Expedia OneKey: The Ultimate Guide

Expedia started in 1996 as one of the first online travel agencies (OTAs) in the market in an attempt to make it easier for the traveler to book their own trips—without the need for a travel agent as an intermediary. The company grew during the dot com years and strategically acquired several companies including Hotels.com, Hotwire and TripAdvisor.

Riding on a 10-year success, it went public as Expedia Inc. in 2005. In 2015, it expanded into the then-nascent market of vacation rentals by acquiring Homeaway’s family of brands including Vrbo. In the same year, they also acquired Orbitz and Travelocity, solidifying the brand in the general travel market.

In 2018, the company changed its name to Expedia Group. And in 2023, Expedia Group rebranded its loyalty program to OneKey, unifying its three main underlying brands.

The rewards currency for OneKey is called OneKeyCash™. Members earn OneKeyCash on eligible bookings across all three brands, Expedia, Hotels.com and Vrbo. Note however that not every reservation across the brands earns at the same rate. Let’s go into the details.

Eligible Bookings

• Flights. You can earn 0.2% in OneKeyCash per dollar spent on eligible flight bookings. Taxes and fees are not eligible to earn rewards.
• All other bookings. All bookings besides flights—accommodation, car rentals, cruises, activities and packages—earn 2% in OneKeyCash per dollar spent on eligible bookings. Taxes and fees are not eligible for rewards-earning.

Note that car rental reservations made through Hotels.com, any gift cards, insurance, reservations made through the “groups and meetings” section of the websites or tickets for events purchased on expedia.com/event-tickets are not considered eligible bookings and therefore will earn no rewards under the program.

Also, reservations booked directly with an airline will earn no rewards even if you searched for the flight on Expedia’s website.

Elite Status

There are four elite status tiers in the OneKey program: Blue, Silver, Gold and Platinum, each with increasingly-rewarding benefits and earning rates. But before we delve deeper into those details, it’s important to understand how to earn elite status with OneKey.

Trip Elements

In order to qualify for elite status, OneKey has coined the concept of “trip elements” to establish qualifying criteria. A one-night hotel stay is a trip element, as is a one-way airline ticket. Trip elements must be at least $25 excluding taxes and fees in order to count toward your elite status.

Trip elements include the following:

• 1 air ticket (whether it’s one way or round trip)
• 1 hotel room night (each night counts as an element)
• 1 night in a vacation rental
• 1 night on a cruise
• 1-day car rental
• 1 round-trip ground transportation ticket (airport shuttles, transfers, etc.)
• 1 activity ticket (a private tour, a theme park ticket, etc.)

Earning Status

The more trip elements you collect, the higher up the elite status ladder you climb. Here’s how it breaks down:

• Blue: No trip elements required—just sign up
• Silver: Five trip elements per calendar year
• Gold: 15 trip elements per calendar year
• Platinum: 30 trip elements per calendar year

Elite Status Benefits

With elite status comes perks. From accelerated OneKeyCash-earning to discounts, everyone from top elites to not-so-frequent travelers can enjoy some benefits. In addition to the base OneKeyCash, elite members will earn extra rewards as follows:

• Blue: No extra OneKeyCash. Save 10% or more with member pricing.
• Silver: 50% bonus OneKeyCash on top of base earning. Member pricing savings of 15% or more and an extra perk such as food and beverage discount at select VIP properties on Expedia and Hotels.com.
• Gold: 100% bonus OneKeyCash on top of base earning. Member pricing with savings of 20% or more, plus an extra perk like food and beverage discounts at select VIP properties as well as early check-in, late checkout and room upgrades based on availability.
• Platinum: 200% bonus OneKeyCash on top of base earning, plus all benefits from Gold status

Credit Cards

In the past, both Expedia and Hotels.com offered their own credit cards that enabled you to earn rewards. But neither of these cards are accepting applications now. With the advent of OneKey, there is a strong expectation that one or more new credit card products will launch under the new program. For the time being, current Hotels.com card holders will earn $11 in OneKeyCash for every $500 spent and will receive automatic Silver status.

Travels may want to consider a general travel card like the U.S. Bank Altitude® Connect Visa Signature® Card* that earns 4X points on travel.

Shopping Portals

There are no Expedia-specific shopping portals that allow you to earn additional OneKeyCash. However, there are plenty of opportunities to stack your OneKeyCash earnings along with the points, miles or cash back you earn from other online shopping portals or credit card rewards programs.

Read More: How To Stack Credit Card and Portal Offers To Save on Online Purchases

OneKey offers a host of different redemption awards, including hotel and short-term rental reservations, car rentals, flights and even activities. When searching for any of your options on either Expedia, Hotels.com or Vrbo, the site will display whether a booking can be covered with your OneKeyCash. If no such option displays, then you either don’t have enough OneKeyCash to pay for the reservation or it isn’t eligible for redemption.

Flight Redemptions

You can use your OneKeyCash to pay for the total cost of flight tickets, travel insurance and Price Drop Protection on eligible airlines. However, you cannot use your OneKeyCash to partially cover the cost of your tickets nor can you use them to cover anything not already included in the ticket fare such as seat selection or additional baggage.

Hotel Redemptions

OneKeyCash is also redeemable for hotel rooms with participating brands but only on “Pay Now” rates. Unlike with flights, you can use your OneKeyCash to partially cover the cost of a hotel stay.

Short Term Rental Redemptions

You can fully or partially cover the cost of participating short-term rentals. If booking a rental where multiple installment payments are available, OneKeyCash can only be used for the first installment. Note that the refundable damage deposit on your short-term rental cannot be covered with your OneKeyCash rewards. This option is not available on all short-term rentals.

Car Rental Redemptions

Cover the full or partial amount of your “Pay Now” car rental reservations and insurance booked through Expedia using your OneKeyCash rewards too.

Activities Redemptions

You can also use your OneKeyCash to partially or fully cover the cost of “Pay Now” activities and insurance.

Expiration

To prevent your OneKeyCash rewards from expiring, all you have to do is earn or redeem points at least once every 18 months.

Family Pooling

While there is no family pooling concept within this program, it’s worth noting that you can earn rewards on reservations even if they are not for yourself.

If you book flights for you and your family, you will be earning points for all those tickets. If you are booking hotel reservations for your friends, you can earn points on those reservations even if you won’t be joining them on the trip.

This opens up the ability to maximize your points-earning beyond your own reservations and potentially accrue more rewards or achieve elite status much faster.

OneKey Rewards offers the ability to book all of your travel across multiple sites while earning rewards at the same time. Unlike many travel websites which don’t offer rewards, most OneKey bookings will earn 2% cash back and you can earn even more by accumulating elite status. While 2% may not be a terribly exciting earnings rate on its own, OneKey Rewards members can still earn credit card rewards as well as shopping portal rewards to double- and potentially triple-dip their points.