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Hilton Honors launches ‘Points Explorer’ – what does it offer?

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Hilton Honors has launched ‘Points Explorer’.

Hilton Honors is the hotel reward scheme which doesn’t have a reward chart.

That’s not entirely true.  Whilst the charts are no longer published, hotels are still working to the old category caps which set a limit on how much each hotel can charge per night.  What is new now is that, on cheaper nights, Hilton reduces the cost of a reward night so that you are never getting worse value than roughly 0.3p.

Hilton Points Explorer

The problem with not having a reward chart is that members who don’t fully understand the scheme seem to be struggling to know what it will cost to get away.  Hilton has now launched a new tool called ‘Points Explorer’ to help which you can find here.

‘Points Explorer’ can be customised by city, country or continent and can be filtered by the number of points you want to spend.  It shows you two bits of information:

the maximum number of points that the hotel is allowed to charge

the lowest number of points that the hotel has actually charged on any night

Whilst it doesn’t show you the points needed on any particular night, it helps members with smaller balances identify properties which they can definitely afford as long as they have more than the capped amount.

For longer stays, you will need to adjust for the fact that status members (Silver and above) get five nights for the points of four when booking standard redemption rooms.

You can try out ‘Points Explorer’ here.

How to earn Hilton Honors points and status from UK credit cards

How to earn Hilton Honors points and status from UK credit cards (April 2024)

There are various ways of earning Hilton Honors points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

Do you know that holders of The Platinum Card from American Express receive FREE Hilton Honors Gold status for as long as they hold the card?  It also comes with Marriott Bonvoy Gold, Radisson Rewards Premium and MeliaRewards Gold status.  We reviewed American Express Platinum in detail here and you can apply here.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Did you know that the Virgin Atlantic credit cards are a great way of earning Hilton Honors points? Two Virgin Points can be converted into three Hilton Honors points. The Virgin Atlantic cards are the only Visa or Mastercard products in the UK which can indirectly earn Hilton Honors points and they come with generous sign-up bonuses. You can apply here.

You can also earn Hilton Honors points indirectly with:

and for small business owners:

The conversion rate from American Express to Hilton points is 1:2.

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which can be used to earn Hilton Honors points. 

(Want to earn more hotel points?  Click here to see our complete list of promotions from the major hotel chains or use the ‘Hotel Offers’ link in the menu bar at the top of the page.)

Category

Hilton Honors

Comments (92)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Michelle says:
    16 Feb16 February 11:23

    OT, I’m off to Dubai early May ( during Ramadan), with my sister. My Hilton gold should expire in March although I never find it clear on the app, but if it does I’m planning to get it again through Amex Platinum and hopefully it’ll come through in time. Am I right in thinking I can book 4 nights for 1 person as a perk of at least retaining silver through the HH credit card? The first two nights I’ll be paying cash, does anyone have experience whether we are pretty likely to get executive lounge access at Hilton the walk if I book these nights in a normal room or should I pay for an executive room or really push the boat out and book into a king deluxe studio as it is ridiculously cheap for those two nights? I’m trying to balance out a nice room with lounge access against any potential concerns of two young (ish) females travelling. Sister has no status, thanis for any help.

    • Benylin says:
      16 Feb16 February 12:21

      1) what do you mean by “I’m trying to balance out a nice room with lounge access against any potential concerns of two young (ish) females travelling.”
      2) Hotels are very empty during Ramadan. Email the hotel and ask what they can do? e.g. pay standard room rate for upgraded room etc, would be surprised if you don’t get much luck.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        16 Feb16 February 14:11

        Is number 1 they are after a hotel with nice rooms, lounge access where they won’t run into idiots?

        Having stayed in the Hilton the walk a few years ago I wasn’t that impressed. Though happy hour saved a pretty penny on drinks. Not sure it’s the same at Ramadan?

    • Mr Dee says:
      16 Feb16 February 20:31

      lounge certainly isn’t guaranteed to get you to the lounge for free unless your upgraded to an exec room so if the next room category comes with exec access and there is availability then you have a better chance, good idea would be to email them and see if they can do anything

    • Graham Walsh says:
      17 Feb17 February 01:38

      Which Hilton in Dubai? I was at the Jumeirah one on the beach and even if you get upgraded to an exec room, doesn’t mean lounge access. You need to either be Diamond or book a room with lounge access.

      I started my Diamond challenge for this holiday and they took the booking date status (gold) and the even though I was Diamond when I arrived, I had to fight for my diamond access.

