Capital One just made huge moves in the travel rewards world to become a more legitimate competitor. These new changes are going to make cards like the Capital One Venture and the Capital One Spark Business Credit Card much stronger contenders going forward and are going to open up a lot more redemption possibilities for many people. Here’s what you need to know about the changes.
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Recent upgrades
Capital One upgraded the Venture by making some changes recently. They added the ability to earn 10 times the points with Hotels.com, which was stackable with the rewards program of Hotels.com. And then they added a $100 TSA Pre-Check/Global Entry credit to the card.
These were decent improvements but nothing that was game changing. However the changes that are about to happen are most definitely game changing.
Beginning next month, Capital One is going to have airline transfer partners for not only the Venture but also its business counterpart, the Capital One Spark Miles card.
And not just that, but the transfer partners are going to be very high quality transfer partners that overlap with some of the other major rewards programs like American Express, Chase, and Citibank.
This is huge news and will open up new ways to earn and redeem lots of miles in the future. Considering all the new restrictions popping up with other issuers making it harder to earn miles, these changes couldn’t have come at a better time.
New Capital One transfer partners
Here are what the new airline partners are going to be broken down by alliance. Keep in mind that Capital One has already stated that they would be adding more transfer partners in the future so this is just the initial lineup of partners.
Star Alliance
- Aeroplan
- Avianca
- EVA Air
SkyTeam
- Aeromexico
- Alitalia
- Flying Blue
oneworld
- Cathay Pacific
- Finnair
- Qantas
- Qatar Airways
No Alliance
- Etihad
- Hainan Airlines
Several of these programs are very attractive including: Aeroplan, Avianca, EVA, Cathay Pacific, Flying Blue and Etihad. These give you some solid ways to redeem on partners like United, American, and Delta so all three legacy carriers are covered with the new partners.
What is the transfer ratio?
The million dollar question is what will the transfer ratio be for these programs? Luckily, we are not left in limbo on this question.
All of your points will be able to be transferred at a ratio of 2 Capital One miles to 1.5 frequent flyer miles.
The Venture and Spark Miles cards don’t have bonus categories but they earn 2 miles per dollar spent, so this is like earning 1.5 miles per dollar spent for these programs which is pretty competitive. But even better, it means that your early spend bonuses will be worth more since you can use your miles for more valuable redemptions than the standard 2% back on travel purchases that these card offer.
Perfect timing
Right now there are increased offers for the Venture and Spark Miles cards that are very high.
For example, the Capital One Spark Miles for Business is offering up to 200,000 miles. You’ll get a bonus of 50,000 miles when you spend $5,000 in the first 3 months of opening your account and you can earn 150,000 miles when you spend $50,000 within the first 6 months.
If you hit the spend requirement, then you’d net a total of 300,000 Capital One miles which would come out to 225,000 airline miles, a fantastic return that you could put to use with all of these new travel partners.
Note: The Capital One Spark Miles for Business will report to your personal credit report so if you’re under 5/24, you should probably take a pass on it for now.
There’s also a high offer out for the Capital One Venture which comes with 75,000 Venture miles when you spend $5,000 within the first three months. 75,000 Capital One miles comes out to 56,250 airline miles.
So all of a sudden, we all have a new way to build up our frequent flyer accounts with some quality programs via the Capital One cards, which is very exciting.
Overlapping partners with other programs
There are a lot of overlapping partners now between Capital One and the other major rewards programs and you might be wondering how they overlap. So here’s a look at the common transfer partners between Capital One and Amex, Chase, and Citi.
Amex Membership Rewards
- Aeroplan
- Avianca
- Aeromexico
- Alitalia
- Cathay Pacific
- Etihad
- Flying Blue
Chase Ultimate Rewards
- Flying Blue
Citibank ThankYou Points
- Avianca
- Cathay Pacific
- EVA Air
- Flying Blue
- Qantas
- Qatar
- Etihad
Questions to be answered
We still need to know what the transfer times will be with these partners — hopefully they will be reasonable. I’m also waiting to find out which other Capital One cards will allow for points to be transferred to these travel partners.
At the moment, I’m still going to prioritize my everyday spend with my Amex and Chase cards, but if a card like the Savor were to join in on the transferability train, that could make things interesting.
Final word
It’s now going to be easier to build balances with quality programs like Aeroplan, Avianca, and Cathay Pacific among other programs. With some of these high early spend offers for the Capital One cards, it’s also an exciting time to earn more miles for these programs. It will be interesting to see which travel partners get added in the future and how these transfer times end up getting worked out but I’m optimistic.
Daniel Gillaspia is the Founder of UponArriving.com and the credit card app, WalletFlo. He is a former attorney turned travel expert covering destinations along with TSA, airline, and hotel policies. Since 2014, his content has been featured in publications such as National Geographic, Smithsonian Magazine, and CNBC. Read my bio.
