My affinity for the Chase Sapphire Reserve is no secret. It has been my favorite credit card since it debuted in 2016. Offering a perfect blend of static benefits and high point multiples, it has been the king of premium cards for nearly a decade.
With Chase significantly altering many of the benefits this year, I naturally wondered if my favorite card would be ruined. I did a quick analysis of these new benefits to see if this card can justify charging its $800 annual fee.
Static Benefits
Always the easiest to quantify.
$300 Travel Credit
The cornerstone credit thankfully remains untouched. Automatically applied to any and all eligible purchases. Easiest $300 you'll save all year.
$300 in DoorDash Credits
$5 / month in food credits. Two $10 promos / month on everything else. Can even be used on alcohol + THC.
$300 to StubHub
A frustrating theme with some of these new benefits is that they split the credits in two so that you can't utilize their full value in a single purchase.
Our first example being the $300 StubHub credit, which is really two $150 credits that you can use every 6 months.
While slightly annoying, and a little more mental effort than I'd prefer, I'll easily be able to take advantage of this.
Already in the Black
Those 3 credits alone net us $100 / year. The calculus is always so much easier when you don't even have to account for spending multiples to justify an annual fee.
I didn't even mention the $120 / year in Lyft credits, or the free Apple Music + Apple TV.
Let's keep this gravy train rolling with a new feature that I didn't expect to gain any value from.
$300 Dining Credit
When I first read about this stipend, I expected it to consist of a handful of over-the-top restaurants in Manhattan and London that I'd never be able to visit, let alone afford.
Diving a little deeper, this credit can be leveraged in many major US cities.
In ATX, I was surprised to see many of my favorite places, that I already frequent, were eligible.
Full list here.
In addition to the dining credit, OpenTable is now offering a number of "Sapphire Reserve exclusive" tables at these establishments. Again, I expected to gain nothing from this. Then I decided to check if I go could get some last minute brunch reservations at Austin's famous Suerte - a normally impossible task. Sure enough, there were tables set aside for us chosen Reserve holders. Color me a believer.
$500 Southwest Credit
A new concept that Chase introduced in their Reserve overhaul was enabling certain perks only to those members who spend a certain threshold per year - in this case, $75k.
Chase's goal in doing this is clear: they want to capture all of your spending onto the Reserve card. They no longer want you to hop around to other cards where you might earn a higher spending multiple. In my case, the Chase Freedom Unlimited, where I earn 1.5x points on everything. A 50% premium to the Reserve's 1x point on ordinary purchases.
Worth Putting All Spend on Sapphire?
Some rough calculus: assume you do spend $75k / year on cards, but only $40k on your Reserve. At first glance, It might seem like a lot to sacrifice $35k in spend on a lower-earning card. The 0.5x extra points you're forfeiting are worth $175 / year. The $500 Southwest credit more than makes up for that. Plus, it reduces that slight mental strain of "which card is best" for every purchase. A win in my book.
$500 Hotel Credit
Amex has a similar feature of highly-curated (read: expensive) hotels that they encourage you to stay at in exchange for a credit and a few minor perks: late checkouts, food / drink credits, etc.
Sometimes you can find a semi-affordable diamond in the rough, depending on the city. I've often found credits like this to be more work than their worth. I hope Chase does a better job at it, but I'm not holding my breath. Thankfully, this bonus will be pure gravy and doesn't sway my decision to hold the card.
This credit is another that is split across two installments - $250 every 6 months.
Lounges
Chase has always lagged behind Amex when it comes to lounges, both in quantity and quality. With Chase's rapid expansion of premium lounges, it's clear they're aggressively pursuing Amex's previous strangehold on luxury consumers. Given that nearly every major airport I fly into will soon have a Chase lounge, I'm seriously considering cancelling my Amex Plat.
Hotel + Airline Statuses, Concierge Services, Etc
There are a lot of other minor perks I didn't dwell into, primarily because I hold them of little to no value. IHG Diamond Elite Status, Southwest A-list status, Reserve concierge. Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but I've never drawn significant benefit by holding status with a certain airline or hotel.
Point Multiples
8x on Chase Travel
This is a downgrade in a few aspects, as booking hotels and rental cars through the Chase portal at one time netted you 10x points. I'll count this as a net win though, since it now includes 8x points on flights. Chase's goal is again clear with this move: give us all your travel bookings. Given the high multiple and relative ease of using the Chase portal, I'm inclined to honor this incentive.
You also earn 4x points when booking directly through hotels and airlines. A 1x jump from the previous 3x.
3x on Dining
The Reserve continues to be the go-to dining card. This feature being maintained, in addition to the new select dining credits, further enhances that.
Goodbye 50% Chase Portal Premium
Before these new rules, it used to be that you would receive a 50% premium on all Chase points when redeemed through the Chase travel portal. If you were a holder of the other cards, this often resulted in a cumulative spending multiple between 2.25x for the Freedom Unlimited, to as high as 7.5x when using the Freedom on select categories.
You can still combine your points from Chase's family of other cards, thankfully.
While I was sad to see this go, given that you now earn a higher multiple on bookings through the Chase portal, I'm going to call this a wash.
Long Live the King
All in all, the Sapphire Reserve continues to be the premier credit card.
Given the new incentives for reaching spending thresholds, it might well now be the only card you need. I love earning a nice yield on my spending, but the longer I've played this game, the more I cherish simplicity.
Chase continues to provide static benefits that their customers actually want, in addition to appropriately rewarding premium spending.
Those who can look past the sticker-shock of the annual fee, have a plethora of value to be gained.
Keeping Track of It All
I'll confess that a lot of these benefits aren't as easy to take advantage of as I would like. Outside of the $300 travel credit (which is automatically applied), a lot of these are going to take a little effort to gain full benefit.
In my efforts to work more smarter, I made this little cheat sheet that I have pinned at the top of my phone Notes.
Sapphire Perks:
- $300 travel credit: ✅
- $300 dining credit ($150 / period):
- Eligible restaurants: https://www.opentable.com/visa/austin
- Jan - June: ✅
- July - Dec:
- $300 StubHub Credits ($150 / period):
- Jan - June:
- July - Dec:
- $500 hotel credit ($250 / period):
- Jan - June:
- July - Dec: ✅
If $75k annual spend is hit:
- $500 Southwest Credit:
- $250 Chase Shops Credit: