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All four major hotel chains in the miles & points world issue awards or certificates that allow the bearer to book a free night* at properties in their portfolio, but Hyatt’s free night awards can be little more complicated than the awards issued by Marriott, IHG, and Hilton, so this article will, hopefully, clear up any confusion.
*It’s not always entirely free as some properties in the Marriott Bonvoy and IHG One Rewards programs charge resort/destination fees on these bookings.
Free nights vs free night awards
For the avoidance of doubt and confusion, let’s get one thing clear from the start:
A ‘free night‘ booking with Hyatt is a booking that’s made with World of Hyatt points.
A ‘free night award‘ booking with Hyatt is a booking made with a benefit that can be earned through a co-branded credit card, through Hyatt’s Milestone Rewards, and through the Hyatt Brand Explorer promotion (more on all of these a little later).
It would be a lot easier if Hyatt referred to these awards as ‘free night certificates’, but as it doesn’t, we’re stuck with what can be confusing terminology.
Importantly, however, bookings made using Free Night Awards are treated by Hyatt in the same way as bookings made with World of Hyatt points, so bookings made with these awards give World of Hyatt elite members access to most of their usual benefits (refer to the ‘restrictions to know about’ section that comes later in this article to see the exceptions).
Also, because Hyatt treats Free Night Award bookings in the same way as bookings made with points, a World of Hyatt Member making a booking with one of these awards is exempt from any destination/resort fees that the property being booked may otherwise charge.
Note: All properties in the World of Hyatt (including Mr & Mrs Smith properties) can be booked by using a Free Night Award that covers the World of Hyatt category in which they sit.
The four types of awards
Hyatt offers 4 types of free night awards:
- An award which can be used for a free night at properties in Categories 1 through 4 and which is valid for 180 days from the date of issue.
- An award which can be used for a free night at properties in Categories 1 through 4 and which is valid for 12 months from the date of issue.
- An award which can be used for a free night at properties in Categories 1 through 7 and which is valid for 180 days from the date of issue.
- An ‘Ultimate Free Night Award’ which can be used for a free night at properties in Categories 1 through 8, and Categories A through F (all-inclusive resorts or Miraval resorts) which is valid for 180 days from the date of issue*.
*This award was introduced at the start of 2024.
How to earn Hyatt free night awards
Through Hyatt’s Milestone Rewards
Hyatt’s Milestone Rewards are the bonus benefits offered to World of Hyatt members when they hit predefined targets by crediting elite qualifying nights to their World of Hyatt accounts or by earning a preset number of base points.
All elite night credits earned by a member will count towards a Milestone Reward, so even credits handed out by Hyatt’s co-branded credit card will get a World of Hyatt member closer to their next milestone.
Hyatt’s Free Night Awards can be earned at four different milestones:
World of Hyatt members who credit 30 nights to their account or who earn 50,000 base points are rewarded with a Category 1 – 4 free night award which is valid for 180 days from the date of issue.
World of Hyatt members who credit 60 nights to their account or who earn 100,000 base points are rewarded with a Category 1 – 7 free night award which is valid for 180 days from the date of issue.
World of Hyatt members who credit 100 nights to their account are rewarded with a Category 1 – 7 free night award which is valid for 180 days from the date of issue.
World of Hyatt members who credit 150 nights to their account are rewarded with an ‘Ultimate Free Night Award’ which can be used in exchange for a free night in a standard room at any Category 1-8 hotel or Category A-F all-inclusive resort or Miraval resort that participates in the World of Hyatt program. This award is valid for 180 days from the date of issue.
Through the World of Hyatt credit card
There are two World of Hyatt co-branded credit cards – a consumer card and a business card – but only the consumer card gives cardholders a free night award every year as part of its benefits package and allows cardholders to earn a second free night award though spending put on their card.
The World of Hyatt credit card gives cardholders a Category 1 – 4 free night award on their card anniversary every year. This award is valid for 12 months from the date of issue.
Holders of the World of Hyatt credit card who spend $15,000 (net) on their card in a calendar year are given a Category 1 – 4 free night award which is valid for 12 months from the date of issue.
Through the Hyatt Brand Explorer promotion
The Brand Explorer promotion is promotion that Hyatt uses to encourage guests to try out all of the various brands that come under the World of Hyatt umbrella.
For every five different Hyatt brands that a World of Hyatt member stays at, they are given a Category 1 – 4 free night award which is valid for 12 months from the date of issue.
If you view your Hyatt account on desktop or mobile, you should see a tab or link to the Brand Explorer promotion …
… and from there, you should see something that resembles the image below and which shows which brands you have checked off the ever growing list of brands that Hyatt operates.
Note: The Hyatt Brand Explore promotion doesn’t reset every year, so once you’ve checked off a brand it remains checked (presumably until you check off the whole lot).
By holding World of Hyatt Lifetime Globalist status
World of Hyatt members who hold lifetime Globalist elite status are given a Category 1 – 7 free night award (valid for 180 days from the date of issue) every year as part of their benefits package. This award is deposited into an eligible member’s account at the start of every year.
How to use Hyatt Free Night Awards
Before moving on to the mechanism of actually using a Hyatt Free Night Award, there are a couple of key things about these awards that you need to keep in mind:
Firstly, as long as an entry-level room is bookable with World of Hyatt points and the room is at a property that sits in a World of Hyatt category covered by your Free Night Award, that room should be bookable with your Free Night Award.
