The Venture Rewards Card is perfect for everyday purchases. If you have a card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred, which gives you three points per dollar on dining, online grocery orders, and streaming services, you’ll want to use that card on bonus category spending. However, on other everyday purchases, you would only earn one point per dollar using your Chase card, so you would want to pull out your Venture Card at checkout to maximize your earnings.
How to spend/redeem miles
You have two options for redeeming your miles—you can either book hotels, rental cars, or flights through the Capital One Travel portal, which gives you a flat rate of one cent per mile. Or, you can transfer your miles to several hotel and airline partners, frequently giving you a much better valuation per mile.
The following partners have a 1:1 transfer ratio, which means if you transfer 1,000 Capital One miles, you will receive 1,000 points in your rewards program account.
- Aeromexico Club Premier
- Air Canada – Aeroplan®
- Cathay Pacific – Asia Miles
- Avianca LifeMiles
- British Airways Executive Club
- Choice Privileges®
- Emirates Skywards
- Etihad Guest
- Finnair Plus
- Flying Blue
- Qantas Frequent Flyer
- Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
- TAP Miles&Go
- Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles
- Virgin Red
- Wyndham Rewards
There are two additional partners: EVA Air has a 2:1.5 transfer ratio, and Accor Live Limitless has a 2:1 transfer ratio. This means that if you transfer 1,000 Capital One miles to EVA Air, you will receive 750 points in your Infinity MileageLands account. If you transfer 1,000 Capital One miles to ALL – Accor Live Limitless, you will receive 500 points in your rewards account.
Ultimately, you want to stretch your miles as far as possible, so transferring them to a partner can help. For instance, on a one-way flight from Newark (EWR) to Paris (CDG) this September, you can book through Capital One Travel and pay 305,020 miles to fly in business class. Or, you can transfer just 73,500 miles to Air France at a 1:1 ratio and book the exact same route and fare class. Note you will have to pay $205.90 in taxes and fees when booking directly with Air France, but you still save over 231,000 miles by transferring.
I transferred 42,200 Capital One miles to Avianca LifeMiles and booked a business class ticket from Buenos Aires to Mexico City. This ticket would have easily cost me over $1,000 if I had booked in cash or over 100,000 Capital One miles if I had booked through the portal.
What I wish I knew before signing up
When I first got the Venture Rewards Card, I was not very savvy with my redemptions, so I quickly blew through my welcome bonus. I redeemed points for statement credits and gift cards, not realizing I could get a significantly better value out of my miles with a bit of research. I believe any redemption is helpful, as it cuts out costs you’d otherwise pay out of pocket. But, if you look at points and miles as having a dollar value, you don’t want to spend more than you have to.
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