Hyatt offers a number of ways to earn free night certificates. For example, members can earn a Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate after earning 30 elite nights during a calendar year as part of the Milestone Rewards. It has long been possible for Hyatt Globalists to receive points for certain types of these certificates if they expired unused. Unfortunately, Hyatt has made a negative change in that regard, drastically reducing the number of points offered.
Hyatt has long offered Globalists points for some types of certificates after they have expired
There are several types of Hyatt free night certificates that members can earn, and a few different ways to earn them.
- Category 1-4 free night certificates
- Earned after completing 30 elite nights in a calendar year as part of Milestone Rewards
- Awarded each year after anniversary to World of Hyatt Credit Card holders (consumer version)
- Awarded after $15,000 in qualifying purchases in a calendar year on the World of Hyatt credit card
- Category 1-7 free night certificates
- Earned after completing 60 elite nights in a calendar year and 100 elite nights in a calendar year as part of Milestone Rewards
- Ultimate Free Night Certificate (Category 1-8)
- Earned after completing 150 elite nights in a calendar year
As a gesture of good customer service, Hyatt has long offered Globalists points for some certificates if they expired unused. Importantly, that option has not been available for certificates that come from the Hyatt credit card, but rather only from certificates that are earned through the World of Hyatt program (like the Milestone Rewards noted above).
Historically, Globalists could receive 10,000 points for an expired Hyatt 1-4 Free Night Certificate or 20,000 points for an expired Hyatt Category 1-7 Free Night Certificate (again, only for certificates issued from the Hyatt side, not those from credit cards, and only after they expired).
Sadly, we’ve received reports that Globalists are now only being given 5,000 points for an expiring Category 1-7 free night certificate and just 2,500 points for an expiring Category 1-4 free night certificate. Reports indicate that this is a change effective today (1/5/26).
If this is a true change, it would obviously be hugely disappointing for those who have soon-to-expire certificates. Getting just 5,000 points for an expired 1-7 free night certificate would be a massive downgrade.
On the other hand, the compensation provided here was never an official, published policy. Rather, it was a goodwill customer service gesture that offered something for the most loyal guests if they were unable to use their rewards. It probably wasn’t ever intended to be widespread, but it became a well-known policy nonetheless. That probably eventually made it more expensive than Hyatt intended when they created certificates that expire. There was never a guarantee that this would be offered. While a change to the unwritten policy is unfortunate, I suppose that’s the way unofficial policy goes.
The short expiration policy on Milestone Reward free nights is a big flaw
This really highlights the major flaw of Milestone Rewards: the free night certificates earned from Milestone Rewards expire too quickly.
My wife and I each reached important Milestone Awards near the end of 2025. In December, she earned a Category 1-4 free night certificate for reaching 30 elite nights, and I received a Category 1-7 free night certificate for reaching 60 elite nights. The super annoying thing about those milestone rewards is that they expire after 180 days, so we both ended up with free night certificates that expire at the beginning of June 2026.
The trouble is that we don’t have any significant travel planned during those six months. The kids will be in school and not on summer break until the final days of June. Even if we did have significant travel planned, most of our more significant trips are planned more than 6 months in advance. Having a six-month window to use-it-or-lose-it really reduces the utility of those rewards. I know that Hyatt’s explanation would be that they want to more closely connect the earning of the reward with the pleasure of using it (with the idea being that the closer to “instant gratification”, the more likely a member is to continue engaging with the program). There might be some science to the psychology there, but I still find the utility lacking. I’d be much more likely to be excited about my 60-night milestone reward if I were able to use it the following December for our annual Christmas-in-New York trip than I will be if I need to “waste” the certificate on a lower-category hotel for a nearby weekend away.
In the past, it has been nice to know that if we didn’t find a use within the 180-day period, we could at least get a decent number of points from Hyatt, making it worth chasing the Milestone Rewards. If the new point reimbursement rates are indeed a change, I would certainly value the milestones a bit less than in the past.
