IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards: How To Earn Suite Upgrades & Lounge Access

There are pros and cons to each hotel loyalty program. Among the major hotel loyalty programs, World of Hyatt is my favorite, followed by Marriott Bonvoy, followed by Hilton Honors, followed by IHG One Rewards.

There’s still a lot of value with IHG One Rewards, in particular with the Milestone Rewards program, which allows you to select rewards when passing certain thresholds. In this post, I’d like to take a closer look at everything you need to know about how the program works.

What are IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards?

IHG One Rewards offers the Milestone Rewards program, whereby you receive certain additional perks for every 10 elite night credits that you earn in a calendar year, ranging all the way from 20 elite nights to 100 elite nights. Potential perks include confirmed suite upgrades, club lounge access, food & beverage credits, and more.

This is intended to give members flexibility, because at each threshold there’s a choice of benefits that members can choose from, based on what’s most valuable for their travel patterns. It’s also intended to somewhat decouple status and perks, for situations where the hotel group might “give away” status, but doesn’t necessarily want to give away the most valuable perks.

These benefits are separate from the standard elite perks offered for IHG One Rewards Platinum and IHG One Rewards Diamond status, and can really take the value of your elite status to the next level. For what it’s worth, this program is a similar concept to World of Hyatt’s Milestone Rewards program.

How do you earn IHG One Rewards elite night credits?

The most common way to earn elite night credits with IHG One Rewards is to just stay at IHG properties, as you earn one elite night for every night stayed. That’s pretty straightforward. On top of that, though, you can now earn elite night credits with IHG’s co-branded credit cards.

IHG’s co-branded credit cards do offer some level of status automatically, though that status doesn’t automatically come with the corresponding elite night credits. However, the four cards do additionally award elite night credits, and those can be stacked across cards.

The four cards include The Brand New IHG One Rewards Premier Select Credit Card (learn more), The New IHG One Rewards Premier Credit Card (learn more), The New IHG One Rewards Credit Card (learn more), and The New IHG One Rewards Business Credit Card (learn more). When it comes to the ability to earn elite night credits with credit cards:

• The $350 annual fee IHG One Rewards Premier Select Card offers 20 elite nights annually, plus two elite nights for every $5K spent
• The $200 annual fee IHG One Rewards Business Card offers 15 elite nights annually, plus two elite nights for every $5K spent
• The $150 annual fee IHG One Rewards Premier Card offers 15 elite nights annually, plus two elite nights for every $5K spent
• The $0 annual fee IHG One Rewards Card offers five elite nights annually

In other words, status aside, having two credit cards could potentially earn you 35 elite nights, having three credit cards could earn you a total of 50 elite nights, etc.

What are the IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards benefits?

There are different Milestone Rewards benefits for every 10 elite nights you earn in a calendar year, ranging from 20 elite nights to 100 elite nights. Even award nights count toward this total, as do credit card elite night credits, as noted above. However, rollover nights (from over qualifying for status in a previous year) don’t count toward this.

With that out of the way, let’s take a look at IHG Milestone Rewards thresholds…

IHG Milestone Rewards at 20 elite nights

At 20 elite nights, IHG One Rewards members can choose one of the following Milestone Rewards perks:

• 5,000 bonus IHG points
• Two food & beverage rewards worth $20 each
• A confirmable suite upgrade

IHG Milestone Rewards at 30 elite nights

At 30 elite nights, IHG One Rewards members can choose one of the following Milestone Rewards perks:

• 5,000 bonus IHG points
• Two food & beverage rewards worth $20 each

IHG Milestone Rewards at 40 elite nights

At 40 elite nights, IHG One Rewards members can choose two of the following Milestone Rewards perks:

• 10,000 bonus IHG points
• Five food & beverage rewards worth $20 each
• A confirmable suite upgrade (limit one)
• An annual lounge membership (limit one)

IHG Milestone Rewards at 50 & 60 elite nights

At both 50 and 60 elite nights, IHG One Rewards members can choose one of the following Milestone Rewards perks:

• 10,000 bonus IHG points
• Five food & beverage rewards worth $20 each

IHG Milestone Rewards at 70 elite nights

At 70 elite nights, IHG One Rewards members can choose two of the following Milestone Rewards perks:

• 10,000 bonus IHG points
• Five food & beverage rewards worth $20 each
• Two confirmable suite upgrades (limit one)
• An annual lounge membership (limit one)

IHG Milestone Rewards at 80, 90, & 100 elite nights

At 80, 90, and 100 elite nights, IHG One Rewards members can choose one of the following Milestone Rewards perks:

• 10,000 bonus IHG points
• Five food & beverage rewards worth $20 each

When should you select IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards?

When you qualify for Milestone Rewards, you should receive an email from IHG informing you of this, with a link to make the selection. It typically has the subject line “You just unlocked a Milestone Reward.” You can also see your progress toward reaching the next Milestone Rewards perks by logging into your IHG account through the website or app.

