How To Redeem Southwest Rapid Rewards Points For Best Value

I don’t write all that much about the Southwest Rapid Rewards program. It’s a program that many people find to be valuable, though there aren’t that many tricks to getting outsized value. That’s because Rapid Rewards is a revenue based frequent flyer program, so you typically get roughly the same value for your points toward flights, regardless of how you redeem.

In this post I wanted to cover the basics of redeeming Southwest Rapid Rewards points, and talk about if there are better ways than others to redeem these points.

Southwest Rapid Rewards points are easy to earn

Southwest Rapid Rewards points are super easy to earn, even beyond crediting Southwest flights to the program. For one, Southwest has several lucrative co-branded credit cards, which can help you rack up points quickly. These cards include the following:

• Southwest Rapid Rewards® Plus Credit Card (review)
• Southwest Rapid Rewards® Premier Credit Card (review)
• Southwest Rapid Rewards® Priority Card (review)
• Southwest® Rapid Rewards® Premier Business Credit Card (review)
• Southwest® Rapid Rewards® Performance Business Credit Card (review)

On top of that, Southwest Rapid Rewards is transfer partners with Chase Ultimate Rewards, meaning you can transfer over points at a 1:1 ratio. This means you could transfer over points from cards like the following:

• Chase Sapphire Reserve® (review)
• Chase Sapphire Preferred® (review)
• Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card (review)

Now, a bit later I’ll talk about the value of actually transferring Chase Ultimate Rewards points to Southwest Rapid Rewards, as it’s not necessarily the best deal.

Southwest Rapid Rewards points don’t expire

Southwest Rapid Rewards points don’t expire, regardless of any activity activity. That’s fantastic, since you never have to worry about keeping your account active in order to prevent points from expiring.

Southwest Rapid Rewards awards have no change or cancelation fees

If you’re redeeming Southwest Rapid Rewards points, there are no change or cancelation fees if you need to make changes to your ticket. If you cancel, you can have your points redeposited in your Rapid Rewards account, and can have your taxes and fees refunded.

How to redeem Southwest Rapid Rewards points

Redeeming Southwest Rapid Rewards points efficiently is easy — just use them to cover the full cost of a flight. Southwest award flights can be booked directly on Southwest’s website, for any seat on a plane.

The value you get per point is pretty consistent, within a small range. I just pulled up three different kinds of tickets, in order to give an example of the current value of these points.

For example, take a one-way flight from Los Angeles to Honolulu:

• A Wanna Get Away ticket costs $175, or you can pay 12,281 points plus $5.60, giving you a value of around 1.38 cents per point
• A Business Select ticket costs $305, or you can pay 23,068 points plus $5.60, giving you a value of around 1.30 cents per point

Next, take a one-way flight from Baltimore to Las Vegas:

• A Wanna Get Away ticket costs $196, or you can pay 13,966 points plus $5.60, giving you a value of around 1.36 cents per point
• A Business Select ticket costs $326, or you can pay 24,003 points plus $5.60, giving you a value of around 1.33 cents per point

Lastly, let’s look at an international itinerary, and take a one-way flight from Tampa to Liberia:

• A Wanna Get Away ticket costs $411, or you can pay 29,465 points plus $24.05, giving you a value of around 1.31 cents per point
• A Business Select ticket costs $531, or you can pay 39,425 points plus $24.05, giving you a value of around 1.29 cents per point

As you can see, all these redemption options give you roughly the same value. It doesn’t matter if you’re booking Wanna Get Away or Business Select, or if you’re traveling domestically or internationally. You’re getting somewhere in the range of 1.29 cents to 1.38 cents per point.

It can’t hurt to try to redeem so that you’re at the higher end of that range, but those are fairly insignificant differences. In my experience, domestic Wanna Get Away fares often offer the best value for your points, but the difference is marginal.

The above is how you should redeem your Southwest Rapid Rewards points, though let me address a few other scenarios.

Southwest Cash + Points isn’t a good deal

Southwest Rapid Rewards recently introduced Cash + Points, whereby you can redeem points to partially pay for the cost of a ticket. While that flexibility sounds exciting, I’d highly recommend avoiding this redemption opportunity. That’s because you get only somewhere around 0.6 cents of value per point when redeeming this way, which is less than half the value you get if redeeming outright for a ticket.

