Capital One Miles Program Review – Earning, Redeeming, and Transfer Partners

In 2018, Capital One joined the transferable points game by adding transfer partners to its line of Capital One Venture and Spark Miles cards. This added a ton more value to the already good credit cards and instantly made the mileage currency one that every travel enthusiast should consider.

We’ve seen Capital One beef up the transfer partner list over the years. The company has 16 airline and 2 hotel transfer partners and it has favorably adjusted almost all of its transfer ratios.

This move cemented Capital One’s place in the transferable points space and showed that the bank is continuing to work on ways to enhance the Capital One Miles experience for its customers.

But is earning Capital One miles right for you? And more importantly, are Capital One miles any good? Here’s a full review of Capital One Miles, Capital One’s transfer partners, and the cards that earn Capital One miles.

What Are Capital One Miles?

Capital One miles are the mileage currency earned by a handful of Capital One credit cards, both personal and business.

You must have an eligible Capital One credit card to earn these miles, and there is no way to earn them without one of these cards. You can earn Capital One miles on all of your purchases, though, and most Capital One credit cards earn more than 1 point per dollar spent on all purchases, in addition to other awesome benefits.

The actual amount of miles you’ll earn per dollar spent varies card-to-card. Don’t worry — we’ll run through how many miles each Capital One Miles credit card earns in the next section of this article. Just note that some Capital One cards earn up to 10x Capital One miles per dollar spent in specific spend categories!

You can redeem your Capital One miles in a variety of different ways, but we think that transferring them to travel partners is the best. This is because you’ll get the most value for your miles and be able to book redemptions such as ANA first class, Emirates first class, and even tickets in Singapore Suites!

Capital One Miles Credit Cards

You can earn Capital One miles with a variety of different Capital One-issued personal and business credit cards.

Here’s a quick look at all of the credit cards that earn Capital One miles:

Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card

The Capital One Venture X card is Capital One’s ultra-premium travel rewards credit card. It earns 10x miles on hotels and rental cars purchased through Capital One Travel, 5x miles on flights purchased through Capital One Travel, and 2x miles on all other purchases.

This card offers some exceptional perks, including up to a $300 annual travel credit on bookings made through Capital One Travel, a bonus of 10,000 miles on each account anniversary year, airport lounge access including a complimentary Priority Pass Select membership, access to Plaza Premium Lounges and the coveted Capital One Lounges, and a $100 Global Entry/TSA PreCheck credit.

Take note of the complimentary Hertz President’s Circle status, primary car rental coverage, cell phone insurance, travel insurance, and no foreign transaction fees, too.

Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card

The Capital One Venture card is Capital One’s classic travel rewards credit card. It offers 2x miles per dollar on all purchases. It also earns 5x miles per dollar spent on hotels and rental cars booked through Capital One Travel.

This makes the card an easy go-to for many travelers — you don’t have to worry about using a specific card for bonus miles in a specific purchase category. Instead, you’ll earn 2x miles per dollar across the board, making it easy to rack up miles.

The card has some other neat benefits, too. Namely, it comes with a $100 statement credit that you can use towards your TSA PreCheck or Global Entry application fee. Simply charge the fee to your Capital One Venture card, and you’ll see the application fee refunded in the form of a statement credit when your statement closes.

Further, the card has no foreign transaction fees. This means that you can make purchases abroad or pay for purchases in a foreign currency without being penalized. Some cards charge up to 3% per foreign transaction, so a $100 purchase quickly becomes a $103 purchase.

You can also access Hertz Five Star status, secondary car rental insurance, no foreign transaction fees, and fee-free authorized users with this card.

Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card

The Capital One VentureOne card is the Capital One Venture card’s little brother. The card has no annual fee, but also earns fewer miles and has fewer benefits.

Instead of earning 2x miles on all purchases, the Capital One VentureOne card earns 1.25x miles per dollar. It even earns 5x miles on hotels and rental cars booked through Capital One Travel!

This isn’t the best no-annual-fee card we’ve seen — the Chase Freedom Unlimited^® earns 1.5% cash-back on all purchases — but it’s still better than a standard 1 point per dollar spent.

