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Hilton Honors Status Match Devaluation — Here’s How to Still Earn Status Easily

  • Jason Stauffer

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    (Photo courtesy of Hilton)

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    INSIDER SECRET: The easiest top-tier hotel status to earn is Hilton’s Diamond elite status because it comes automatically with the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card

    The Hilton Honors program has long been very generous with its status match opportunities. If you had status with just about any major hotel chain you were able to easy register for a trial of the equivalent Hilton status with an opportunity to easily extend the status beyond the trial period.

    Now Hilton has overhauled the terms of its status match limiting the instant match to Hilton Gold status and making it more difficult to extend the status match or earn top-tier Diamond status.

    The information for the Hilton Aspire card and Hilton Surpass card has been collected independently by Million Mile Secrets. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.

    Hilton Honors Revamps Status Match

    Previously, you were able to match top-tier status instantly to Hilton Diamond or Gold status for 90 days and then if you made a certain number of stays during that period the status would be extended. This is great because you could take advantage of the elite status benefits right away.

    Now you are only able to instantly match to Hilton Gold status for 90 days, with an opportunity to fast-track your way to Diamond status. Once your status is matched you can extend your Gold status or earn Diamond status through March 31, 2021, by meeting these requirements during the 90 days:

    Normally you need 20 stays, 40 nights or 75,000 base points in a calendar year for Gold status or 30 stays, 60 nights or 120,000 base points in a calendar year to earn Diamond status. You can submit a request for a status match here.

    Hilton doesn’t publish which hotel statuses it will match with, but you will need proof of your current elite status level of the other hotel program and proof of a stay within the past 12 months at that chain. Screenshots of you account or hotel receipts will suffice, just make sure to remove any personal information other than your name and account number.

    While this is a negative change Hilton status is still very easy to earn. I get Diamond status with my Hilton Aspire card, but if you don’t have any Hilton status you might want to go for Gold. Gold Hilton status comes with free breakfast (something even the top-tier status as IHG doesn’t have) and it’s comes automatically with the Hilton Honors American Express Surpass® Card.

    Plus right now the Hilton Surpass card has a limited-time increased offer for 130,000 Hilton points and a free weekend night after spending $4,000 on purchases in the first four months of account opening. Offer ends August 28, 2019. Normally this card doesn’t come with a free weekend night as part of the intro bonus, so this is an incredibly valuable deal. If you want to learn more about the card you can read our Hilton Surpass review for all the details.

    To learn more about the Hilton Honor program, check out these detailed guides:

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    Featured image courtesy of Hilton.

    Editorial Note: We're the Million Mile Secrets team. And we're proud of our content, opinions and analysis, and of our reader's comments. These haven’t been reviewed, approved or endorsed by any of the airlines, hotels, or credit card issuers which we often write about. And that’s just how we like it! :)