Today, June 10, 2026, Chase announced a refresh of the Chase Sapphire Preferred, including new and updated benefits that will be effective starting June 15th, 2026.
Overall, these are positive changes, but there is a decrease in the Ultimate Rewards transfer ratio to World of Hyatt, which impacts one of the most valuable redemptions available on the card.
Here’s what you need to know about the changes.
Overview of the Sapphire Preferred changes
Here are all of the changes that were announced today. Importantly, the Sapphire Preferred’s annual fee is not increasing as part of these changes. In the last few months, there was a lot of speculation on Reddit and elsewhere that the card’s annual fee would be increasing. Fortunately, this si not the case.
Positive changes
Increased (3x) points on gas, EV charging, and vacation homes. Previously the card would earn only 1x on gas and EV charging, as these would be treated like general purchases. Vacation homes previously would earn 2x as a travel purchase.
Chase Travel Hotel Credit increased from $50 to $100. We are unsure whether existing cardmembers will receive this after their next anniversary or granted the increased credit in the current year.
New trusted traveler credit. You can now receive up to $120 toward Global Entry, TSA PreCheck, or Nexus once every four years.
Added Emergency Evacuation and Transportation insurance. We don’t yet have details about what this includes, but will update this post once those details are available.
Complimentary Apple TV subscription for one year. To take advantage of this benefit, you must activate by December 31, 2026.
Negative changes
End of the 10% anniversary bonus. Prior to these changes, you could earn an anniversary bonus equal to 10% of the total dollars spent on the card (not the total points you earned). Cardmembers who applied before June 15, 2026 will continue to earn the anniversary bonus on purchases through October 1, 2026. (This had been previously reported by Frequent Miler.)
Devaluation of Hyatt transfers. Effective for new cardmembers who apply after June 15, 2026, transfers to World of Hyatt will be at a 4:3 ratio, instead of the current 1:1 ratio. For existing cardmembers, you have until October 1, 2026 to transfer points to Hyatt at a 1:1 ratio.
Changes are overall good. But Hyatt devaluation hurts.
Aaron Hurd
Executive Editor of Cards and Points
Credit card forums have been abuzz with speculation about a coming Sapphire Preferred refresh for the last year. But of course this happened literally days after I released a video guide to the Sapphire Preferred on my YouTube channel. Oh well.
I’m most excited to see the 3x points on gas and EV charging and the increased in the Chase Travel Hotel Credit.
Frankly, one of the most glaring disadvantages of the Ultimate Rewards ecosystem is that it offers relatively poor rewards in common spending categories like gas and groceries. The updates to the Sapphire Preferred’s earning fixes part of that.
And increasing the hotel credit likely provides $50 of value to most Sapphire Preferred cardmembers. I’m imagine the overwhelming majority of hotel stays booked through Chase Travel are more than $100 total. So if you were booking at least one hotel stay through Chase to capture the value of your $50 credit, you’re probably going to have to do no additional work to capture a marginal $50 of value. Fantastic!
The trusted travel credit doesn’t excite me personally, because I have so many cards with this same benefit, but for your average Sapphire Preferred customer who doesn’t have 40+ credit cards, this adds real value. And the emergency evacuation and transportation insurance could be quite valuable, depending on the restrictions.
Of course, I am bummed about the devaulation of Hyatt transfers for the Sapphire Preferred. The change in transfer ratio means a 25% cut to the value that I can get from my Hyatt points.
Does that make Hyatt a worthless transfer partner as many influencers are saying? Absolutely not. Hyatt points are still valuable enough that the transfer partner is useful and I’ll continue to use it. But the change does really take the shine off the Ultimate Rewards ecosystem.
Finally, since these changes go into effect on June 15, 2026, I’d speculate than an increased Sapphire Preferred welcome bonus will be launched at that time.
Overall, I think that these are positive changes for most cardmembers. After all, the majority of Sapphire Preferred cardmembers probably do not mess with points transfers to partners. And I’m extremely pleased to see that Chase has chosen not to up the annual fee.
