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What are IHG One Rewards hotel points worth?

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This article is our attempt to decide what IHG One Rewards points are worth. How should you value them?

Valuing miles and points is a thankless job. We have always published articles on what Avios points are worth, but that Avios article is so complex that it simply proves my point.

In the face of constant reader requests, however, I wrote this series of articles on how we value each of the major hotel points currencies.

You can buy IHG One Rewards points directly from IHG here.

What are IHG One Rewards points worth?

Here are links to the full series:

The reason I have changed my mind after all these years is that I have found a methodology that works for me. It takes a subjective valuation and then explains the boundaries around it. Or, in plain English:

  • I will tell you (without justifying it) what I think an IHG One Rewards point is worth
  • I will tell you, on the upside, how far wrong I can be (which is good news)
  • I will tell you, on the downside, how far wrong I can be (which is bad news)
  • I will tell you what IHG One Rewards points are worth if you turn them into something else – usually airline miles – which effectively locks in a floor value

Why I think ‘range’ is important when valuing hotel points

When we look at using Avios for business or First Class flights, the ‘cash alternative’ is often a poor comparison. Most HfP readers don’t want to, or simply can’t afford to, pay cash for business or First Class flights. Their choice is Avios or nothing. Even if you can afford to pay, what are you comparing with? A cheap non-refundable sale flight? A pricier flexible ticket? The cost of an indirect flight, not on BA?

Hotels redemptions are different:

  • you stay in far more hotels each year compared to the number of premium cabin flights you take, so you can be selective about when you use points
  • you can usually afford to pay for a hotel if you choose not to use points
  • there are far more options in the hotel market than in the flight market – most people only have a lot of miles in one airline programme, whereas you are likely to hold hotel points in multiple schemes
What are IHG One Rewards points worth?

It is easy to sit on hotel points until you get a good deal

The net result of the three facts above is that it is easy to turn down a hotel redemption when it doesn’t seem like good value. You can pay cash or redeem via another hotel scheme instead.

Here is the crux of what I am trying to say. If you compare two hotel schemes:

  • scheme A usually gets you 0.3p per point but if you are lucky you can get 1p
  • scheme B usually gets you 0.4p per point but if you are lucky you can get 0.6p

…. scheme A may actually be the best.

Most people who try to ‘value’ hotel points don’t take this into account.

If you redeemed points for every stay you did, regardless of the cash price, scheme B would be the best. No-one does this though. In reality you can pay cash for your stays in scheme A until the day when a bumper redemption arrives and you can get 1p.

Here’s a real example. I value Marriott Bonvoy points at 0.5p as our article will show in a few days. If you do 20 Marriott hotel stays and use Bonvoy points for all of them, I think you will average 0.5p, give or take.

However, last summer I spent five nights at the JW Marriott Resort & Spa in Venice, reviewed here. We booked two Junior Suites for 594,000 points in total. I got 1.0p per point, and this was a ‘real’ saving – I have stayed in these rooms before at this hotel and would have paid cash if needed.

Two years ago, I booked three nights at the Al Maha desert resort in Dubai. This got me 1.5p per Bonvoy point vs my 0.5p valuation.

Later this week I will be at a Marriott resort in Turkey where I will be getting 2.0p per Bonvoy point. Admittedly this is not a ‘real’ saving as I wouldn’t have paid the stupendous cash price.

These redemptions justified all of the Marriott stays where I paid cash rather than redeem for 0.5p per point.

What are IHG One Rewards points worth?

What are IHG One Rewards points worth?

With our methodology out of the way, let’s take a look at what IHG One Rewards points are worth.

To keep things simple, we do not adjust for the fact that you would earn points back if you paid cash instead. This can have a noticeable impact when generous bonuses are running.

IHG One Rewards has historically run more generous promotions than the other major chains, but this has not been true since the pandemic. Hilton Honors is the only scheme running back to back promotions these days.

The HfP average valuation of an IHG One Rewards point:

0.4p

We are not justifying this valuation, except to say that I have looked at enough IHG One Rewards redemptions over the years to be happy with it.

How high can value go on the upside?

Not very high, which is not good.

If you can get 0.6p per point then take it.

Over the last two years, IHG One Rewards has been bringing in ‘revenue based redemptions’. In plain English, this means that the points required are linked to the cash price.

Hilton has a similar system, but Hilton was smarter. Hilton still has a ‘points price cap’ for each hotel, so you know that you will rarely pay more than 95,000 points per night at its top hotels, and proportionately less at mid-market ones.

IHG One Rewards appears to cap redemptions at 120,000 points per night. There are some exceptions, such as the Maldives hotels, but it holds in major cities such as New York and London.

This means, based on our 0.4p ‘fair value’ opinion, you can beat this if your hotel is selling for £480+ per night. Clearly this doesn’t happen often but it’s not impossible. Those are the nights when the best value is to be found.