So if you don’t have enough Rapid Rewards points for an award ticket, just keep accruing them, rather than redeeming them with Cash + Points.

Think twice before making a Chase points transfer

Chase Ultimate Rewards is an incredibly popular points currency, so many people may be tempted to transfer points at a 1:1 ratio to Southwest Rapid Rewards, to pay for tickets that way. However, I’d recommend thinking twice before doing that.

That’s because you can also redeem Chase Ultimate Rewards points toward the cost of a ticket by booking directly through the Chase Travel Portal, and in many cases that will be a better value:

• If you have the Chase Sapphire Reserve®, then you can redeem for 1.5 cents each toward travel purchases
• If you have the Chase Sapphire Preferred® or Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card, then you can redeem for 1.25 cents each toward travel purchases

Just to give a concrete example, take the Southwest flight from Los Angeles to Honolulu that I shared above, with the below pricing on Southwest’s website.

If you have the Chase Sapphire Reserve® and instead book the flights with points directly through the Chase Travel Portal, below is what the pricing would be like.

Rather than redeeming 12,281 Southwest Rapid Rewards points and paying $5.60, you could instead redeem just 11,614 points through Chase, and not pay taxes. Best of all, you’d even earn points for the flight, since you’re booking a revenue ticket (and offsetting the cost with points), rather than booking an award through Rapid Rewards.

The moral of the story is that if you have the Chase Sapphire Reserve®, you’re almost always better off booking through the Chase Travel Portal. Meanwhile if you have the Chase Sapphire Preferred®, you’ll want to compare redemption values more closely.

Don’t redeem Southwest points for gift cards

Southwest Rapid Rewards lets you redeem your points for gift cards with a variety of retailers, but it absolutely isn’t an efficient use of points. You can generally expect that you’ll get somewhere around 0.5 cents of value per Rapid Rewards point, which is well under half of the value that you’d get if redeeming toward flights.

Only consider this if you have a stash of Southwest points, and have decided (for whatever reason) that you’re never flying Southwest again, and don’t even have others you want to redeem your points for.

Don’t redeem Southwest points for hotels & rental cars

Southwest Rapid Rewards also lets you redeem your points for hotel stays and rental cars, and this has dynamic pricing. What’s consistent is that it doesn’t represent a very good value.

For example, take a night at the Aloft Tampa Downtown, where you can redeem 27,100 Rapid Rewards points for your stay, including all taxes and fees.

If you booked this directly through Marriott, the night would cost $211, including all taxes and fees. This doesn’t even account for the fact that there are much lower rates available through Marriott, but I’m just doing an apples-to-apples comparison of the flexible, publicly available rates.

You’re getting well under a cent of value per point here, which compares quite unfavorably to flight redemptions.

Get more value with Southwest Companion Pass

This is more a general tip for maximizing value on Southwest, rather than something specific to points. To get the most value for travel on Southwest, try to earn Companion Pass, which is one of the best deals in travel. With this, you can have a companion fly with you while paying only the taxes and fees, regardless of whether you’re paying cash or redeeming points.

You can largely unlock Companion Pass through credit cards, so there’s lots of potential value to be had here. You’re potentially doubling the value of your Rapid Rewards points, which is pretty awesome.

Bottom line

Southwest Rapid Rewards is a straightforward, revenue based frequent flyer program, which makes redeeming points simple. You’ll generally find that each Rapid Rewards point gets you around 1.3 cents of value toward the cost of a ticket, regardless of the type of fare you’re booking, where you’re headed, etc. The differences in redemption value between itineraries is minor.

There are other ways to redeem Southwest Rapid Rewards points, ranging from Cash + Points, to gift cards, to hotels, to rental cars, but they consistently represent poor value.

The other major thing to consider is that if you have Chase Ultimate Rewards points, you might be better off redeeming them directly toward the cost of a Southwest ticket through the Chase Travel Portal, rather than transferring them to Rapid Rewards. You’ll potentially get more value per point, and will even accrue rewards for your ticket.

What’s your take on the best way to redeem Southwest Rapid Rewards points?