The card does not have foreign transaction fees. Further, it’s one of the only no-annual-fee credit cards with miles you can transfer to travel partners. Because of this transfer ability, the Capital One VentureOne card is still worth a look for travelers who don’t want to deal with fees.

Hot Tip: A great perk that comes with all Capital One consumer and business cards through June 22, 2024, is a free 6-month membership to The Cultivist, a service offering free access to museums worldwide.

Capital One Spark Travel Elite

The ultra-premium business card available for select Capital One customers is the Capital One Spark Travel Elite card, which has the ability to earn up to 10x miles on purchases. It’s very similar to the Capital One Venture X card.

You’ll earn 10x miles on hotels and rental cars booked through Capital One Travel, 5x miles on flights booked through Capital One Travel, and 2x miles on all other purchases.

Also, there’s a $300 annual Capital One Travel credit, complimentary Priority Pass Select membership, access to Capital One Lounges and Plaza Premium Lounges, a 10,000-mile anniversary bonus every cardmember year, and a Global Entry/TSA PreCheck application fee credit every 4 years.

Lastly, this card features no personal guarantee, no preset spending limit, travel insurance, cell phone protection, and fee-free employee cards.

Capital One Spark Miles for Business

On the other hand, we have the Capital One Spark Miles card. This card is similar to the personal Capital One Venture card, but it has business-specific benefits that make it useful for businesses of all types and sizes. Unlike the popular Capital One Spark Cash for Business, it earns Capital One miles instead of cash-back.

Like the Capital One Venture card, businesses can earn 2x miles per dollar spent on all purchases, and 5x miles on hotel bookings and car rentals booked through the Capital One Travel portal. Just note that these hotel stays may not be eligible to earn hotel points or use elite status benefits (if you have them).

Further, there’s an included TSA PreCheck or Global Entry credit for the primary cardholder. As you’d expect, the Capital One Spark Miles card also has no foreign transaction fees, making it great for businesses that pay international invoices with a credit card.

There are some business-specific benefits that Capital One adds to all of its Spark business credit cards, too. These include the ability to easily export purchase records, generate year-end spending summaries, and request free employee cards with set spending limits. You can also elect account managers on your team to make payments, manage statements, and more.

Hot Tip: If you’re a business owner, you should familiarize yourself with this business-specific points and miles guide.

Capital One Spark Miles Select for Business

The Capital One Spark Miles Select card is the no-annual-fee version of the Capital One Spark Miles card. Like the Capital One VentureOne card is to the Capital One Venture card, this card earns fewer miles and has fewer benefits, but may be worthwhile for cash-strapped companies and other businesses that don’t want to lock up cash in card annual fees.

The card earns 1.5x miles per dollar spent on all purchases and has no foreign transaction fees. You’ll also earn 5x miles per dollar spent on rental cars and hotel rooms booked through Capital One Travel, making it easy to earn some bonus miles on employee travel booked through the portal.

Earning Bonus Capital One Miles With Capital One Travel

Beyond making purchases with your Capital One credit card, there aren’t many ways to earn bonus Capital One miles.

However, there is an exception to this: booking flights, rental cars, and hotel rooms with select cards through Capital One Travel, Capital One’s in-house online travel agency (OTA).

If you have a Capital One Venture card, Capital One VentureOne card, Capital One Spark Miles card, or a Capital One Spark Miles Select card, you’ll earn 5x Capital One miles per dollar when you book rental cars and hotels through the portal.

For businesses, this can be especially lucrative for those that regularly charge client-reimbursable travel expenses to their business credit card.

If you have a Capital One Venture X card or the Capital One Spark Travel Elite card, this number goes all the way up to 10x miles per dollar for rental cars and 5x miles per dollar on flights.

These bonus categories can help you rack up some serious bonus miles if you have lots of paid travel expenses.

This means that a $500 hotel stay could earn a whopping 5,000 Capital One miles. We recently valued Capital One miles at 1.8 cents per point, meaning that this miles haul is worth — at a minimum — a cool $90 for Capital One Venture X cardholders.

Earning Bonus Capital One Miles With Refer a Friend

Cardholders of the Capital One Venture X card, Capital One Venture card, and Capital One VentureOne card can earn bonus miles (that vary by card) through a personal referral link through the Refer-A-Friend program. So long as the person that signs up with your link is a new Capital One cardholder, you’ll earn bonus miles for each friend approved.

