Why I Love My World Of Hyatt Credit Card Even Though It’s Not My Daily Driver

Cardholders of The World of Hyatt Credit Card receive a free night at any Category 1-4 hotel each year after their first cardmember anniversary. Importantly, there’s no spending requirement to receive this annual free night certificate.

In my opinion, these free nights are well worth the card’s cost even before taking any other benefits into account. The standard room redemption rate for a Category 4 hotel is 15,000 points, while you’ll pay 12,000 or 18,000 points during off-peak and peak seasons.

While World of Hyatt points valuations vary depending on who you talk to, I aim to receive a redemption value of 2 cents per point (or more) on my Hyatt stays. So using the 15,000 standard redemption price, I would expect to get at least $300 of value from my annual fee night.

In my experience, it’s been easy to book a free night at a Category 4 property that would otherwise cost me $300 or more per night. Here are a few Hyatt Category 4s I’ve stayed at with my free night certificate along with examples of their cash pricing on popular dates.

Andaz Savannah

Grand Hyatt Washington

Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress Resort

I’ll also be staying at the Hyatt Centric Waikiki this year using an anniversary night and the cash price for the week we’ll be there is currently right at $300.

It’s worth mentioning that while Hyatt now shows cash prices inclusive of resort fees (which are waived on award nights) the prices you see above do not include taxes. Depending on where and when you stay, taxes could add $50 or more to your nightly cost. But you won’t pay those taxes on award stays either, further increasing the value of your free night.

If you want to get the most out of your annual free night certificate, Hyatt’s Explore tool can help. Once you’ve typed in the area you’d like to visit, you can filter by hotel category.

I’ll typically start by selecting both Categories 3 and 4. While I wouldn’t generally want to use a free night certificate on a Category 1 or 2 property, there are times that a Category 3 can provide a great value. You can also see a listing of all the eligible properties in each category here.

Even though this article is all about why I don’t need to spend a lot on The World of Hyatt Credit Card to find it valuable, it’s worth noting that cardholders can earn another free Category 1-4 night by spending $15,000 on their card during the calendar year. This could be worth pursuing for some, especially if you’re a new cardholder who needs to spend $15,000 anyway to maximize your welcome bonus.

New cardholders are able to earn 30,000 bonus points after spending $3,000 on purchases in the first 3 months of account opening, plus up to 30,000 more bonus points by earning 2 bonus points per dollar spent in the first 6 months on purchases that normally earn 1 bonus point on up to $15,000 spent.

The World of Hyatt Credit Card earns 4 bonus points per dollar spent at Hyatt hotels and resorts. That’s on top of the 5 points you already earn as a World of Hyatt member. Plus you get a 10% bonus for being a Discoverist member (which is an automatic benefit of card ownership). Combined, that’s 9.5 points earned per dollar spent.

So if you spend $1,000 in a given year on Hyatt stays with The World of Hyatt Credit Card, you’ll earn a minimum of 9,500 points, with at least 4,000 of those points solely due to being a cardholder. If you wouldn’t otherwise qualify for Discoverist status, then the card accounts for 4,500 points of your earnings.

Remember that I aim to get around 2 cents per point from my World of Hyatt points. At this valuation, those 4,500 points would be worth about $90 to me toward stays, again nearly offsetting my $95 annual fee.

Another way to look at those 4,500 bonus points is that they’re enough to book an off-peak award at a Category 1 Hyatt hotel (costs 3,500 points). The 9,500 combined points, meanwhile, could get me a free night at a Category 3 Hyatt property during off-peak season (costs 9,000 points) or a peak-season award at a Category 2 hotel (costs 9,500 points).

Now the amount I actually spend on Hyatt stays will vary from year to year. But in any case, the numbers above translate to earning an additional 8% to 9% at Hyatt exclusively by virtue of my card ownership. That’s a meaningful supplement to the value I already extract from the annual Category 1-4 free night certificate.