Of course, even 120,000 points per night is a crazy figure at some brands. Here are two Holiday Inn Express properties Iin New York at 120,000 points:

What are IHG One Rewards points worth?

When I started collecting IHG points, you could book ANY InterContinental hotel globally for a fixed 30,000 points per night. Other brands cost even less. Things have changed ….

You need to be clear that this is not premium ‘last room availability’ pricing. Hotels are still only obliged to make 5% of their rooms available for redemption. IHG is also still only paying hotels the usual peanuts figure for redemptions. On a stay at the Hotel Indigo Bath (reviewed here) I was given IHG’s receipt by mistake which showed they paid £32 for my room.

It is important to note we recently saw many IHG hotels rise in redemption cost with no equivalent change in cash prices. These were primarily hotels which got you more than our 0.4p average. It’s possible that our 0.6p ‘stretch target’ is now too high.

The Mr & Mrs Smith upside has gone

IHG, until recently, had a partnership with the Mr & Mrs Smith marketing group to feature some of their hotels on its website. Redemptions at these hotels got you a fixed 0.55p per point, far ahead of what you’d get at most IHG properties.

Mr & Mrs Smith was bought by Hyatt and the properties have gone from the IHG website.

New hotels can often provide value

One trend that we have seen is IHG using redemptions to drive business at new hotels. It takes time for a hotel to grow demand, and IHG is keen to show the owner that the reward scheme can deliver guests. New hotels can often give you a superior ‘pence per point’ as a result.

That said, realistically, the best value you can expect from IHG One Rewards is 0.6p per point. If you are booking a hotel where your points are worth 0.6p, take it and pocket the cash saving.

What are IHG One Rewards points worth?

How low can value go on the downside?

Low, but not disastrously so.

One upside of the move to revenue-based redemption pricing is that you will rarely get a truly terrible deal.

My London analysis in 2021 showed that 0.25p per IHG One Rewards point is about as bad as it gets. I’ve not seen anything to change my view since then.

That said, 0.25p is still 35% worse than our benchmark of 0.4p per point, so you should absolutely avoid redeeming at this level if at all possible.

If IHG One Rewards devalues hugely tomorrow, what is my escape route?

This is our floor price. What can you do with your points if IHG One Rewards devalues massively overnight?

With IHG One Rewards, the best value is to convert your points to airline miles or to gift cards. It doesn’t end well either way.

Airline miles:

The conversion rate to Avios and other major airline currencies is 5:1.

If we assume an airline mile is worth 1p, then you are getting 0.2p per IHG One Rewards point in the worse case scenario.

Gift cards:

If you redeem IHG One Rewards points for a UK High Street gift card it is even worse. The catalogue is here.

At the top end – it is worse for smaller balances – 53,000 points gets you a £100 voucher for a UK High Street store or restaurant chain. This is just under 0.2p per IHG One Rewards point, in line with what you get with a conversion to airline miles. These gift cards devalue year on year – last year they were 52,500 points and the year before they were 49,000 points. This year has also seen a ‘hidden’ devaluation with the cutting of £100 gift cards for many retailers – the £50 ones you are now forced to get instead are poorer value.

By redeeming for gift cards, you are losing 50% of the value compared to an average hotel redemption and 66% of the value compared to a ‘good’ hotel redemption.

In summary …. what do we think IHG One Rewards points are worth?

  • on average: 0.4p per point
  • on a very good day: 0.6p per point – usually there is little ability to go beyond this, and we may need to reduce this ‘stretch target’ following recent price increases
  • on a bad day: 0.25p per point
  • if you transfer out in a worse case scenario: 0.2p per point for airline miles or UK retailer gift cards

The lack of a pricing cap per hotel (ignoring the non-brand specific 120,000 points cap) makes IHG One Rewards less attractive than Hilton Honors or World of Hyatt. Marriott Bonvoy also seems to be retaining some sort of caps at its priciest hotels. Not having a cap at the high end sharply reduces your ability to get outsize value.

There is no point saving up for a bumper redemption at a luxury resort. Revenue-based pricing makes those rewards no better value than your local Holiday Inn Express.

If you find that a certain hotel can get you 0.6p per point then you should pull the trigger, because you will struggle to do better. Any redemptions which get you 0.4p to 0.5p should be seen as acceptable.

If you want to buy additional IHG One Rewards points from IHG, the link to buy is here.


IHG One Rewards news

IHG One Rewards update – November 2024:

Get bonus points:

Nights to do not need to be consecutive. Read more in our article here and click here to register.

IHG is running a second promotion for stays at five of its smaller brands. You will receive triple base points between 1st October and 31st December 2024 on stays at voco, avid hotels, EVEN Hotels, Atwell Suites and Garner Hotels. Read more in our article here and click here to register.

New to IHG One Rewards?  Read our overview of IHG One Rewards here and our article on points expiry rules here. Our article on ‘What are IHG One Rewards points worth?’ is here.