To find your link, sign in to your account or look in the app for the Refer a Friend tile on the account details page.

Capital One offers a variety of ways for its cardholders to redeem Capital One miles. While we generally suggest sticking with moving miles to transfer partners, there are a few other ways Capital One miles can be redeemed, too.

To give you a full look at your options, we’ll take you through all of your Capital One miles redemption options below.

Transferring Capital One Miles to Transfer Partners

By far the most lucrative way to redeem your Capital One miles is by transferring them to one of Capital One’s numerous transfer partners. The bank’s list of transfer partners includes some of the most well-known airline mileage programs and hotel loyalty programs, and some of its transfer partners are exclusive to Capital One.

The upside to transferring to travel partners instead of using one of Capital One’s other redemption options is that you’re not restricted to a single point value. Instead, the value of your miles depends on what you’re redeeming your miles for after you transfer them.

For example, you can transfer your Capital One miles to Singapore Airlines’ Krisflyer loyalty program and book a ticket in the airline’s world-famous Suites first class product. Doing this will likely give you over 4 cents per point in value.

Most transfer partners are now at a 1:1 ratio, though there are still a couple that fall under the 2:1.5 or 2:1 ratio. An example of this is transferring Capital One miles to EVA Air Infinity MileageLands at 2:1.5. Transferring 100,000 Capital One miles to EVA Air would yield 75,000 miles. On the other hand, most other transfer partners like Avianca LifeMiles and Emirates Skywards process at a 1:1 ratio.

Here’s a quick look at all of the Capital One Miles transfer partners, along with their transfer rates:

Many of these transfer partners overlap with Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi ThankYou Rewards, and American Express Membership Rewards. However, some partners such as ALL – Accor Live Limitless and Finnair Plus are exclusive to Capital One Miles, so adding a Capital One card to your wallet could open you up to even more redemptions, even if you have a stash of other points.

Bottom Line: Before you transfer points, find the ticket you want to book and ensure that award space is available. Doing this will prevent you from locking up your miles without a plan and potentially getting stuck with airline miles or hotel points that you can’t use. Keeping your miles as liquid as possible until you redeem them is key to making sure that you get the best value when it comes time to redeem them.

Turn Your Capital One Miles Into Gift Cards

You can redeem your Capital One miles for gift cards to popular merchants such as Applebee’s, AutoZone, and Macy’s. All gift card redemptions are processed at a value of 1 cent per mile, meaning that 50,000 Capital One miles are equal to a $500 gift card to a merchant of your choice.

We don’t recommend redeeming your Capital One miles for gift cards, as you’ll get a lower cent per point value than if you redeemed through one of Capital One’s transfer partners.

However, if you don’t have any upcoming travel plans, gift cards are a better use of miles than if you were to redeem for cash-back or through Amazon.

Cover Amazon Purchases With Capital One Miles

Like Chase Ultimate Rewards and American Express Membership Rewards, you can use your Capital One miles to cover Amazon purchases at checkout. Simply add your Capital One card to your Amazon payment methods and you’ll have the option to use miles to cover your Amazon purchases.

Just keep in mind that you’ll get a really low point valuation if you go this route. Capital One miles can be redeemed at a flat rate of 0.8 cents per mile spent. For reference, the 0.8 cent valuation towards Amazon purchases means 125 Capital One miles gives you $1 off your purchase.

So with that in mind, stay away from this type of redemption. It may be a convenient way to use your miles to save money on everyday purchases, but you’ll lose tons of value in the process.

Redeem for a Statement Credit or Check

Finally, you can redeem your Capital One miles for cash-back in the form of a statement credit or a check.

However, we don’t necessarily recommend doing this. You’ll get a flat 0.5 cents per point in value when redeeming miles this way. So 50,000 miles would be worth just $250.

With that in mind, we recommend that you avoid cashing out your Capital One miles for statement credit or a check. You’re better off redeeming for a gift card or even redeeming miles through Amazon if you want to use your miles to cover everyday expenses.

