Smart Travel: Upgrade Your Getaways
Best Travel Credit Cards, Southwest Policy Changes, and Disneyland Deals
Wed, 12 Mar 2025
Learn which travel credit cards might be best for you, plus news about major policy changes at Southwest. Which travel credit card is the best travel credit card? Hosts Meghan Coyle and Sally French try to answer that question by picking their favorites, fantasy sports draft style. But first, they discuss the latest travel news, including Southwest changing some of its beloved policies, how to get the best deals on cruises this year, and some Disneyland discounts you can cash in on this summer. Then, Meghan and Sally get into their travel credit card fantasy draft, where they talk about benefits and drawbacks of each card, including annual fees, statement credits, lounge access, and point redemption options. Plus, they answer a listener’s question about where to travel for a quick “babymoon.” Resources discussed in this episode: The 8 Best Ways to Buy Disney Tickets 16 Best Travel Credit Cards of March 2025 Top Airline Credit Cards With Companion Tickets How to Pick the Best Credit Card for You: 4 Easy Steps In their conversation, the Nerds discuss: the best travel credit card, how to pick the best travel credit card, travel credit card perks, travel rewards credit cards, Southwest Rapid Rewards changes, credit card perks, Disneyland ticket discounts, best credit cards for travel points, credit cards with lounge access, Capital One Venture X review, Chase Sapphire Preferred vs Reserve, Amex Platinum travel benefits, Southwest Companion Pass updates, how to maximize travel points, NerdWallet travel credit cards, best credit cards for frequent flyers, how to earn free flights with points, Disney vacation savings tips, best cruise deals wave season, travel credit cards with no annual fee, best airline credit cards for free checked bags, Hyatt vs Hilton rewards program, cash back vs travel rewards credit cards, best co-branded hotel credit cards.
Chapter 1: What are the latest changes in Southwest's policies?
I know it's falling apart. So for starters, the airline announced yesterday that customers will no longer get two free checked bags for all flights booked on or after May 28th, 2025, save for a few exceptions like customers who hold a Southwest Rapid Rewards credit card, A-list elite status, or if they buy business select fares.
Now those travelers get either one or two free checked bags depending on their fare class or status. And I have to say, I rarely check bags, but even I'm bummed about this news because I'm just worried it'll slow down boarding as people try to stuff their roller bags that they otherwise would have just checked, but instead they're stuffing them in the overhead bins.
It's really going to slow things down. And everyone for the most part used to be treated the same on Southwest. But the free checked bags are now only for a select few. Southwest is also renaming want to get away to basic. It's actually basic economy now. Gross.
Basic fares are not going to allow changes or standby, and they now earn two points per dollar instead of the previous six points per dollar.
And that's not the only bummer for Southwest. So now Southwest flight credits will expire within one year for all fares, except once again, Basic just gets that low class status. Their flight credits will expire within six months from the ticketing date. Again, this is so rough. Southwest has always stood out to me because its flight credits had no expiration date. So I find this so frustrating.
I feel like a lot of people flew Southwest for the flexibility and knowing that they could make changes. But now you can't make changes on basic fares, your flight credits you have to use within a certain time period.
Let's point out, though, there are a lot of things we still don't know, like what impact these changes will have on Southwest's famous companion pass and what the cost of checking a bag will be.
And then Southwest had previously said they would end their free-for-all seating style this year as well. That is one thing we don't have details yet on if this will actually go into effect. If so, when?
I can imagine what it's going to be like. This is really sad to see. Southwest is becoming like all these other airlines. Southwest is also going to start using dynamic pricing. They used to consistently offer high value points. It was one that I transferred to semi-often. But it's hard to imagine that these points are going to be worth as much with all of these changes.
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Chapter 2: How can you get Disneyland ticket deals this summer?
Some of the best deals to look out for during wave season are the ones that let guests or kids in your stateroom sail for free. They charge by stateroom and it's a little bit complicated but don't get swayed by onboard credit. More onboard credit is nice but sometimes those just make you overspend because you want to use it up. You want to look for the discounts on the people in your stateroom.
Right.
Now, I will note, I am eyeing a Virgin Voyages cruise myself. We talked about this a few episodes ago, but I saw this deal on Virgin this month. It's an 80% discount on the second passenger, plus up to $300 in drink credits.
