United Quest Card	United Club Infinite Card
Annual Fee	$95, waived the first year	$250	$525
United Credit	No	Yes, $125	No
Mileage Voucher	No	Yes	No
United Spend Earning Rate	2X	3X	4X
United Club Membership	No	No	Yes
Other Travel Earning Rate	2X (hotels only)	2X	2X

If you’re looking to choose between these three cards, the most important factors for you are likely the annual fee and the bonus.

The United Explorer Card has the lowest annual fee at $95 which is waived for the first year, but you’ll also earn the least amount of points. The United Quest Card has the highest bonus, but with the median annual fee. Finally, the United Club Infinite Card has the highest annual fee, but the median bonus.

If you’re choosing between these three cards, most people will choose the United Quest Card. Although the $250 annual fee isn’t waived the first year, it is decently modest and comes with a large bonus to help make it worth it.

The United Club Infinite Card makes sense if you’re seeking a United Club Membership, but otherwise it has a lower bonus and a higher annual fee without some of the additional benefits.

Who Is This Card For?

The Chase United Quest Card is a good card for those of you looking for a good card to hold long-term. If you fly United often, some of the perks easily help offset the annual fee. But if you’re more likely to use the points for Star Alliance partner flights then you’re still getting a nice bonus for a relatively modest annual fee.

Our Take

Overall, this is a great new addition to Chase’s United card lineup. It fits an interesting niche between the low annual fee United Explorer Card and the high annual fee United Club Infinite Card.

Warning: some slight math below!

There are some redeeming properties that help offset the annual fee as well. The $125 annual United purchase credit effectively reduces the annual fee to only $125. You do have to be able to take full advantage of this though, but for many U.S. travelers this won’t be much of an issue.

The 5,000 miles vouchers are another new perk. These can be used to fully redeem a domestic flight, or to help offset the miles on a more expensive flight. One way to look at this is 10,000 miles for free every year that just requires you to actually book a flight rather than deposit into your account.

If you want to place a value on the award flight vouchers, consider that if you needed to transfer points to United, you’d be looking at using Chase points. To transfer Chase points, you need a card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card to be able to transfer to airline partners. All Ultimate Rewards on the Chase Sapphire Preferred are worth 1.25 cents each.

Since you’d be transferring 10,000 points at 1.25 cents each, those points are worth $125. Effectively, this means the two vouchers are worth at least $125. So long as you’re able to use both vouchers and the United purchase credit, the United Quest Card pays for itself year after year.

That being said, not everything is spectacular about this card. If you’re looking for a card to put general travel spend on, it typically makes more sense to put the spend on a card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card. You’ll earn 2X Ultimate Rewards points on travel with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, and you could later transfer those to United if you wanted. You wouldn’t be locked in to United miles by using a card that earns points with a bank program. Although it is nice to see the ability to earn more United points on broad travel, it really isn’t as great of a perk as it seems.

Final Thoughts

The new Chase United Quest Card finds a gap between the United Explorer Card and the United Club Infinite Card, and it fills it well.

By offering some unique perks, it is easy to justify the annual fee of this new card. I’m hoping we see some of these perks on other cards in the future.

Not everything is glamorous. The bonus spend categories make more sense to stick with other cards like the Chase Sapphire Preferred, but it is nice to see the opportunity to earn more United miles for those who can get great value out of them.

Overall, the United Quest Card easily finds good sticking ground as a new mid-tier card offering from Chase that I’m sure will be popular to hold onto year after year.