Chase Sapphire Preferred’s Sky-High 100,000-Point Welcome Bonus

One of the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card’s (see rates and fees) best welcome bonuses has returned.

This limited time offer is ending soon, but right now you can earn 100,000 bonus points after spending $5,000 on purchases during the first three months from account opening. At face value, this new bonus is worth 67% more than the previous welcome offer, but that’s just scratching the surface of its potential. Redeemed the right way, these bonus points can net you more than $1,250 in travel.

If you’ve ever considered getting the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card, now is the best time to apply as we don’t know how long this welcome bonus will last.

The standard Chase Sapphire Preferred Card offer is for 60,000 points after new cardholders spend $4,000 during the first three months from account opening. With this new welcome bonus, you can earn an additional 40,000 points with only a $1,000 increase in the minimum spending requirement.

These extra Chase points are worth $400 in cash as a statement credit or direct deposit, and they’re worth even more if you use them to pay for travel booked through Chase Travel^SM. With the Sapphire Preferred, your points are worth 25% more for Chase Travel bookings (1.25 cents), so you can use 40,000 points to pay for an additional $500 in travel.

And that’s just the straightforward redemptions. The Sapphire Preferred also gives you the option to transfer Ultimate Rewards points to any of Chase’s partner travel loyalty programs at a 1:1 ratio. As you’ll see, this can take an already great welcome bonus and push its value into the stratosphere.

Being able to transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to travel loyalty programs lets you wring the most value from those points by booking luxury hotels and premium award flights. And with 100,000 bonus points to spend, you’ll have more options than ever to travel in style while saving money.

For example, on select routes, one-way business-class award flights from the U.S. to Spain on Iberia cost 34,000 miles on off-peak dates and 50,000 points on peak dates. These prices apply to routes from New York, Boston, Washington D.C and Chicago to Madrid, and certain flights to Barcelona.

With the Sapphire Preferred’s previous 60,000-point bonus, you could only book a single, one-way business-class award flight from the U.S. to Europe with Iberia. The 100,000-point bonus allows you to book a round-trip business-class award flight or up to three one-way flights with Iberia. The cash price for each of these awards is typically several thousand dollars.

At the time of writing, we found a round-trip business class award from Boston to Madrid for 84,000 points. One leg is on an off-peak date and the other is on a peak date.

Paying cash for the same flight costs over $8,000.

This is a stunning deal, even accounting for the award flight’s roughly $250 in taxes and fees. Instead of getting one cent point for cash back or 1.25 cents per point if you booked these flights through Chase Travel, you’re getting over nine cents per point in value.

You’ll need a good to excellent credit score to qualify for this card — if your FICO score is less than 670, you probably won’t make the cut. For the best odds, you’ll want a 700+ score. In addition to the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card’s credit score requirement, there are other restrictions you should be aware of before you apply.

You aren’t eligible for the Sapphire Preferred if you:

• Currently have any version of the Sapphire card (being an authorized user on someone else’s account doesn’t disqualify you)
• Have earned a welcome offer from any Sapphire card in the previous 48 months (that’s 48 months from when you earned the new cardmember bonus, not when the account was opened or closed)

You’ll also need to navigate the unofficial Chase 5/24 rule. If you’ve opened five or more credit cards from any card issuer in the past 24 months, you’re much less likely to be approved for most Chase credit cards. One caveat is that business credit cards typically don’t add to your 5/24 count, as long as they don’t appear on your personal credit report.

To find a better welcome bonus than what the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is offering, you’ll need to look for a business credit card (which are harder to qualify for) or a premium credit card (which will have a more expensive annual fee). Plus, most cards that offer bigger intro bonuses have much higher spending requirements.

Several travel credit cards earn flexible travel rewards and have the same $95 annual fee as the Sapphire Preferred. The Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card has a limited-time offer that’s close in value. You can earn 75,000 miles after spending $4,000 on purchases in the first three months from account opening. You’ll also receive a $250 Capital One Travel credit to use within your first cardholder year.

The Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card’s bonus is worth at least $1,000 in travel, but the $250 travel credit expires, which makes the bonus less flexible. Earning 25,000 additional transferrable points with the Sapphire Preferred gives you more options and can be far more valuable. However, it is easier to earn the Venture Rewards Card’s welcome bonus because it has a lower spending requirement.

Normally, the welcome bonuses you can earn with the Wells Fargo Autograph Journey℠ Card or Citi Strata Premier℠ Card (both have $95 annual fees), match or exceed the Sapphire Preferred’s standard offer. Right now, that’s not the case.

These cards also earn transferrable rewards and offer similar perks, and they have lower minimum spending requirements. But you’re getting much less value upfront compared to the Sapphire Preferred’s limited-time welcome bonus. As long as you can manage the Sapphire Preferred’s elevated spending requirement, it’s a clearly better option for most people right now.

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