It also pays to time your selection of Milestone Rewards:

• You should select the annual lounge membership and bonus points immediately, if those are the choices you want, since there’s no downside (the lounge membership has the same expiration no matter what, and points don’t expire for IHG elite members)
• Since the suite upgrade awards and food & beverage credits are valid for 12 months from when they’re issued, I’d recommend waiting as long as you can to make the selection, so that you potentially have the longest window to use them

IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards benefits explained

All of this probably sounds great, but how do all of these IHG Milestone Rewards benefits work in terms of logistics? What can confirmed suite upgrades be used for, how does the lounge membership work, how can you redeem food & beverage credits, etc.? There are four different kinds of perks here, so let’s go over the details of each of these.

IHG confirmed suite upgrades

IHG One Rewards has a surprisingly competitive confirmed suite upgrade concept. Here’s how this works:

• The suite upgrades can be used to confirm a suite upgrade for a stay of up to five nights
• The suite upgrades can only be applied on cash stays when booking eligible rates, or on award nights booked with points
• The suite upgrades can’t be applied to group rates, stays using IHG free night awards or InterContinental Ambassador weekend night awards, employee rates, or stays booked through online travel agencies
• The suite upgrades can’t be used at select brands, including Avid, Atwell Suites, IHG Army Hotels, IHG Residences, Ruby, Iberostar, and Macao Alliance Resorts
• The suite upgrades can be applied by calling IHG One Rewards customer support between 14 days and one day prior to arrival
• The upgrade can be up to a standard suite, though if that’s not available you can confirm an upgrade to another premium room that’s not a suite
• The suite upgrades are valid for 12 months from when they’re issued, and are non-transferable
• The suite upgrades can’t be stacked with guaranteed upgrade benefits, like InterContinental Ambassador perks
• Unfortunately there is no way to apply suite upgrades online, or to waitlist upgrades, though it’s possible that functionality will be added in the future

IHG annual lounge membership

While IHG One Rewards Diamond members receive complimentary breakfast, executive lounge access isn’t otherwise a benefit. The exception is if you select an IHG annual lounge membership as part of the Milestone Rewards program:

• An annual lounge membership gets you plus an extra guest staying in your room access to lounges for the entire year in which it’s earned, plus the following 12 months (in other words, if earned in October 2026, it would be valid through December 31, 2027)
• The annual lounge membership can be used to get club lounge access for an unlimited number of stays, regardless of whether you’re paying cash or redeeming points
• The annual lounge membership can be used at virtually any IHG property with a club lounge, including InterContinentals
• The annual lounge membership works on paid stays as well as points stays, as long as they are considered qualifying
• The annual lounge membership doesn’t guarantee any club level perks beyond access to the club lounge

IHG food & beverage rewards

Food & beverage credits are one of the IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards perks that can be selected at each threshold:

• The food & beverage credits will be posted digitally to your IHG account
• You can redeem food & beverage credits individually, or use multiple toward a single purchase
• Food & beverage credits are valid for 12 months from when they’re issued, and don’t retain any residual value
• Food & beverage credits aren’t valid at restaurants that do not allow charges to a guest’s room bill, gift shops, vending machines, or stays where a third party is paying
• Food & beverage credits are valid at all properties except IHG Army Hotels, select Six Senses locations, Iberostar, and Macao Alliance Resorts

IHG bonus points

At each Milestone Rewards threshold, IHG One Rewards members have the option to select bonus points. These will be posted to your account if selected. For context, based on my miles & points valuations, IHG points are worth 0.5 cents each, so to me 5,000 points are worth $25 (while 10,000 points are worth $50).

Which IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards are best?

If you ask me, the IHG One Rewards Milestone Rewards program is extremely lucrative. A few general thoughts:

• If you stay at IHG properties that have club lounges with any frequency, then selecting an annual club lounge membership should be a no-brainer, especially since you can choose this with just 40 elite nights
• Aside from the club lounge membership, the confirmed suite upgrades are definitely the perk with the most potential value
• If you’re trying to decide between the food & beverage credit and the IHG bonus points, I’d generally choose the food & beverage credit; for example, at the higher thresholds you could choose $100 worth of food & beverage credits or 10,000 bonus points (which I value at $50), so there’s an obvious winner there

IHG One Rewards Diamond status requires 70 elite nights per year, so let’s just look at the value of the Milestone Rewards if you were to earn 70 elite nights. If you selected the most “valuable” options (based on how I view it), you’d receive the following additional perks:

• Four confirmed suite upgrades
• An annual club lounge membership
• $340 worth of food & beverage vouchers

Executive lounge access, four confirmed suite upgrades (each valid for up to five nights), and $340 in food & beverage credits isn’t half bad on top of the standard elite perks, like free breakfast, room upgrades subject to availability, etc.

Bottom line

IHG One Rewards offers the Milestone Rewards program, whereby you can select additional perks for every 10 elite nights you earn in a calendar year. This is exciting, as it offers perks like club lounge access, confirmed suite upgrades, and more.

Just keep in mind that Milestone Rewards are tied to how many elite night credits you earn, rather than being tied to your status as such. Credit cards can help you earn elite status and elite night credits, and those are two separate metrics.

What’s your take on IHG’s Milestone Rewards program?