The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is the G.O.A.T of all the points and miles cards for many reasons. It is the best all-around, easy-to-use, beginner-friendly card that earns flexible points and gives you access to some of the very best transfer partners. You may have seen other beginner cards like the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card or the American Express® Gold Card, but the Sapphire Preferred is my number one recommendation. Here’s everything you need to know about it.

<All information about the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card has been collected independently by The Traveling Hansens. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.>

Sapphire Preferred details

The current welcome offer for the Sapphire Preferred is 60,000 bonus points after $4,000 in purchases in your first 3 months from account opening.

There is a $95 annual fee, which is SO worth it for this workhorse card.

This card will count against Chase’s 5/24 rule, but it is 100% worth a spot!

Sapphire Preferred Benefits

• $50 annual hotel credit when booked through the Chase Travel℠ portal.
• 5X on travel booked through the Chase Travel℠ portal, 3X on dining, 2X on other travel, 1X on everything else.
• 25% points boost when booking through Chase Travel℠, so instead of every 10,000 points being worth $100, they’re worth $125.
• Trip Cancellation/Interruption Insurance, Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver, Lost Luggage Insurance and more.
• No foreign transaction fees.

Eligibility

To be eligible for this card, you cannot currently hold either Sapphire card. You also cannot have earned the welcome offer on either Sapphire card in the last 48 months. Remember, it’s 48 months from when you last earned the offer, not just when you last opened the card.

If you currently have this card open, but it’s been more than 48 months and you’d like to earn the bonus again, you can downgrade it to a no-annual-fee card. The Chase Freedom Unlimited® is a great option. Then you can wait a few weeks and reapply for the Sapphire Preferred to earn the welcome offer again.

<All information about the Chase Freedom Unlimited® has been collected independently by The Traveling Hansens. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.>

Transfer partners

This is where the Sapphire Preferred really shines! Chase has 11 airline partners and 3 hotel partners. All points transfer at a 1:1 ratio in increments of 1,000.

Here are the partners:

• Aer Lingus
• Air Canada
• Air France-KLM
• British Airways
• Emirates
• Iberia
• JetBlue
• Singapore
• Southwest
• United
• Virgin Atlantic
• Hyatt
• IHG
• Marriott

Chase is the only bank that has so many domestic partners- many other banks only have international partners. This means it can be a bit harder to find the best redemptions (although not at all impossible, so definitely don’t count them out!). But you won’t have this problem with Chase!

More often than not, we transfer our Ultimate Rewards to Hyatt. Hyatt points rates are so much lower than the other hotel chains, which means we can get really great value out of them.

However, we’ve also used them for things like Flying Blue (Air France) flights to Paris, Southwest flights to Hawaii, Virgin Atlantic flights to Cabo, and more. They really are the very best points.

How to transfer your points

Here are the steps for transferring your points from Chase to one of its transfer partners.

First, log on to your Chase account, choose your Sapphire Preferred card, then click on your Ultimate Rewards® and hit “redeem”.

Next, hover over “travel” at the top of the page and select “transfer points to partners”.

All of Chase’s travel partners will pop up, with any current transfer bonuses listed at the top. Choose the one you’d like to transfer to. In this case, we’ll choose Hyatt (of course).

After that, you’ll go through three steps. First, you’ll confirm your name and loyalty account information. If you haven’t set up a free loyalty account with the hotel or airline, make sure you do that first!

Next, enter how many points you’d like to transfer in increments of 1,000.

Finally, confirm the details and hit submit.

Generally, transfers are instant, although there can be unexpected delays. You may need to log out and log back into your hotel or airline account to see the points available.

One important note- do not transfer points until you have found the available flights or hotel nights! Once you’ve transferred your points, they’re stuck in that program. You wouldn’t want your points to be stuck with no way to use them as you intended.

Earning more points and combining

There are many cards that earn Ultimate Rewards®, but you will need a Sapphire Preferred (or the Sapphire Reserve® or business version of the card) in order to transfer your points to those partners. This is just one more reason why having a Sapphire Preferred is necessary!

Here are some of the other cards that earn Ultimate Rewards:

• Chase Sapphire Reserve®
• Chase Freedom Flex® (advertised as cash back, but it actually earns Ultimate Rewards®)
• Chase Freedom Unlimited® (advertised as cash back, but it actually earns Ultimate Rewards®)
• Chase Ink Business Cash® Credit Card (advertised as cash back, but it actually earns Ultimate Rewards®)
• Chase Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card (advertised as cash back, but it actually earns Ultimate Rewards®)
• Chase Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card

<All information about the Chase Sapphire Reserve®, Chase Freedom Flex® and Unlimited®, and Chase Ink Business Cash®, Unlimited®, and Preferred® has been collected independently by The Traveling Hansens. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.>

Points earned from any of these cards can be combined onto your Sapphire Preferred and then transferred to travel partners. To combine your points, log in to your Chase account and go to your Ultimate Rewards®. Hover over Rewards Details, then click “combine points”.

Choose which cards you want to move points from and to, enter how many points you want to move, and hit confirm. Voila! Easy peasy!

Other card options

If you already have this card or feel like it’s not a good fit (even though I think everyone should have one!), here are some other great beginner card recommendations:

• Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card
• American Express® Green Card
• Citi Strata Premier

If you’re looking for a no-annual-fee card, click here.

<All information about the American Express Green Card and Citi Strata Premier has been collected independently by The Traveling Hansens. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.>

Wrapping it up

Like I said, the Sapphire Preferred is one of the very best cards. It’s a staple in our wallet for so many reasons and should absolutely be a staple in yours! If you don’t have one, what are you waiting for??