Buy points: If you need additional IHG One Rewards points, you can buy them here.

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

Comments (26)

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

  • Irons80 says:

    The sweet spot with IHG Rewards come with Diamond and / or Ambassador membership, because you will invariably be upgraded on redemption bookings to higher room categories, making the 0.4p valuation worth a lot more. Without status, I personally wouldn’t bother with redemptions – you’ll only get basic / lowest category rooms.

    I am lucky – I travel a lot and therefore have Diamond Ambassador so I collect a lot of points and feel that I get good value on redemptions without worrying what the value of each point is worth, but of course YMMV

    • BBbetter says:

      With redemptions, upgrades are a hit and miss. You are the last in queue, so unless you are visiting off peak, less chances of upgrades.

  • SRF says:

    I have a about 300-400k of points and I’m currently Diamond but that will expire 31/12 and reduce me down to no status (unless I still get Platinum or similar as a Creation legacy).

    There’s a genuine chance I’ll earn no points this year. Do I need to do a cheap qualifying night somewhere to make sure my points don’t vanish, or will my current Diamond Status protect them from that?

    • Rob says:

      Protected.

      • SRF says:

        Thank you

      • Roy says:

        So are the points safe for 12 months from the point where you lose elite status, then?

        If so, might be worth doing an article about it as there are probably a lot of people who currently have Platinum through the credit card who will lose status next year. I had been assuming my points will expire 12 months from my last stay – if I definitely get a whole 12 months that’s useful to know.

        • Rob says:

          IHG gives soft landings (or has been, at least to me) which would mean you wouldn’t lose status and so wouldn’t lose your points. In your situation I’m not sure exactly how it would work to be honest if you’re not soft landed – but my original comment was related to the fact that I didn’t think you’d lose status in one go.

          • Roy says:

            Thanks, Rob. In that case I’ll play safe and contribute to assume 12 months from last stay/activity.

    • josh says:

      Suggest try to use points while you have Diamond. That is what I am doing. As IHG Plat next year i would never stay in their hotels as much better options at Marriott or Hyatt. So the IHG points lose a lot of value value in my opinion.

      • SRF says:

        I’d love to but holding a new born that arrived safely after nearly a full-term of complications of drama, so sadly we’ve had to hibernate and idea of spontaneous nights away this year.

        I recently had the joy of getting caught doing 35 in 30…. looking at the Speed Awareness course options, it seems all the local providers run from Holiday Inns and Crown Plazas.

        I’d even been considering booking a night into a hotel the night before, just to get a creditable stay and safe-guard my points.

        • Timerichmoneypoor says:

          Congratulations, and welcome to a life with very different & much more important priorities!

  • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

    Next January I’m getting .54 of a penny per night – BFR = £ 223 or 41k points at the Kimpton de Witt so am more than happy with that.

    Using the Railcard rate it falls to .48 of a penny.

    I only book either the railcard or BFR rate as they offer the flexibility to cancel and rebook

    I agree with the 0.4 pence floor as that’s the price with buying points when there is a 100% bonus.

    My personal view is that some of the reports of a devaluation recently were over egged and it was more of a blip than anything else.

  • whiskerxx says:

    I have status and Club Lounge access from the Milestone Reward scheme.
    My forthcoming October points stay offers some flexibility and provides 0.9p when comparing the same room against a non refundable cash rate and 1p when compared to the refundable cash rate.
    What’s not to like?

  • Andrzej Przybysz says:

    IHG, and maybe other companies as well, discriminate against families in many countries. It’s hard to find an IHG reward room for family who wants to stay in one room with their children with points even when it’s not a problem with money. Germany or UK are easy but Poland and France have very few properties that allow that.

  • Novice says:

    I think I spent in total over time buying ihg points for 1500 pounds maybe can’t remember properly. Regent Hong Kong 3 nights is about £450 x 3 for my dates so I used 251000 points and have 29,030 points left on account.

    Don’t know if that was a good deal because I’m not great at working out stuff but I do know I am happy I got my room for 83000 points avg and now it’s 92000 for same dates.

    • Novice says:

      I paid £1251 ($1500 at that time) just checked so I think the points worked out to my advantage.

      • Novice says:

        Actually for a solo it is £480 or thereabouts just checked for my dates so yep did well considering I am nowhere near clever at this game. 😂

        • Novice says:

          I wishI could edit post; it’s £486 per night so 486 x 3 = £1458. Can you work it out pls how much value I got per points?

        • TGLoyalty says:

          Just over 0.52p but I’m factoring in you would have got 10% back.

        • Novice says:

          Thanks TGLoyalty. I reckon it’s not bad then. Especially since my entire trip is costing a lot so to use points for some hotels was good.

  • BBbetter says:

    Good time to buy points with £ at the strongest level since Mar 2022.

  • SG says:

    Do IHG have a refer a friend offer?

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

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