Citi Transfer Partners Overview
Citi’s Transfer Partners
Citi ThankYou has 16 airlines, 5 hotels and 1 retail transfer partners, totaling 22. Citi is the sole transfer partner for American Airlines AAdvantage immediately making Citi ThankYou points one of the most valuable. Citi also has unique international airline partners like EVA Air Infinity MilageLands and Thai Airways Orchid Plus.
| Hotel Transfer Partner | Transfer Ratio(Citi ThankYou → Partner) | Transfer Time |
|---|---|---|
ALL - Accor Live Limitless | 1:1 | Instant |
Choice Privileges® | 1:2 | Instant |
Leaders Club | 5:1 | Instant |
Preferred Hotels & Resorts | 1:4 | Instant |
Wyndham Rewards | 1:1 | Instant |
| Retail Transfer Partner | Transfer Ratio(Citi ThankYou → Partner) | Transfer Time |
|---|---|---|
Shop Your Way | 1:10 | Instant |
What Card Do I Need To Transfer My Points?
While several Citi cards earn ThankYou points, not all of them earn/unlock transferable ThankYou points. To truly maximize the value of your ThankYou points, you need the Citi Premier Card, the Citi Strata Elite Card, or the Citi Prestige Card (no longer available).
Without those premium cards, your ThankYou points transfer partners and ratio are significantly limited.
While cards like Citi DoubleCash cards accumulate “limited” ThankYou points, you will need to pair it with a Citi Premier, Strata Elite, or Prestige card truly unlock their value.
- Citi Double Cash® Card ($0 annual fee): Earn 3X points on restaurants, supermarkets, gas stations, air travel, and hotels
- Citi Custom Cash® Card ($0 annual fee): 5% cash back on your top eligible spend category up to $500 spent each billing cycle
- Citi Rewards+® Card ($0 annual fee): Earn 2% cash back on purchases: 1% when you buy and 1% as you pay with no categories, caps, or annual fee
Examples of High Value Transfer Partners
While some transfer partners shine, others are mostly worth ignoring. In this section, we’ll highlight some good and bad examples for you.
Turkish Airlines Miles & Smiles
Citi is one of three partners with Turkish Airlines (the others being Bilt & Capital One). Notably, given Turkish’s award chart, Turkish award redemption sweet spots are enough for some to consider getting the card purely to gain Turkish miles.
One of the best sweet spot redemptions is flying to Hawaii from the contiguous North America for just 7,500 miles one-way in economy (or just 12,500 miles in business class) on United Airlines. Why not just book United award flights directly using United miles? Well, oftentimes, you’ll actually find that award charts can offer tremendous value in the right circumstances; in this case, booking via partner airline is actually better than booking direct. Here, Turkish considers Hawaii as part of the contiguous 48 states when pricing tickets, so even an east coast flight to Hawaii is a domestic ticket that costs 7,500 miles at the lowest.
Simply because award charts can offer tremendous value if the right conditions are met; sometimes, booking via a partner is better than booking direct. Turkish considers Hawaii as a part of the U.S. when pricing award tickets, so even an east coast flight to Hawaii is considered a “domestic” flight and is priced 7,500 miles at the lowest. United would likely price the same flight 3x or 4x more.
Examples of Low Value Transfer Partners
Aeromexico
Aeromexico is the flag carrier of Mexico and is a widely accessible transfer partner from major card issuers like American Express, Citi, and Capital One. However, using your Citi ThankYou points for Aeromexico is generally not advised.
For instance, this MEX to LAX flight runs $204.26 USD in economy paid with cash, but has a massive $134.23 USD tax/fee associated with it for the award redemption that already costs 18,000 Aeromexico Points (or 18,000 Citi ThankYou points). This implies that your Citi ThankYou points are only worth about 0.38 cents per point when used for an Aeromexico award redemption—horrendous when even a transfer to JetBlue can net you about 1.3 cents per point.
Despite the fact that Aeromexico also has an around the world ticket option, SkyTeam redemptions are expensive and its known to be difficult to even be able to book these around the world tickets successfully.
Conclusion
Citi points have become more difficult to come by, but there are still some fantastic uses for Citi ThankYou points. If any of the transfer partners fit your use cases, it may be worth taking these cards seriously so that you can book a trip in the future.