Hot Tip: When your eligible card is linked to PayPal, you can checkout with PayPal and redeem your miles at a rate of 125 miles to $1. We’d recommend this only if you can’t use your miles for travel or as a statement credit.

Comparing Capital One Miles to Other Transferable Points Programs

As you know, Capital One Miles isn’t the only transferable points currency out there. Here’s a look at how these miles stack up to other transferable points programs like Amex, Chase, and Citi.

Capital One Miles vs. American Express Membership Rewards Points

American Express Membership Rewards is a premier transferable points program. There are more American Express transfer partners than Capital One, and its personal and business cards have more points-earning options, too.

For example, the American Express^® Gold Card earns 4x points per dollar spent at restaurants and at U.S. supermarkets (up to $25,000 per calendar year). When you take into account that almost all of the Membership Rewards transfer partners transfer at a 1:1 ratio, many will find that Membership Rewards points are more valuable than Capital One miles.

Further, Capital One and American Express share many of the same transfer partners. There are some exceptions to this rule, though. For example, ALL – Accor Live Limitless and Turkish Airlines are not offered by Amex.

On the other hand, many Membership Rewards-earning credit cards have higher annual fees than Capital One cards.

Capital One Miles vs. Chase Ultimate Rewards Points

Like Membership Rewards, Chase’s Ultimate Rewards points currency can be more easily earned than Capital One miles. This is especially true for business owners as the Ink Business Preferred^® Credit Card earns 3x points per dollar spent in select business spending categories, including travel, shipping, and online advertising, amongst others.

Further, Chase Ultimate Rewards points transfer 1:1 to all of its Chase transfer partners. You can redeem your points at up to 1.5 cents per point in value towards paid bookings through the Chase travel portal. The value you’ll get depends on the Ultimate Rewards credit card you have, though.

Note that we recommend starting out with Ultimate Rewards points when you begin your miles and points journey. This is because Chase’s famous 5/24 rule makes those with over 5 new credit cards in the past 24 months ineligible for new Chase credit cards.

Capital One Miles vs. Citi ThankYou Rewards

Citi’s ThankYou Points currency is another underdog of the miles and points world. It isn’t quite as well known as Amex or Chase’s options, but it’s worth a look if you’re over 5/24 and want to take advantage of exclusive transfer partners such as Turkish Airlines Miles & Smiles. That said, we still value Capital One miles higher than Citi ThankYou Points (which we value at 1.6 cents apiece).

So, you may want to check out Capital One before Citi, but only after you’ve exhausted your options for earning more valuable points currencies such as Amex Membership Rewards or Chase Ultimate Rewards.

Final Thoughts

Now you know the ins and outs of Capital One Miles. We started by discussing what these miles are, then we examined how to earn and spend them, and compared them to other types of transferable points.

Capital One miles are a solid addition to your portfolio of points and miles. They may not be as valuable as Chase Ultimate Rewards or American Express Membership Rewards, but the unique set of transfer partners, lucrative earnings on non-bonus spend categories, and interesting credit card benefits make them interesting for specific uses.

We highly recommend that you stick to redeeming your Capital One miles through transfer partners.

For Capital One products listed on this page, some of the above benefits are provided by Visa® or Mastercard® and may vary by product. See the respective Guide to Benefits for details, as terms and exclusions apply.

Enrollment required through Capital One website or mobile app. Upon enrollment, eligible cardholders will remain at upgraded status level through December 31, 2024.  Please note, enrolling through the normal Hertz Gold Plus Rewards enrollment process (e.g. at Hertz.com) will not automatically detect a cardholder as being eligible for the program and cardholders will not be automatically upgraded to the applicable status tier.  Additional terms apply.
The information regarding the Capital One Spark Travel Elite was independently collected by Upgraded Points and not provided nor reviewed by the issuer.

The information regarding the Capital One Spark Miles Select for Business was independently collected by Upgraded Points and not provided nor reviewed by the issuer.
The information regarding the Chase Freedom Unlimited^® was independently collected by Upgraded Points and not provided nor reviewed by the issuer.

Information regarding the Capital One Spark Miles for Business was independently collected by Upgraded Points and not provided nor reviewed by the issuer.
For rates and fees of the American Express^® Gold Card, click here.