There are loads of journey rewards playing cards vying in your consideration, however one in every of my favourite playing cards is the IHG® Rewards Premier Credit Card.
The IHG Rewards Premier card presents a compelling sign-up bonus to draw new cardholders. The card can be choice to preserve long-term resulting from its many perks that may simply offset its modest $99 annual price. Here’s why I like the IHG Rewards Premier card and plan to maintain it in my pockets for the foreseeable future.
Sign-up bonus
The IHG Rewards Premier Credit Card is presently providing its best-ever sign-up bonus of 175,000 bonus factors after spending $3,000 within the first three months of account opening. Based on TPG’s valuations, 175,000 IHG factors are price about $875.
IHG One Rewards makes use of dynamic award pricing, so the variety of award nights you will get from 175,000 factors will rely fully on when and the place you need to redeem your factors.
Note that the IHG Rewards Premier card and its sign-up bonus aren’t obtainable if you’re a:
- Current cardmember of any private IHG Rewards Credit Card.
- Previous cardmember of any private IHG Rewards Credit Card, and also you acquired a brand new cardmember bonus for a private IHG Rewards Credit Card inside the final 24 months.
Chase’s 5/24 rule may forestall you from being authorized for a brand new Chase card. Check out our submit on calculating your 5/24 standing for extra data.
Related: Is the IHG Rewards Premier card definitely worth the annual price?
Anniversary evening
Even in the event you do not spend many nights in resorts or favor a distinct resort loyalty program, the IHG Rewards Premier Credit Card can nonetheless be price its $99 annual price annually. After all, most cardholders can get greater than $99 of worth annually from one profit: the anniversary evening you obtain after every account anniversary.
You can use the anniversary evening for an evening with a redemption fee of 40,000 factors or much less. But you can even add-on factors out of your IHG Rewards account to redeem for an evening costing greater than 40,000 factors. You should redeem your evening and full your keep inside 12 months of the free evening’s problem date.
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I’ve gotten good worth from my anniversary nights over time. For instance, I’m scripting this story throughout a keep on the Kimpton De Witt in Amsterdam that I booked utilizing a number of anniversary free nights. The award fee on my nights was 40,000 factors, whereas the paid fee would have been about $281 per evening. Even ignoring the paid fee, I used to be blissful to commerce a number of anniversary nights to remain at this Kimpton close to Amsterdam Centraal.
But you can even get sufficient worth out of your anniversary evening to justify the cardboard’s annual price nearer to dwelling. Although discovering nights costing lower than $99 in lots of U.S. cities is changing into much less frequent, you will nonetheless typically discover IHG award nights for 40,000 factors or much less.
There are many various methods to make use of the anniversary evening. But so long as you are getting greater than $99 of worth out of your anniversary evening annually, retaining the IHG Rewards Premier card long-term probably is smart — particularly when you contemplate the cardboard’s different invaluable perks.
Related: The 19 finest IHG resorts on the planet
Fourth-night reward perk
My favourite perk of the IHG Rewards Premier Credit Card is the “redeem three nights, get fourth reward evening free” profit. In brief, this perk helps you to pay zero factors for each fourth evening if you redeem IHG factors for a keep of 4 nights or longer.
Let’s have a look at an instance. For this keep on the InterContinental Phuket Resort in Thailand, I might pay a median of 27,250 factors per evening (as an alternative of 37,750 factors per evening) because of the fourth-night reward perk.
This perk additionally works for longer stays. For instance, this is an eight-night keep the place two nights would price zero factors after the fourth-night reward perk. (Note that the primary and fourth strains within the screenshot under pool two nights collectively as they’re all priced at 11,000 factors every.)
You can use this profit an infinite variety of instances and for longer stays. For instance, you will obtain the fourth, eighth and twelfth nights free on a 12-night keep. And it should all the time be these nights which might be free, no matter whether or not these nights are the most affordable or costliest of the entire keep.
For instance, on a four-night keep the place the nights are priced at 10,000 for every of the primary three nights and 12,000 on the fourth evening, that fourth evening can be free though it is priced the best.
Most vacationers will solely use this perk a number of instances a 12 months, however I’ve benefited from over 35 fourth-night rewards previously six years. If you steadily redeem IHG factors for stays of 4 nights or longer, this card profit will probably prevent a big quantity of factors.
Related: What is IHG One Rewards elite standing price?
Other invaluable advantages
The IHG Rewards Premier card contains a number of different invaluable perks. For instance, the cardboard earns 10 factors per greenback spent at IHG resorts and resorts, a return of 5% based mostly on TPG’s valuations. The IHG Rewards Premier card additionally earns 5 factors per greenback spent on purchases at fuel stations, on different journey and at restaurants and three factors per greenback spent on all different purchases.
Plus, the IHG Rewards Premier card presents the next advantages:
- Automatic IHG One Rewards Platinum Elite standing for so long as you retain your IHG Rewards Premier card.
- Earn IHG One Rewards Diamond Elite standing by means of the tip of the next calendar 12 months throughout any calendar 12 months you make purchases totaling $40,000 or extra along with your IHG Rewards Premier card.
- Save 20% on factors purchases if you pay along with your IHG Rewards Premier card. You cannot mix this low cost with some other factors buy presents, although. So, you will sometimes do higher ready for an IHG purchase factors promotion as an alternative of saving 20% by means of this perk.
- No international transaction charges.
- Get a Global Entry, TSA PreCheck or Nexus credit score of as much as $100 each 4 years as reimbursement for an utility price charged to your card.
- Earn a $100 assertion credit score and 10,000 bonus factors any calendar 12 months you spend not less than $20,000 in purchases.
- Get a $25 United TravelBank money deposit in your United MileagePlus account twice a 12 months (on or round Jan. 1 and July 1) when you full a one-time registration for this perk.
Platinum Elite standing will get you some helpful perks if you keep at IHG resorts, together with extra bonus factors on paid stays and complimentary upgrades (topic to availability and on the resort’s discretion).
Related: The finest resort bank cards with annual charges beneath $100
Bottom line
The IHG® Rewards Premier Credit Card is presently providing its best-ever sign-up bonus of 175,000 bonus factors after spending $3,000 within the first three months of account opening. Based on TPG’s valuations, these bonus factors are price $875.
And after you have the IHG Rewards Premier card, two card advantages — the anniversary evening certificates and the fourth-night-reward perk — ought to present considerably extra worth than the $99 annual price annually. As such, I consider the IHG Rewards Premier card is a invaluable card to get after which preserve 12 months after 12 months.
Check out our full IHG Rewards Premier Credit Card assessment for extra particulars.
Official utility hyperlink: IHG® Rewards Premier Credit Card