As already mentioned, The World of Hyatt Credit Card gives cardholders automatic Discoverist elite status. For noncardholders, reaching the Discoverist tier requires staying 10 qualifying nights, earning 25,000 base points or hosting three meetings. Discoverist members get access to a variety of benefits above basic member status including:

• 10% earnings bonus on eligible Hyatt purchases
• Premium internet
• Bottled water
• Preferred room
• Elite check-in
• 2 p.m. late checkout
• American Airlines AAdvantage® bonus

To be honest, a few of these aren’t worth writing home about. I always laugh when hotel brands add the water bottle benefit to their elite tier charts. The preferred room benefit sounds nice, but it only entitles you to a more “desirable” room within your booked type (like a higher floor or better view), not an upgrade to a higher-priced room. And while I’ve never had an issue with Hyatt’s “premium” internet speed, I don’t know how much faster it really is than the standard Wi-Fi access Hyatt already provides to all guests.

However, I do truly appreciate getting the free 2 p.m. late checkout. My family has taken advantage of this benefit countless times to enjoy a few more hours at the pool on the last day of stays. Also, I love that being a Discoverist member allows me to earn Hyatt points when I fly with American Airlines. Finally, the 10% bonus on eligible Hyatt purchases is nice.

For many Hyatt loyalists, it won’t be hard to earn Discoverist status (or higher) through stays anyway. But if you’re someone who likes to frequent a variety of hotel chains, being a World of Hyatt cardholder assures that you’ll never drop below Discoverist status regardless of how often you visit Hyatt properties in a given year.

While I’m not interested in trying to reach Explorist or Globalist status through credit card spending alone, it’s worth mentioning that it’s technically possible. Cardholders of The World of Hyatt Credit Card receive 5 qualifying night credits each year and then earn an additional 2 nights for each $5,000 they spend on their card.

Every once in a while, Chase and Hyatt will persuade me to dust off my World of Hyatt card and move it into my daily use card rotation for a few weeks or months. That’s because they’ll occasionally send me email offers that can make the card’s effective earnings rate far more attractive than normal.

For example, last spring they offered me an extra 5,000 points if I spent at least $3,000 on the card in about a two-and-a-half month span.

Depending on how many purchases are made on the card’s bonus categories, this deal guarantees earnings of 8,000 to 11,000 World of Hyatt points (which I value at ~$160 to ~$220 toward Hyatt stays) for $3,000 of spending. That’s a great deal in my book. As a reminder, the World of Hyatt card earns 9 points total per dollar spent at Hyatt - 4 bonus points per dollar spent at Hyatt hotels and 5 base points per dollar from Hyatt as a World of Hyatt member. Earn 2 bonus points per dollar spent at restaurants, on airline tickets purchased directly from the airlines, on local transit and commuting and on fitness club and gym memberships and 1 point per dollar on all other eligible purchases.

In another example, last year Chase and Hyatt offered to increase my earnings rate to 5 points per dollar at gas stations, groceries stores and restaurants on up to $1,500 of combined spending from April to June. Sign me up!

At times, I receive stay-related cardmember-exclusive deals. Often these offers require you to visit specific locations or brands within a set period. For example, I recently received an offer to earn 5,000 bonus points for stays of three nights or more at Inclusive Collection brands, up to 10,000 total bonus points.

Now I don’t expect to act on this offer myself. But this is a zero-effort bonus earnings opportunity for cardmembers who already plan to stay at an eligible all-inclusive Hyatt property during the qualifying dates.

I certainly don’t bank on getting great promotional offers on my World of Hyatt card as it would still be worth it to me without them. But I do tend to receive at least one to two compelling offers per year. Each one I take advantage of just adds more icing to the cake.

The World of Hyatt Credit Card may spend more time in my sock drawer than my wallet, but that doesn’t diminish its value to me. Thanks to its annual free night, earnings on Hyatt stays, elite benefits and targeted offers, the card has long been a mainstay in my credit card lineup; and I don’t expect that to change any time soon.