American Express has finally caught up with the Hilton re-brand: they’ve changed the name of their Hilton cards and upped the standard offers.
The Offer
Head to the American Express website, or use these direct links: Hilton Honors, Hilton Honors Surpass. (thanks to reader DDG for reminding me about these links!). Help a reader out by using a referral link instead.
- Hilton Honors card: Earn 80,000 Hilton Honors bonus points after spending $2,000 within 3 months of account opening.
- Hilton Honors Surpass card: Earn 100,000 Hilton Honors bonus points after spending $3,000 within 3 months of account opening, PLUS earn a free weekend night award after your first anniversary of card membership.
- Both of these offers can be generated by referral as well. The Hilton Honors card gives 20,000 points per referral, up to 80,000 per year. The Hilton Honors Surpass card gives 25,000 points per referral, up to 80,000 per year.
Upgrade Offers
A lot of people have been able to upgrade to the Surpass card and get a 100,000 point bonus as well. We discuss this in more depth here.
Generating Referrals
As a reminder, please do not share referrals in the comments. You can share and use each other’s links here.
Matching
As a general rule (with very limited exceptions mostly applying to the SPG cards), American Express does not match offers. However, reader T was able to get 3,000 courtesy points, having recently signed up for the 75,000 points offer. I doubt that American Express will match the weekend free night on the Surpass card, but it can’t hurt to try for some courtesy points on the Hilton Honors card if you recently signed up.
Our Verdict
These bonuses compete with the recent increased referral offers…but there’s a catch for each offer.
The catch for the Hilton Honors card is that the 80,000 bonus points requires $2,000 in spend instead of $1,000 in spend, and you only get an extra 5,000 points. That extra $1,000 in spend is $20 on a 2% card, which isn’t that much less than an extra 8,000 Hilton points (including 3,000 from unbonused spend), even before the recent program changes. And if you really wanted 5,000 more points, $1,000 in spend at a grocery store on this card gives you exactly 5,000 points. Let’s just say I’m not impressed, even if it is technically the highest public offer ever. (Basically, I would stick with the 75,000 bonus points for $1,000 spend offer unless you would put $2,000 on this card anyway. You can use that extra $1,000 in spend for more lucrative signup offers.)
The catch for the Hilton Honors Surpass card is that the free weekend night requires you to keep the card for year 2 and pay the $75 annual fee again. In my opinion, you should easily be able to redeem a free weekend night certificate for much more than $75. This offer is awesome and I’d go for it in a heart beat if I didn’t already have a Surpass.
If you have any questions or comments, please drop them below! If you’re interested in other recent offers on these cards, you can head over to our post “A Spreadsheet of Current & Recent Credit Card Signup Bonuses for Major Issuers”.
As always, we recommend reading through these things everybody should know about American Express credit cards before applying for this card or asking basic questions.
h/t u/ha_ka on r/churning