Secondly, unlike the free night certificates issued by Marriott and IHG, these awards don’t come with a points value, so as long as you’re trying to make a booking at a property that’s covered by your Free Night Award, you should be able to book an entry-level room at that property regardless of what ‘season’ you’re booking in (i.e. of-peak, standard, and peak season have no meaning when it comes to Hyatt Free Night Awards).
Ok, now let’s move on to actually using the award(s) you’ve earned.
If you’ve earned one or more Free Night Awards, you’ll find them in your Word of Hyatt account (login –> go to your account –> click on ‘awards’), but you don’t actually need to view what awards you have to use them.
To make a booking with a Free Night Award, conduct a search on Hyatt.com or via the Hyatt app as you would if you were making a points booking (i.e. make sure the ‘use points’/’show World of Hyatt points & awards’ option is selected before searching).
When the results of your search appear, you can either scroll down the list of properties while making note of which ones fall into a category that your award covers …
… of you could use the filters that both Hyatt’s desktop site and app offer to restrict your results to properties at which your Free Night Award can be used.
If a property that you select from your list of results is a property in a World of Hyatt category covered by your Free Night Award and has an entry-level room that bookable with points on the date you selected, you will be given the option to book that room with points or with your award.
On the desktop site, this will look something like this:
The booking shown in the image above was being made using a Category 1 – 4 certificate and note how even though the booking was being made during peak season (i.e. the Category 4 property cost 18,000 points per night), the award could still be used.
A reason to be careful
Using a Hyatt Free Night Award online is remarkably simple, but if you have multiple Free Night Awards in your account, you may be better off making your booking by phone.
Why? Because two issues can arise when it comes to redeeming awards from accounts with multiple awards.
The first issue, which is rare, can occur when an account holds two awards of the same kind (e.g. 2 x Cat 1-4 awards) with different expiration dates.
Usually (almost always), the Hyatt booking engine will use the award that’s closest to its expiration date to make a 1-night booking, but there have been reported instances when that hasn’t been the case.
If you have more than one Free Night Award in your account, keep an eye on which one gets pulled to make sure that you use the older award first.
The second issue, which is less rare than the first, can occur when an account holds two different types of awards (e.g. 1 x Cat 1-4 award and 1 x Cat 1-7 award) and the holder of these awards wants to use an award to book an property in Category 4 (for example).
In most cases such as this one, the award holder would, presumably, like to use the Cat 1-4 award to make this booking and not the Cat 1-7 award, but the Hyatt booking engine has been known to do the opposite.
Clearly this is sub-optimal, and this is another reason you should be careful to check what Free Night Award has been pulled if you find yourself in this position.
If you encounter either of these issues and find that the booking engine has pulled the wrong award to cover your reservation, cancel the booking (which will return the award to your account within minutes) and call the reservation line where an agent should be able to help you out.
Gifting Hyatt Free Night Awards
As part of the changes made to the World of Hyatt at the beginning of 2024, members with Free Nights Awards in their accounts can gift these awards to another World of Hyatt member.
To do this, log into the World of Hyatt and access your account.
In your account, click on ‘Awards’ and bring up a view of the awards that you currently hold.
Click on the three dots to the right of the award that you would like to gift, and the option to gift the award will appear (you’ll need the recipient’s World of Hyatt membership number and surname).
Restrictions to know about
- Once an award expires, that’s usually it. Hyatt doesn’t extend the validity of its Free Night Awards so the award will disappear from a World of Hyatt account once it expires.
- World of Hyatt Free Night Awards cannot be topped up with World of Hyatt points, so there’s no way to use a Cat. 1-4 Free Night Award, for example, at a property in Category 5 or higher.
- Suite upgrade awards and club access awards cannot be used on a stay made with a Free Night Award.
- All Free Night Awards must be redeemed for a reservation with a checkout date before the award expires (i.e. you cannot check-in on the day the award expires).
- If you want to use multiple Free Night Awards on a single reservation, you’ll need to use the ‘Pay My Way’ feature on the Hyatt website (this feature allows World of Hyatt members to pay for stays with a combination of points, awards, and cash).
Exceptions to expired awards
Historically, some Hyatt elites (mostly Globalist elites) have been able to request points in lieu of an expired Free Night award, but as this isn’t a stated rule or benefit, there is no guarantee that this will be an option that’s open to you.
Seeing if you can get some points out of a Free Night Award after it has expired* will require you to put in a call in to a World of Hyatt representative or to email/call a Hyatt Concierge (if you have one) within 90 days of an award expiring.
The number of points you’re offered (if any) will depend on what certificate you’re exchanging, with holders of Category 1 – 4 certificates usually offered 10,000 points and holders of Category 1 – 7 certificates usually offered 20,000 points.
*Be aware that Hyatt representatives are not able to convert valid certificates into points, so you’ll have to wait until your certificate has expired before making a request (you may not be able to see the expired certificate in your account, but the phone agents/concierge team can).
Bottom line
The World of Hyatt program offers four types of Free Night Awards (not be confused with free nights that are booked with points) that are given out to Lifetime Globalist elites and which can be earned through the World of Hyatt credit card, through Hyatt’s Milestone Rewards, and through the Hyatt Brand Explorer promotion.
How much value you can extract out of these awards will depend on your travel patterns and the types of property at which you’re happy to stay, but a good way to make sure that you don’t miss out on any value is by making sure you know the rules that govern the use of these awards.
Let us know in the comments if you think that we’ve missed anything out or if you have any questions.
