Capital One Miles Redemption: How To Use Capital One Miles

Capital One offers fixed value redemptions for most of their rewards. This means that unless you transfer your miles to a travel partner, you’ll typically receive one cent per mile. Capital One has made redeeming miles seamless and effortless, with all your options available directly on the Capital One website or through the Capital One app.

Redeem For Future Travel

Capital One has an intuitive travel portal that makes it simple to redeem your miles. Just search the Capital One travel portal for your city, dates and the number of people in your party. Then on your checkout page you’ll see an offer to either charge your card or redeem your miles at one cent each to cover some or all of the cost. So 25,000 miles would completely offset a $250 hotel stay.

Redeem for Recent Travel Purchases

If you’re not sure if you want to pay cash or miles at the time of booking, Capital One will let you use miles to offset past purchases from your credit card. Once logged into your account, simply choose the option called “Cover Travel Expenses” and you’ll be presented with a list of purchases that you’ve recently made on your card that are eligible for this redemption option.

This is a fantastic way to use your miles later even if you didn’t feel comfortable committing to using them beforehand. Whether you book with miles before travel or use them afterward, they’ll redeem at the same rate. There’s no downside to waiting for the charge to post first.

Even if you don’t have the miles needed to cover the stay today, it’s likely that you can book the room with your card with no financial risk. That’s because when you book with a hotel directly they often won’t charge your card until your arrival. Until then, you’ll have extra time to build up your rewards balance.

Transfer to Travel Partners

Capital One has over 15 different transfer partners to choose from. Moving points from Capital One over to these partners is quick and easy, and allows you the chance to find even more value from your points. Here’s the full list and their transfer ratios.

Program	Type	Transfer Ratio
Aeromexico	Airline	1:1
Air Canada Aeroplan	Airline	1:1
Air France KLM	Airline	1:1
Accor Live Limitless	Hotel	2:1
Asia Miles	Airline	1:1
Avianca LifeMiles	Airline	1:1
British Airways	Airline	1:1
Choice Privileges	Hotel	1:1
Emirates Skywards	Airline	1:1
Etihad Guest	Airline	1:1
EVA Air	Airline	2:1.5
Finnair	Airline	1:1
Qantas	Airline	1:1
Singapore Airlines	Airline	1:1
TAP Miles&Go	Airline	1:1
Turkish Airlines	Airline	1:1
Virgin Red	Airline	1:1
Wyndham Rewards	Hotel	1:1

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When logged into your account, head to the “Transfer Rewards” box and click. This will take you to the list of all the transfer partners Capital One has on offer.

Find your program of choice and click on Transfer Miles. A pop up window will appear where you can enter your account membership number. This is the membership number for your airline or hotel program, not your Capital One account.

Note, that your name on your Capital One account has to be the same as your airline/hotel account, otherwise the transfer could be delayed or denied.

The last step is deciding how many miles you want to send over. You’ll need to send them in 100 mile chunks with a minimum of 1,000 miles. Most transfers take about 24 hours but some can be faster.

Redeem for Cash Back or Gift Cards

Note that redeeming for cash back and gift cards is not a great option, but it’s important to know that it exists. When redeeming for cash back, you’ll receive 0.5 cents per mile redeemed, a 50% loss compared to the option for eliminating travel purchases.

Using miles for gift cards offers a varying redemption value. Some gift cards can be purchased at a rate of 1 cent per point, while others offer a lower redemption value.

Before redeeming your miles for less than 1 cent a piece, consider if you have the ability to wipe out a travel purchase or another way to get more value from your miles.

Redeem for Tickets, Experiences and Events

Through the Capital One Entertainment platform, you can redeem your miles for tickets to shows and sporting events. There are also several cardholder exclusive offers made throughout the year such as pre-sale or discounted tickets and VIP packages.

These events do have a tendency to sell out fast. So if you see something that catches your eye, don’t wait too long.

Since all travel redeems for 1 cent a piece with Capital One, you may think that it doesn’t really matter how you use your miles. However, baseball ticket redemptions and travel partner transfers could yield a higher value. Here’s how.

Capital One Baseball Tickets

One of the most underutilized and more unique ways to use your Capital One miles is to attend a baseball game at your favorite stadium. For most games, Capital One has at least 4 tickets available exclusively to cardholders at lower-level seats in the stadium for only 5,000 miles each.

Game dates will vary, but finding tickets is easy. Scroll past the Cardholder Exclusive section and you can see the “Shop By” section. Here you can filter by the dates you’d like to search and the Sports category. If there are Capital One Exclusive ticket dates available, you’ll see the 5,000-mile tickets available.

Transfer to Airline Partners

It can be overwhelming to learn about all the programs, so let’s focus on four of the best transfer partners to get the most value out of your Capital One Miles.

British Airways

British Airways uses a distance-based chart that can provide some nice sweet spots. For example, while the airline doesn’t fly to Hawaii, its partners Alaska Airlines and American Airlines do. So for 13,000 Capital One Miles converted into British Airways Avios, you could fly one way from the U.S. West Coast to Hawaii.

Turkish Airlines

Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles partners with U.S. carrier United Airlines and offers a low redemption value of only 7,500 miles one-way for domestic flights. Fly across the country from New York to San Francisco or even go all the way to Hawaii for only 15,000 miles round trip. Flights can be hard to come by and you might find a better availability by calling the Turkish Airlines call center.

United Airlines isn’t the only value in the Turkish Airlines repertoire as their own flights can be redeemed for as few as 45,000 miles each way in business class. Onboard you’ll have a lie-flat seat for a restful flight over the Atlantic Ocean and a personal chef to whip up great meals, customized to your liking. If you connect somewhere in Europe, Asia or the Middle East, consider spending some time in the Turkish Airlines lounge in Istanbul. Between the free Wi-Fi, endless buffets, cinema, kids center and even a masseur, finding something to do during your layover is a breeze.

Choice Hotels

Choice Hotels is known around the U.S. for its budget-friendly hotel brands like Sleep Inn and Comfort Inn, but one of the best kept secrets is its partnership with Preferred Hotels brand. Starting at just 25,000 miles, you can book luxury independent hotel stays all over the world.

Air Canada

Air Canada offers dozens of partners via not only their Star Alliance membership but also many other unique airline partnerships. Emirates recently partnered with Air Canada and has given them access to both business and first class seats. While first class seats often cost hundreds of thousands of miles, business class seats are generally much more attainable. Flight costs are variable so make sure to check your origins and destination, but we were able to find a flight from Newark to Athens (an over 9-hour journey) for just 78,500 miles in business class.

The best way to maximize your Capital One is through travel partners. This offers many opportunities to earn much more than the standard 0.5 cent to 1 cent per point value that you’ll get through other redemptions. Take the time to study your options for transfer partners and consider how to move your miles to airlines and hotels for maximum value.

You’ll need an eligible Capital One credit card to earn Capital One Miles. Excluding purchases made through Capital One Travel, the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card and Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card cards will net you 2 miles per dollar while the Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card earns 1.25 miles per dollar.

If you have any of these cards, the best way to earn Capital One Miles quickly is to book travel through their travel portal. For hotel and rental car bookings, you can earn up to 10 miles per dollar. Flights booked through Capital One Travel earn up to 5 miles per dollar.

Know that your experience with the Capital One Rewards program will vary wildly depending on the Capital One credit card that you have. Some cards will offer higher bonuses for travel and general purchases compared to other cards. Dig into more detail on the earnings structure of each card and learn all about the program by reading our full Capital One Rewards guide.