  • N says:
    16 Feb16 February 12:49

    OT: Rob, what’s the new Marriott resort that’s opening this year near London? You’ve mentioned it a few times over the past year…

    • TGLoyalty says:
      16 Feb16 February 13:19

      The Langley?

      Also notice that hotel football at old Trafford is a Marriott hotel now.

  • Ian M says:
    16 Feb16 February 13:11

    OT – BAEC transfer bonus from hotel schemes..

    Am I right in thinking the last time they ran this was March 2018 or did I miss one?

    • Matt says:
      16 Feb16 February 16:03

      Even with a bonus you’d lose a lot of value transferring to BAEC. Ok I guess if you have no use for hotel points.

      • Ian M says:
        16 Feb16 February 17:39

        I have a specific use for a marriott category 5 travel package certificate. With a 35% bonus Avios it will be very good value

        • Genghis says:
          16 Feb16 February 19:03

          New cat 5 TP is 390k MRs for 100k airline points.
          New cat 5 hotel only is 150k (6 x 25k) using 5 for 4
          Therefore if there was a 35% bonus on you’d be paying 240k MRs (=£1200) for 135k avios (=£1,350). So yes, a gain but I wouldn’t describe it as “very good value” given avios are of a lower order and easier to collect elsewhere.

        • BJ says:
          16 Feb16 February 19:55

          @Genghis, Category 5 is 35k so 6x35k=210k. Many Cat 5 hotels in excess of £250/night so value can still be exceptionally good in the right circumstances.

        • Genghis says:
          16 Feb16 February 20:19

          Of course. Dunno what I was thinking (old no’s).

    • Rob says:
      16 Feb16 February 16:50

      Correct

  • Jon says:
    16 Feb16 February 13:18

    The Virgin Manchester flight only goes to JFK. Unless I am missing something! There is a MAN to Newark daily flight but that is with United. The Virgin JFK flight uses the old bucket and spade 747 planes.

  • Waddle says:
    16 Feb16 February 14:58

    OT:
    I rang up BA today to ask how much it would be to upgrade a YVR-LHR trip I booked in November from WTP to CW with cash. The rep on the phone said because it was a BA Holiday and I made the booking in November but didn’t clear the balance until January he was able to check what the cost to upgrade would have been in November or in January and was able to apply the cheapest rate out of the two. I didn’t know this as I thought I would be paying the spot rate today. It seems to be another useful “feature” of making a BA Holiday booking vs a flight-only booking if looking to upgrade in the future.

    I didn’t end up upgrading with cash but I thought this was a bit of info I’d pass on as I certainly didn’t know this.

    I upgraded with Avios + £100pp (family of 4) and got around 2.56p per point against the cheaper rate (January) which I thought was decent enough value.

  • Nick_C says:
    16 Feb16 February 15:27

    OT – Bonvoy out to airmiles.

    Am I right in thinking that the 25% bonus only applies to complete units of 60000?

    ie 60000 Bonvoy gets you 25000 Avios, 90000 gets you 35000 (not 37500), 120000 (in one transfer) gets you 50000?

  • flyforfun says:
    16 Feb16 February 15:59

    Interesting to see BA bring back the old liveries for the 100 promotion. Will they bring back the world tail fins though? 🙂

    I’m sure I have a photo in my collection somewhere which showed and the world tail fins and the new one that replaced it together at Heathrow and circa 2001 when I was flying a lot for work.

    • BJ says:
      16 Feb16 February 19:10

      Somebody mentioned recently they are bringing back the tartan ones on a319s. These are used to INV, and I guess sometimes GLA and ABZ, have not seen one at EDI of late but I might just have been on wrong flights.

  • Graham says:
    16 Feb16 February 16:41

    O/T. I’ve just discovered that you can create an Atol protected flight+hotel package when booking an Avios reward flight with BA and earn 15 Avios/£ spent on the hotel (the flights are paid for with Avios). BA are using Hotels.com & Expedia as agents for this.

    I’ve never come across this before and the agent did say it was new. I spoke to 2 agents and they both confirmed it.

    Just wondered if I’ve previously missed this or is it new. It seems like a valuable benefit being able to create a package on reward bookings with protection in case of flight disruption.

    • Anna says:
      16 Feb16 February 19:31

      Hi Graham, this is interesting but slightly confusing, who were you booking this through?

      • Graham says:
        16 Feb16 February 19:47

        I was booking over the phone with BA using the EC Silver line no. Interestingly one of the agents gave me her email address and it was an Avios.com address.

        • Graham says:
          16 Feb16 February 21:39

          I’ve just had it confirmed by email that adding a hotel to an Avios flight redemption booking will provide Atol protection.

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