Pick me. I want to go. I'll be the 80% discount. I love it. I've also been wanting to check out the expedition cruises. Those are also on sale too during wave season.
So HX Expeditions, oh, that's a tongue twister, has a sale running through Monday, March 17th, where you can get up to 25% off their voyages to Alaska, Antarctica, Greenland, and Svalbard, which is a collection of inhabited islands close to the North Pole. But for me, I desperately want to go to Antarctica for some reason.
Oh, me too. I have not done Antarctica yet. Now, National Geographic Lindblad has a sale running through April 15th. Now, I will warn everyone, these types of cruises that we're talking about can be super expensive. Like minimum $5,000 is generally what we're looking at. So just keep in mind, even with a discount, it's still a ton of money.
If you want to sail into the Arctic Circle or do the Galapagos aboard one of these expedition ships, you should definitely try to book during one of these beginning of the year sales because that's probably the best deal you'll get. And RIP to when Lindblad and Hyatt had a partnership. Do you remember that, Sally?
Oh, that's right. Yeah, you could totally earn and redeem points with Hyatt points on your Arctic cruise.
That partnership ended in 2023. And that was such a good way to earn Hyatt points because these expeditions were so expensive. So you could earn thousands of points in one cruise. I hope we'll get to go on one of these one day, even if we don't earn thousands of points.
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Chapter 3: What are the best cruise deals during wave season?
Well, you know, I have actually been to the Arctic Circle myself. It was very cool. What was it like? Well, you know, a lot of people are like, is it beautiful? And it's actually very bleak. It's the tundra, so it kind of looks like this space wasteland. There's no trees, no nothing, but it's beautiful in a bleak way. 10 out of 10 would recommend.
Interesting. All right. Well, we really are all over the map with our travels and with our credit cards.
No surprise there. Now we've got a really fun game coming up where you'll find out what our favorite travel credit cards are. So stay right there. Do not move an inch.
Sally, what's the number one question you get asked when you tell people what you write about at NerdWallet?
Oh, easy. It's what's the best travel credit card.
That's the first thing people ask me as well. And I imagine we tell them the same thing. I hope you're telling them it depends. Yes. I don't know what the best travel credit card is for you because I just met you.
I don't know anything about you. There is no one best travel credit card for everyone. There are so many factors that go into it, like how often you travel. Are you willing to spend money on an annual fee?
Do you want lounge access, automatic elite status, a credit towards pre-check or global entry?
And that's just half of what goes into it, which is why I typically recommend you read NerdWallet's articles that break down the best travel credit cards. Of course, we will link to that in the show notes.
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Chapter 4: Which travel credit card should you choose?
Yes, redeem them. Do not spend them to transfer for like a handbag that you buy in the shopping portal. Of course, there are also many ways to actually redeem your points for travel. So you have this class of general travel credit cards that earn transferable points. These are something like Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards, City Thank You Points, Capital One Miles.
These are all various types of credit card points that you can redeem for travel. either directly through the credit cards portal, which is sort of just like this general booking site, or you can transfer those points to specific airline or hotel partners. So each of those rewards programs that I named have various transfer partners with specific hotels or airlines.
For example, you can transfer Amex points to Delta Airlines.
And then don't get those confused with co-branded airline or hotel credit cards. Like a Hilton credit card will only earn Hilton points. And there's not a lot of worthwhile ways to spend those points except to book a Hilton hotel.
Yeah, even sometimes Hilton might like have an airline transfer partner, but we generally do not recommend going that route. Of course, it is important to understand if you are earning points in a specific co-branded airline or hotel credit card, then they're kind of stuck there.
You don't want to transfer your points earned from Hyatt to a Hyatt airline partner because they're just going to lose a lot of value.
Yeah, so for the purposes of this episode, when we refer to a travel credit card, we're talking about a card that earns some type of transferable currency that you can redeem with multiple airlines or hotels. And airline or hotel cards will be specific to one brand.
And I do want to say there are some cash back cards that work well with travel cards in the same family. So right now I'm thinking about cards like the Chase Freedom. These earn points that you can definitely redeem for cash back. And that is totally good for a lot of people because you're not messing around with transfer partners.