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The six-month expiration for the milestone awards is so frustrating, especially when you consider that the brand explorer ones are good for a whole year! I think someone who gets 30 nights in one year deserves just as much of a reward as someone who plays Hyatt Bingo over multiple years and may not even be that loyal to Hyatt? Last year, I realized I’d end my Hyatt year at 27 nights. I actually could use a Cat 1-4 for this fall, but it’d be expired by then. So, I didn’t bother to mattress run/put spend on my card to get there. Juice wasn’t worth the squeeze. One of the rare annoyances in this otherwise wonderful program.
I just earned a cat1-4 certificate and it has an expiration date of 1/5/27. Did Hyatt extend their certificates to expire in one year at the same time that they reduced the points for expired certificates?
Are you sure that was earned as milestone benefit and not a CC related Car 1-4? The ones from CC benefits (annual and spend related) have always had 1 year expiry. The one from 30 night milestone has 6 month expiry.
I learn something new every day! Thank you.
It was from cc spend and not a milestone award. I’m sure I’ve earned from cc spend before and maybe not noticed the one year expiration date?!? I hope I’m wrong, but in the past, it seems to me they all had six month expirations. Maybe I was confused because I received an email from Hyatt for hitting a milestone at the same time I had hit the spending on the credit card.
CC ones have always had 1 year expiration, as far as I remember.
Wahhh call the wahhhmbulance
With two certs expiring in February and no travel plans, should I just use them on a hometown mattress run? I’m guessing I won’t be compensated as a lowly Discoverist if I allow them to expire.
I am having a hard time finding a valuable use for cat 1-4 certs. I never want to waste the cert on a property that only costs 5,000 points but I’m not going to find a good use unless I plan a whole trip around them. Part of the problem is all of the new rebates with CSR and Amex Platinum. I’m planning on cancelling my Chase Hyatt card when the AF comes due.
Not unless you are on your way to trying to qualify for Globalist or it’s a good staycation hotel.
There are groups out there where people trade Hyatt certs, GoH, suite upgrades. You can probably try to do 2 for 1 for a later expiring cert or a GoH. Per T&Cs make sure you aren’t trying to trade for cash.
Out of curiosity, how do two people “trade” certs, GOH, and suite upgrades?
Offering such a low value alternative to the certificates strikes me as negative goodwill: they might be better off offering nothing! I’ve commented before about the strangeness of having only a 6 month window to use the valuable category 1 through 7 Globalist “requalifying” certificate. After all, they give you a year to use most of their award certificates. People have speculated this is intentional, because most people will naturally earn them very late in the year and the certificates will expire before summer. I guess this is a possible explanation, but it is also negative goodwill.
I’m not surprised, though it is disappointing.
I received 20K for an expired 1-7 certificate last year, but they were reluctant to do so.
So this was always the detail that kept me from being too excited about those free night certificates. That is NOT a generous reward, unless you have SPECIFIC plans for a certificate you intend to pursue, you’re better off spending your nights elsewhere.
Agreed that this is one of Hyatt’s biggest flaws. With the short expiration, they become challenging to use efficiently. Reservations often need to be made more than 180 days in advance for the best Hyatts.
Also, Hyatt should let us combine awards i.e. a Free Night Award and a Suite Upgrade Award on the same reservation.
And give Globalists points instead of useless Club Access Awards.
I didn’t get any Club Access Awards last year. I chose the 2K Next Stay award instead.
My bad, I did the same. I forgot that Hyatt made things a little better last year in that regard.
My family travels far less than I thought you guys do, but we never have any difficulty using these certificates. Yes, there are fewer Cat 1-4 properties but there are always some decent ones where we travel. Even if I planned a trip far in advance I can always cancel and rebook with a FNC when it becomes available.
Agree, the certificates have more limited value for “aspirational” properties as those are likely to book up closer to a year out, but I find it hard not to see them as still being valuable for general travel contrary to other comments here. The Cat 1-4 award works nicely for a good Hyatt Place/House/Regency stay – plenty of places where you need a room and everything is $200+ for the night but you don’t care that much about the hotel particulars. We just burned a Cat 1 – 4 cert for a New Year’s eve stay.
