AMEX Membership Rewards devaluation: What should you redeem your points for?

On 23 February 2026, American Express will devalue its Membership Rewards (MR) programme, increasing the cost of airline miles transfers by 22-25%.

That’s going to sting, to put it mildly. Not only does it devalue your earn rates going forward (and goodness knows that was never a strong suit of AMEX cards in the first place!), it also retroactively devalues your past spending — unless you zeroise your account before the deadline. 

Thankfully, there’s still time to transfer MR points at existing rates. The only question is: where? 

For many people, Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer would be the obvious choice. But AMEX also has seven other airline partners, plus two hotel programmes. Are any of these viable alternatives to tried-and-tested KrisFlyer miles?

Where should you transfer your Membership Rewards points?

As previously announced, American Express will increase the cost of Membership Rewards transfers to its eight airline partners with effect from 23 February 2026. 

Frequent Flyer Programme	Conversion Ratio (AMEX: Partner)
	Plat Charge Centurion	Others
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250
	400 : 250 600 : 250	450 : 250 650 : 250
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250
	400 : 250 500 : 250	450 : 250 550 : 250

If you hold an AMEX Platinum Charge or AMEX Centurion, the cost of transfers will increase by 25% (50% for Emirates Skywards). 

For the AMEX Platinum Reserve, AMEX Platinum Credit Card and all other MR-earning cards, the cost of transfers will increase by 22% (44% for Emirates Skywards).

Since any MR points remaining in your account on 23 February will automatically be worth less, it would be ideal to transfer as many out as possible— though an argument could be made for maintaining a small “working capital” balance for hotel points transfers, or for AMEX events that require MR point redemptions. 

Here’s my take on which non-KrisFlyer programmes are worth considering.

The programmes I’m ignoring

First, let me tell you which programmes I wouldn’t bother with:

• Emirates Skywards (in any case, transfers are suspended until the new transfer ratios kick in)
• Malaysia Airlines Enrich
• Qantas Frequent Flyer
• THAI Royal Orchid Plus

Now, I’m not saying these are completely worthless. In fact, I’ve linked to some guides for each of these four programmes, which highlight the occasional pocket of value. 

That said, I don’t think they’re anywhere near as useful as Cathay Pacific Asia Miles, British Airways Club and EVA Air Infinity MileageLands for someone based in Singapore, and that’s what I’m going to focus on below.

Cathay Pacific Asia Miles

Asia Miles can be a worthy backup programme to KrisFlyer, giving you oneworld options alongside Star Alliance.

While there will be fuel surcharges for Cathay Pacific and most partner redemptions, the redemption cost in miles can be reasonable. Some potential sweet spots are listed below.

All Asia Miles earned from 1 January 2020 never expire, so long as you earn or redeem at least one mile every 18 months. 

British Airways Club

British Airways Club recently carried out an Avios devaluation, which saw most award costs increasing by around 10%.

However, there are still some worthwhile redemptions, such as:

• Economy Class awards below 650 miles (excluding CX & JL): 6,500 Avios
• Finnair Business Class from Singapore to Helsinki: 62,500 Avios 
• Qatar Airways Business Class awards from Singapore to Europe: 70,000 to 75,000 Avios

Fuel surcharges will again be an issue, though they will be mild on the ultra-short Economy routes, as well as Finnair (just S$22.70 from SIN-HEL!).

In addition to British Airways, Avios are also the legal tender for Qatar Privilege Club, Finnair Plus, Iberia Plus and a few other programmes.

Avios can be transferred at a 1:1 ratio between all these programmes, using a British Airways Club account as a central hub (e.g. if I want to convert from Qatar Privilege Club to Finnair Plus, I must convert Qatar > British > Finnair).

This allows you to tap additional sweet spots, as highlighted in the table below.

British Airways Avios do not expire, so long as you earn or redeem at least one Avios every 36 months.

EVA Air Infinity MileageLands

EVA Air’s frequent flyer programme, Infinity MileageLands (IML), is an underrated gem that offers some excellent redemption opportunities.

Here’s a comparison of one-way Business Class awards between KrisFlyer and IML, for travel on Singapore Airlines and EVA Air respectively.

There are a few caveats to highlight.

First, EVA Air does have fuel surcharges, but at least they’re fairly modest. For a one-way Business Class ticket, expect to pay:

• SIN-JFK/LAX/SFO/SEA: S$101.60
• SIN-NRT: S$71.60
• SIN-TPE: S$51.60

Second, EVA Air’s flight timings are not ideal for connections to North Asia destinations like Tokyo or Osaka. You will almost always have to do an overnight layover in TPE, since the North Asia flights depart before the inbound flight from Singapore arrives (this doesn’t have to be a bad thing- you could spend an evening in Taipei before jetting off again the following morning!).

Even if you insist on flying with Singapore Airlines, it’s worth noting that you could redeem SIA flights via the IML Star Alliance chart at a lower cost than KrisFlyer!

