Update 4/3/19: When this was originally posted in June of 2016 Mint flights were getting 1.7¢ in value. At some stage this dropped to 1.4¢. TPG is now reporting that this has dropped even further and JetBlue Mint flights are getting approximately 1.09¢ in value.
In the post we’re going to look at how much JetBlue TrueBlue points are worth. JetBlue points can be used for the following things:
- Flights on JetBlue
- Flights On Hawaiian Airlines
- JetBlue Vacation Packages
- Magazines
- Newspaper Subscriptions
- Charity Donations
Let’s take a look at each of the options and see how much value you can get from your JetBlue points.
Contents
JetBlue Flights
JetBlue doesn’t have an award chart like most other airlines, instead points can be used for all flights that are bookable with cash (there is a 3,500 1,000 point minimum that must be redeemed though). The amount of points that is required is tied to the cash value of the flight and some other factors as well. Wandering Aramean has a really in depth post on the value of points that I’d recommend reading. I’ll summarize the post into a quick few bullet points for quick reference.
- Points can be redeemed for a minimum of 0.97¢ per point
- Points can be redeemed for a maximum of 1.89¢ per point
- The average value per point is 1.41¢
- Mint fares (basically their business class product) 1.09¢ per point
- International redemptions provide a better average point value than domestic
Knowing that you can get a baseline value of 0.97¢ per point is useful.
These maximum values don’t always seem to be accurate anymore, as recently you could get almost 5¢ per point on flights to Cuba.
Hawaiian Airline Flights
Hawaiian Airline flights used to follow the same rules as above but on December 22nd, 2017 they added an award chart. The award chart is as follows:
Vacation Packages
It’s not possible to book a vacation package with only JetBlue flights, you must use a combination of points & cash. You also won’t earn any JetBlue points on these bookings, nor will you be able to use a promotional code with these bookings. I did a few searches and they all seemed to return a value of 1.55¢ per point (I’m not sure if that’s just a fixed rate of I got lucky).
Just keep in mind you’re missing out on 6x JetBlue points when using cash + points and that usually it’s going to be cheaper to book the hotel and flight separately (especially when you account for discounts you can get from third party hotel websites). It might be worth considering a Vacation Package if you have the JetBlue Plus (personal or business card) as you get a $100 statement credit annually.
Magazine/Newspaper Subscriptions
Points can be redeemed for magazine and newspaper subscriptions. Let’s take a quick look at two options that might be popular:
- TIME Magazine (52 issues): 1,200 points (~$30 value for 2.3¢ in value)
- Wall Street Journal (304 issues): 3,200 points ($12 for 12 weeks introductory rate, rough value of 1.625¢ in value)
I compared to the RRP, nobody really pays the recommend price for these magazine or newspaper subscriptions these days. There will also be a limit to the amount of magazines/newspapers you want to be receiving.
Charity Donations
It’s possible to donate JetBlue points to select charities. Unfortunately these donations are not tax deductible. There is a minimum of 500 points that can be donated and all of the points go directly to the charity.
Our Verdict
Realistically the only thing you’ll want to redeem your JetBlue points are for flights with either JetBlue or Hawaiian Airlines, I don’t think any of the other options provide good value. At minimum you’re looking at about 1¢ in value and a maximum of about 1.4¢, JetBlue doesn’t provided outsized value on business/first class international flights like other airlines but they do provide some good value none the less. If anybody has any thoughts/corrections then let me know in the comments.
You might also be interested in other posts in our valuation series:
