Marriott Bonvoy has just rolled out a positive change, though perhaps in reality it’s just intended to slightly offset the points inflation we’ve seen in recent years.
Marriott expands free night award top off feature
In early 2022, Marriott Bonvoy rolled out a new functionality, whereby free night awards could be topped off with up to 15,000 points per night to stay at a more expensive property (compared to not being able to top them off at all). In other words, if you have a free night certificate valid at a property costing up to 50,000 points, you could redeem the certificate plus 15,000 points for a stay at a property costing 65,000 points.
There’s now an update — as of March 12, 2026, Marriott Bonvoy members are able to top off free night awards with up to 25,000 points, so that’s a 67% increase in terms of the number of points with which free night awards can be topped off.
To cover the basics:
- This is valid for all free night awards, including those issued through co-brand credit cards, promotions, and program benefits, such as Choice Benefits
- Members have the flexibility to add points to each eligible free night award, including those used to book a multi-night stay, and this can be done during the booking process
- Members can still apply nightly upgrade awards on these reservations
- Should a member choose to modify a reservation in any way, it may impact the points needed to redeem for the stay
This is a positive change, but it’s hard to get too excited
I don’t want to be negative about an improvement, as it’s nice to see some added flexibility for these certificates. However, as anyone who is engaged in the Marriott Bonvoy program can attest to, being able to top off free night awards with 10,000 more points than before doesn’t even keep up with inflation.
Nowadays Marriott Bonvoy’s top properties sometimes retail for over 200,000 points per night, so even with a top off, a certificate could still be a long way off from securing a room at many properties. It sure would be nice if Marriott didn’t cap the extent to which these free night awards could be topped off… after all, members have to earn those points through engagement anyway!
Hotel loyalty programs seem divided on free night award flexibility:
- Hilton Honors free night awards all don’t have category caps, and can be redeemed at nearly all properties
- IHG One Rewards free night awards can be topped off with an unlimited number of points
- World of Hyatt free night awards can’t be topped off with points
Bottom line
It’s now possible to top off Marriott Bonvoy free night awards with up to 25,000 Bonvoy points to redeem at more expensive properties, an increase from the previous policy of being able to redeem up to 15,000 additional points.
This means certificates worth 35,000 points can now be redeemed at properties costing up to 60,000 points, certificates worth 50,000 points can now be redeemed at properties costing up to 75,000 points, and 85,000 point certificates can be redeemed at properties pricing up to 110,000 points.
What do you make of Marriott Bonvoy’s expanded points top off feature?
