Hilton Honors have been offering a very generous status match promotion for more than a year where if you hold status in a competing hotel chain, you can get matched instantly to Hilton Honors Gold or Diamond and retain your matched status through a certain number of stays.
Hilton has changed up their status match program, effective immediately. If you were halfway through a challenge when this happened, you’ll stay on the old scheme. However, if you apply for a status challenge from today onwards, you’ll follow the new scheme.
Qualification based on nights, no more instant Diamond status
Here are the new conditions of the status match program:
- Instant upgrade to Hilton Honors Gold status for 90 days. No straight upgrade to Diamond status
- Completeย 10 nights within 90 days to maintain Hilton Honors Gold status until March 2021
- Completeย 18 nights within 90 daysย to be upgraded to Hilton Honors Diamond status until March 2021
Here’s a table for comparison between the old and new qualification methods:
| Old | New | |
| Gold | 4 stays within 90 days of matching | 10 nights within 90 days of matching |
| Diamond | 8 stays within 90 days of matching | 18 nights within 90 days of matching |
The main devaluation is that even if you no longer receive instant Diamond status, even if you’re matching top-tier elite status from a competing chain. You only get a maximum of Gold status for the 90-day status match window.
Hilton Honors Gold status will still give you benefits such as space-available room upgrades, late check-out (by request), and complimentary breakfast at all properties.
Although you can receive an instant upgrade to Hilton Honors Gold status just by having the AMEX Platinum Charge Card, the card comes with a hefty S$1,712 annual fee and an income requirement of S$200,000 which might not be accessible to some. If you can qualify for it though, obtaining Hilton Honors Gold through this channel might be a “cheaper” option compared to the status match.
Concluding Thoughts
If you had applied for the status match when it was still based on stays, consider yourself to be very fortunate.
Having only to complete 4 stays to maintain Gold status was a pretty achievable requirement to hit and I imagine there are just too many Hilton Honors Gold and Diamond members at this point in the system.