SIA flights do pop up on IML from time to time, though you need to take care because the IML search engine has been known to show phantom SQ space. What this means is that awards are shown, but when you complete the booking, you find that your seats are only waitlisted instead of confirmed (yes, IML allows you to waitlist for SQ seats, strange as it sounds).

Unfortunately, it’s a chicken and egg situation, as there’s no knowing whether the awards are actually available unless you have sufficient miles in your account to complete the booking.

By the way, EVA Air’s website and UX are clunky, to say the least, and booking award tickets for more than one person is a convoluted process that will raise your blood pressure. Spare yourself the aneurysm and refer to my guide below.

Guide: How to book EVA Air Infinity MileageLands awards for multiple travellers

IML miles expire 36 months after the date they were earned, regardless of activity. 

What about hotel points?

There is no change to the conversion rates to hotel programmes, namely Hilton Honors and Marriott Bonvoy.

Hotel Programme	Conversion Ratio (AMEX: Partner)
	Plat Charge Centurion	Others
	1,000 : 1,000	1,000 : 1,000
	1,000 : 1,250	1,000 : 1,250

To evaluate whether these are worth considering, we can think about it in terms of opportunity cost: how many airline miles are you giving up for each hotel point?

Hotel Programme	Miles per Hotel Point
	Plat Charge Centurion	Others
1,000 MR points = 1,000 pts	0.63	0.56
1,000 MR points = 1,250 pts	0.5	0.44

If you have an AMEX Platinum Charge or AMEX Centurion, then you’re giving up 0.63 miles per Marriott Bonvoy point, or 0.5 miles per Hilton Honors point.

Assuming you valued a KrisFlyer mile at 1.5 cents, then you would need to value a Marriott Bonvoy and Hilton Honors point at more than 0.94 cents and 0.75 cents respectively for the trade to be worthwhile. 

If you have an AMEX Platinum Reserve or AMEX Platinum Credit Card, then you’re giving up 0.56 miles per Marriott Bonvoy point, or 0.44 miles per Hilton Honors point. 

Assuming you valued a KrisFlyer mile at 1.5 cents, then you would need to value a Marriott Bonvoy and Hilton Honors point at more than 0.83 cents and 0.67 cents respectively for the trade to be worthwhile.

For reference, OMAAT values a Marriott Bonvoy and Hilton Honors point at 0.7 US cents (0.89 cents) and 0.5 US cents (0.64 cents) respectively, so it’s marginal in my opinion. You could even argue that Hilton points should be valued even lower, given the crazy award price hikes they’ve been doing of late. 

What about other options?

There is also no change to the cost of other Membership Rewards options, including Pay with Points (and Pay with Points+), eVouchers, or Amex Collectibles. 

However, I don’t think any of these are worth it, given the paltry valuation on offer. 

For example, Pay with Points is equivalent to accepting 0.77 cents per mile for the AMEX Platinum Charge and AMEX Centurion, and 0.86 cents per mile for the AMEX Platinum Reserve, AMEX Platinum Credit Card and all other MR-earning cards. 

Even the enhanced Pay with Points+ rate of 0.96 cents and 1.08 cents is well below what I’d trade a mile for. 

What if I’m waiting for my sign-up bonus?

If you recently signed up for an AMEX Platinum Charge or AMEX Platinum Credit Card, my advice to you is simple: complete your minimum spend as soon as possible.

Even though the T&Cs say that bonus MR points will only be credited after 12 weeks, in practice, they credit immediately upon meeting the minimum spend. This appears to be a recent change that took effect from early December 2025, and has been corroborated by numerous data points within the community. 

AMEX Membership Rewards devaluation: What about pending welcome offers?

As a reminder, these are the current welcome offers for the AMEX Platinum Charge and AMEX Platinum Credit Card— but only sign up if you’re certain you can beat the clock!

	Welcome Bonus	Till 22 Feb 26	From 23 Feb 26
AMEX Platinum Charge	190,000 MR points with S$8K spend* New Apply	106,250 miles	95,000 miles
	98,250 MR points with S$3K spend Existing Apply	61,406 miles	49,125 miles
AMEX Platinum Credit Card	43,750 MR points with S$1K spend New Apply	24,306 miles	19,886 miles
*This is slightly complicated. Of the 190,000 bonus MR points, only 90,000 will be credited this year. The remaining 100,000 MR points will be credited in the 15th month (i.e. second membership year). So even though it might be possible to dodge the devaluation on the 90,000, there’s no avoiding the devaluation on the 100,000.

Conclusion

With the AMEX Membership Rewards devaluation due to hit in a few weeks, now’s the time to sit down and really plan out your mileage requirements for the next few months or even years. 

Which destinations are you planning to visit? Which AMEX transfer partner offers the best value for that destination? Are you invested enough in Marriott Bonvoy or Hilton Honors that you’d prefer to keep some points on standby for hotels?

It’s hard to go wrong with KrisFlyer for someone based in Singapore, but don’t limit your horizons because other AMEX airline partners can offer better value depending on where you want to go.

Where are you transferring your Membership Rewards points?