Or if you just need the rewards to pay rent, they are there for you. But what's cool about these cards is you can redeem them at a higher value for travel if you have, in this case, Chase Sapphire cards where those points can be transferred and become way more valuable.
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Chapter 5: What makes Chase Sapphire Preferred a top travel credit card?
No, I'm going to go with the Bill World Elite Mastercard. Ooh, a spicy pick. Yeah. This one has no annual fee, so if you are dead set on not spending any money on... an annual fee for a credit card that you can use for travel. I think this is your best bet. It earns points on rent payments. They have great rent day promotions on the first of each month. And again, a lot of transfer partners.
So some of my favorites in the Bilt program are Hyatt. According to the last NerdWallet analysis we did, their points are worth 2.2 cents each. Hilton and Marriott are also Bilt transfer partners if you want a little hotel variety. And Alaska Airlines is a sleeper here. Crazy.
All that for no annual fee.
Yeah. The only annoying thing is you have to make five purchases per month to be able to earn the points on rent. And it is a little bit hard to remember for me. I'm still trying to figure out which subscriptions I can just put on there and get the recurring purchases.
Well, I'm going to go the totally opposite direction. You went for no annual fee. I'm going with the highest annual fee ever. Yeah. That is the platinum card from American Express. Tell us why you went all the way to the other side of the spectrum. Annual fee on this card is $695. So I will say huge caveat, this card is definitely not for everyone.
But I am picking it because if you can make it work for you, it can be hugely valuable. A lot of that comes down to the statement credit. Something that I feel like a lot of people are able to use are something like the Uber credit card. Card members get $15 in Uber Cash each month to use on orders and rides in the U.S., plus a bonus $20 in December. So that's up to $200 in Uber Cash annually.
When you use an Amex card for your transaction, that right there takes a huge amount out of the annual fee. Another one I find easy to use is streaming subscriptions. You get $20 of statement credits each month when you use the card for eligible purchases. On subscriptions, those are things like Disney+, the New York Times. A bunch more.
There is a list of eligible subscription services on Amex's website. Again, this can be huge savings of up to $240 for a year. As you know, I'm a Baby Yoda fan who needs my Disney Plus.
Oh, yeah. Wait, how did I get stuck with the podcast math job? All right, let's see. $200 towards Uber Cash, $240 for the statement credits on certain subscriptions. That's $440 of value right there. That's two-thirds of the annual fee in one fell swoop. And there's lots more, too. Yes.
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Chapter 6: How does Chase Sapphire Reserve compare to Sapphire Preferred?
So basically, I feel like I'm able to stay here for half the price because you just consider $550 for the annual fee. She considers that alone to be worth it.
It can be. You do have to keep in mind all of those limits on what type of hotel you can book with those free night awards. I think Hyatt's card limits the free night award to hotels that are in category four or below. I think Hyatt has eight. So that's like the bottom four tiers of hotels.
Yeah, so with the Hilton card, you can just use it on a standard room reward at pretty much any property in the Hilton portfolio. There are a few exceptions, like some all-inclusives. The problem with theirs is it has to be a standard room night reward and often standard rooms book up and there's only premium room availability. So there is a downfall there.
I will say with Hyatt, almost just like a bigger of a downfall, you can only use it at category one through four hotels. So if you're staying at a category five or higher, you cannot use it there. But I feel like I'm traveling so much for like weddings, sports meets, things like that, that there's always a category four or lower hotel that I can use right there.
Yeah, and still, even those Category 4 hotels are still more expensive than the annual fee of that card.
Totally. I'm like, the annual fee is $95, and there's no way anyone's finding a hotel room for less than $95 in this economy. So I almost feel like this benefit alone is enough to justify that credit card.
So for my last pick, I think I'm going to do the same thing as you except on the airline side. I'm going to pick a $95 card. And I really believe you should stick to that lower price point for the annual fee if you're going to get a co-branded card because you don't want to trap too many of your points in one brand where it's hard to move them.
For airline cars, it's really easy to justify the annual fee if you check a bag. If you have that $95 card and you check a bag three times, you're literally good. You already made it up. So are you going with American Airlines since you already have elite status? I really like my American Airlines AA Advantage Platinum World Elite MasterCard.
That earns you loyalty points, which is what you need a lot of to earn elite status. Okay. We talked about that last episode too. You know, game time decision, we're going to go with the United Explorer card.
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