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Pay With Points at Checkout 2026: When It Pays and When It Costs You
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Almost every rewards program now lets you pay with points right at checkout, from Amazon to your card's travel portal. It is the easiest way to use rewards. It is also, very often, the lowest-value way. Here is how to tell the difference before you click.
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What Paying With Points Actually Means
Paying with points means applying your rewards balance directly to a purchase instead of redeeming for cash first. The common versions:
- Retailer checkout: linking a card to a store such as Amazon's Shop with Points, then using points for all or part of an order.
- Issuer travel portals: booking flights or hotels through your card's portal and covering the cost with points.
- Program-specific tools: features like American Express Pay with Points on Amex Travel bookings.
The convenience is real. The catch is that each option sets its own exchange rate, and those rates vary widely.
Kudos recommends the best card in your wallet at checkout, so the part of an order you do not cover with points still earns the most it can.
Points or cash back? We compared what transferable points and flat cash back really pay. Compare points and cash back.
What Your Points Are Worth When You Pay With Points at Amazon
At Amazon's standard Shop with Points rates, NerdWallet lists these values:
- Chase Ultimate Rewards®: 0.8 cents per point
- Citi ThankYou® Rewards: 0.8 cents per point
- Capital One miles: 0.8 cents per mile (Capital One cash back cards redeem $1 for $1)
- American Express Membership Rewards®: 0.7 cents per point
- Bilt Points: 0.7 cents per point
Compare that with a basic cash redemption. Chase points, for example, can usually be redeemed for cash at 1 cent each, which makes the Amazon rate 20% worse than cash.
Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more. Eligibility and Benefit level varies by Card. Terms, Conditions, and Limitations Apply. Please visit americanexpress.com/benefitsguide for more details. Underwritten by Amex Assurance Company.
Shopping online anyway? Kudos Boost adds extra rewards at participating stores. Read the Kudos Boost guide.
The Hidden Cost: Rewards You Do Not Earn
The exchange rate is only half the cost. The part of a purchase you cover with points generally does not earn new rewards, while a card payment would.
Take a $100 Amazon order. Paying with Chase points at 0.8 cents takes 12,500 points. Redeeming 10,000 points for $100 cash and paying with a card that earns 2% would cost 2,500 fewer points and earn $2 back on top.
Calculation formulated by Kudos, based on NerdWallet's 0.8-cent Amazon rate and 1-cent cash rate for Chase Ultimate Rewards, applied to a $100 purchase paid with a 2% cash back card.
On one order, that is small. Now scale it up. If you cover $1,200 a year of shopping with points at 0.8 cents, you spend 150,000 points. Cashing out 120,000 points instead and paying with a 2% card saves 30,000 points and earns $24 in new cash back. That gap is the real price of the points button: a weaker exchange rate plus the rewards your card would have earned.
Pay With Points on Card Travel Portals
Travel portals are where paying with points gets closer to fair value. Instead of a fixed discount rate, many portals pay at least 1 cent per point, and some pay more on select bookings.
- Chase Points Boost: on select hotels booked through Chase Travel, Chase Freedom Flex® and Chase Freedom Unlimited® cardholders can get up to 10% more value, lifting points from 1 cent to as much as 1.1 cents each. Select Sapphire and Ink cards see higher Points Boost rates.
- Amex Travel: 1 cent per point on eligible flights, but 0.7 cents on prepaid hotels.
The same rule applies here as at Amazon. Check the cents per point you are getting before you confirm, and compare it with a cash redemption or a transfer to a partner.
Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more. Eligibility and Benefit level varies by Card. Terms, Conditions, and Limitations Apply. Please visit americanexpress.com/benefitsguide for more details. Underwritten by Amex Assurance Company.
When Paying With Points Makes Sense
There are good reasons to use the points button. The best ones:
- Targeted promotions: Amazon periodically runs offers that discount an order when you use even one point from a linked card. Recent examples include 50% off with Chase points up to a $15 discount and 40% off with Capital One points up to $20. These beat any cash redemption, so check your Amazon account for them.
- Flights through Amex Travel: American Express says Membership Rewards points are worth 1 cent each on eligible flights booked through Amex Travel, versus 0.7 cents on prepaid hotels.
- Points-back benefits: The Business Platinum Card® from American Express returns 35% of points on eligible Pay with Points flights with your selected airline, up to 1 million points back per calendar year. That lifts the effective value to about 1.54 cents per point.
Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more. Eligibility and Benefit level varies by Card. Terms, Conditions, and Limitations Apply. Please visit americanexpress.com/benefitsguide for more details. Underwritten by Amex Assurance Company.
Pay With Points vs. Transferring to Travel Partners
Transferable points can be worth far more than any checkout rate when you move them to an airline or hotel program. The Points Guy priced a business class flight from Boston to Paris at $2,590 in cash. The same seat cost 60,000 Air France-KLM Flying Blue miles plus $377.10 in taxes and fees, or about 3.7 cents per point after fees.
Covering that same fare with Amex Pay with Points at 1 cent each would take 259,000 points. That is more than four times as many points for the same seat.
Transfers take more work and are generally irreversible, so find the award seat first, then move your points. If you do not travel much, a clean cash redemption often beats both options.
Can You Pay With Points and a Card at the Same Time?
Usually, yes. Amazon lets you choose how many points to apply and charges the rest to your linked card. Amex Pay with Points works the same way on eligible travel, with a minimum redemption of 5,000 points and the balance charged to your American Express card. Splitting is useful for grabbing a promotion that needs only a small number of points. Apply the minimum, get the discount, and let your card earn rewards on the rest. It also helps when you want to keep a points balance for a future trip. Cover a small slice of a purchase with points, charge the rest, and your balance stays intact for a transfer that could be worth several times more.
How to Decide at Checkout
A quick test works for almost every purchase:
- Find the cash value. For most programs, a statement credit or deposit is worth about 1 cent per point.
- Compare the checkout rate. If paying with points returns less than that, cash out instead and pay with a card.
- Look for a promotion. A targeted discount can flip the answer in favor of points.
- Pick the right card for the cash portion. Whatever you do not cover with points should go on the card that earns the most for that purchase.
If you would rather not run this math every time, a simple base card helps. See why we like a three-card cash back setup for keeping everyday rewards high without the guesswork.
Final Thoughts
Paying with points is fine for a promotion or a trip you cannot book any other way. For everyday shopping, it usually trades your points at a discount and skips the rewards you would have earned on a card. Check the rate against 1 cent per point, and when it falls short, pay with your best card instead.
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Editorial Disclosure: Opinions expressed here are those of Kudos alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
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