Would it be nicer to have a full year? Yes. The Hyatt milestone FNCs aren’t as good as Hilton’s uncapped FNCs, but they still beat the heck out of $50 quarterly credits from Hilton cards. And earning those FNCs from stays rather than card spend is an added perk that Hilton and Marriott don’t do a good job of competing with (Marriott requires 75 nights just to get a measly 40K cert).
There are 23 Cat 1-4 properties in the Bay Area, including a really nice Unbound hotel with great suites, some decent Regency hotels, a couple of Centrics. Even in NYC there’s a great Regency across the river in Jersey City and an excellent Hyatt Place with large, quiet rooms in Queens just one stop from Manhattan, etc.
You know, I stayed at that Regency once for an event that was held there. It was decent, and I could see it being a good use of a cert in the right situation, I guess. But I go to NYC several times a year, and when I’m going to the city for a dinner/show/event, I just don’t want an hour-long round trip to go back to the hotel for a bit in the middle of the day or have 30 minutes on a train at midnight after the event has ended or whatever. I’m not saying that it’s a bad place or that there isn’t a situation where it might fit (like if you just want to visit lower Manhattan for a few hours or something), but when I’m going to NYC for the weekend, I’m not looking to stay in Jersey City.
All that said, I don’t dispute that there are plenty of places where one can get good value out of a Cat 1-4. We finished up a cruise in Tampa today and drove to Orlando for a 3-night Hilton stay (timeshare presentation). We decided to extend our stay in Orlando by adding 1 night at a Hyatt specifically to make use of a Cat 1-4 cert at a good value on a property we like, but we’re adding the inconvenience of hotel hopping and we didn’t really need that night, we added that night mostly to use the cert, because our other travel plans between now and June include a place where there are zero Hyatts of any category, a stay with family (so no hotel required), and an area where the only Hyatt options are higher than Category 4. The kids are going to be back in school, so the likelihood of a spontaneous trip to a place with a good-value use during these six months is low for us. Obviously, that’s highly situational, and many people will have a totally different situation that will make use of the certificates relatively easy. That’s true with most benefits in the game — they work for some and not others. But I think that the short expiration window makes these more difficult and less member-friendly.
Most of the situations where I’m looking at a Hyatt House/Place, they in the Category 1-2-3 range, and it always pains me to use a certificate on a stay that would otherwise only cost 8.000 points! But, in the future, I suppose it will cause less pain than letting it go unused.
I will say that I agree that the cornucopia of hotel credits on various cards now makes these short-expiry certs less valuable to me. In a situation where rooms cost $200 per night, I am more likely to be looking for a Hilton where I can split the charge over a couple of Business Platinum cards and my Hilton Business card or to use an FHR/THC credit or Citi $300 hotel credit or that sort of thing.
Don’t get me wrong — I love Hyatt and I’ve gotten great value out of certificates repeatedly over the years. I just don’t like the 6-month expiration on the Milestone Rewards certs.
Major bummer. Hopefully they either reconsider this change, make all their FNCs last a year, or allow their FNCs to be combined with other cert types (GoH/SUA).
I was denied compensation for an expired Cat 1-7. The 6-month expiration is heinous.
Same. Concierge told me last year that since they are now giftable, Hyatt would no longer provide points as an alternative.
I hope they reconsider this. Often I plan vacations a year in advance and when I don’t get the chance to use an award, I like that Hyatt was offering a good amount of points for it.
Many-year globalist, here.
The purchasing power of Hyatt Cat 1-4/1-7 awards have become wildly diminished. They’re become more difficult to use than they’re worth. Hyatt’s aggressive cat increases plus properties playing with award availability has made any points or awards almost untenable.
I no longer see the cat 1-4/1-7 awards as holding much value. Same with Hyatt’s points.
I don’t compare Hyatt to Hilton/Marriott. The true competition for Hyatt is AirBNB/ VRBO for me. Since Hyatt’s “awards” have become so difficult for me to use I see them more as a liability than an asset. It’s such a chore to find availability and use them.