A Massive Hyatt Points Devaluation Is Upon Us: Here’s What You May Have Missed

If you’ve been in this space for long enough, then you’d know that the World of Hyatt program continues to be a favorite for many who ardently keep accumulating points for their next vacation. Over the years, Hyatt has been a popular program not only because they’ve maintained a decent loyalty program with an award chart, as opposed to their peers like Hilton and Marriott who’ve gone completely dynamic in their pricing. However, this announcement from last night may have disappointed many.

Hyatt Devaluation Explained – Beyond the Numbers

If you simply take it at face value, you’ll see that the prices have gone up at the higher category levels, which is always expected with devaluations. At the lower end, however, the prices have fallen, only by a bit.

Here’s a quick summary of the changes. As per the press release, these changes will go into effect at some point of time in May 2026. You can view the new award chart here:

• Hyatt will continue to have 8 category levels but will move from three pricing tiers to five. Hyatt has had three tiers: off peak, standard and peak. Now, moving forward, they will have five tiers: lowest, low, moderate, upper, top.
• Also, you’ll now be able to share points digitally, which makes things much much easier.
• Explorists, Globalists, Lifetime Globalists and World of Hyatt Cardmembers will now be able to access award night availability earlier than other members.

Moreover, Hyatt will announce shifts in hotel category levels, as they usually do each year. However, the following category level changes are going to be effective immediately:

• The Barnett, part of JdV by Hyatt, will move from Category 5 to Category 4
• Grand Hyatt Grand Cayman Resort & Spa will move from Category 6 to Category 8
• Hyatt Place San Antonio-Northwest/Medical Center will move from Category 1 to Category 2
• Andaz Pattaya Jomtien Beach will move from Category 4 to Category 5
• Grand Hyatt Incheon will move from Category 3 to Category 4
• Hyatt Centric Malta will move from Category 2 to Category 3
• Hyatt Regency Kotor Bay Resort will move from Category 4 to Category 5

Pricing Changes

• Earlier, we had 8 categories and 3 pricing segments. Now, we’ll have 8 categories and 5 pricing segments. In essence, we’ll be going from 24 prices to 40 different prices on Hyatt’s award chart.
• At the lower end, there’s actually a drop in pricing from 3,500 points to 3,000 points. However, that pales in comparison to the massive jump at the higher end. Peak pricing has jumped for Category 8 hotels from 45,000 points per night to a massive 75,000 points per night! That’s a massive increase of 67%.
• It’s not like peak prices for Category 6 or 7 are any better, jumping by 38% and 57% respectively. Even Category 2 and 5 are seeing jumps of over 50% for peak pricing.
• Hyatt has also updated the charts for club level rooms, suites, Miraval and all inclusive resorts as well.

Moving forward, for Category 8, the pricing will look like this at the top-most pricing band out of the five pricing bands:

• 85,000 points per night for a Club Level Room
• 96,000 point per night for a Standard Suite
• 110,000 points per night for a Premium Suite
• 85,000 points per night for a Category F all inclusive resort, with a whopping 42,500 per night for each additional person!

My Take: This is a Massive Devaluation, Marketed as ‘Continued Transparency’

As per the press release, Hyatt’s touting the fact that while the pricing is still changing, at least, it’s predictable and transparent.

“Our members tell us they value transparency and the ability to plan with confidence,” said Laurie Blair, senior vice president, global marketing and loyalty, Hyatt. “We know change can be difficult, especially in a loyalty program our members care deeply about. This update reinforces our commitment to a published award chart with fixed point thresholds while ensuring World of Hyatt remains strong, sustainable and rewarding for years to come.”

Yes, on the positive side, we can still see the prices on a chart (unlike Hilton and Marriott who don’t have award charts any more), but when you look at the numbers, the jumps are massive in some cases.

What You May Have Missed

Here’s one aspect of the whole thing I find particularly interesting. Every year, around April, Hyatt announces category award changes. More often than not, you’ll see popular properties go up in category levels. You’ll see that news being covered by multiple blogs in this space. Moving forward, category movements will actually become less newsworthy and common. Why? Because, Hyatt has now expanded the pricing bands from three to five. This is key, because it gives an existing property to increase their pricing significantly without having to change their category.

Let’s compare that by comparing the pricing range for each category in the old and new chart:

If you look at how broad the ranges are now, you”ll see that a given property has a lot of leeway and can charge any price out of the five price points in a range of 40,000 points for Category 9 and 20,000 points for Category 5 & 6. What this means is that even if a given property doesn’t go up in category, they still have enough room to increase prices in a wide range.

The Pundit’s Mantra

Hyatt is touting these changes as enhancements to the program. There are a few things that they deserve credit for. Firstly, they’ve still kept an award chart alive, unlike some of their peers. Secondly, this change has been announced well in advance, instead of being a sudden unannounced change.

However, it doesn’t change the fact that these prices increases are massive and moving forward, you’ll be paying a lot more in Hyatt points for the same redemptions.

What’s your impression of these changes made by World of Hyatt? Tell us in the comments section.

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