This article was updated in April of 2023.
Most people earn the majority of their points and miles through credit card sign up bonuses. There are numerous other ways to earn points and miles that don’t involve getting a new credit card or even flying. It’s really easy to earn more points and miles if you pay attention to when and how you spend your money and what credit card you use. If you are currently using a debit card, it’s best to switch to credit cards as they are more secure and offer better protections and benefits. Here are the 14 ways to easily earn more points and miles from everyday spending:
1. Spend on the right credit card
Look at the credit cards you currently have and find out how many points you earn for each category. Some cards give you 4x on dining and grocery or some give 3x on travel or 8x on gas. It can make a big difference in your points balance if you pay attention to which card you use. You can put stickers on your credit cards to remind you of each card’s bonus categories, or there are some apps that help you keep track. The best ones I’ve found are Wallet Flo, Card Pointers, The Points Guy and Max Rewards.
2. Make sure you have a credit card that earns at least 1.5x or 2x on all of your spend
Any spend that you can’t earn more than 1.5 or 2x on should go on this card. Personal cards that give at least 1.5x are the the Chase Freedom Unlimited, Citi Double Cash, and the Capital One Venture and Venture X. Business Credit Cards that earn at least 1.5x on all spend are the American Express Blue Business Plus, Chase Ink Business Unlimited and the Capital One Spark Miles.
3. Earn points on paying rent
A fairly new addition to the credit card rewards space is Bilt Rewards. This is a program that allows you to earn points on rent payments.. Even if your apartment complex isn’t part of the Bilt Rewards network you can still earn points on rent payments without any service fee. You’re paying rent anyway so you might as well be earning points for it to fund your next trip. Bilt also has a credit card which allows you to earn even more points. With the credit card you earn 3x on dining, 2x on travel and 1x on rent and all other purchases. You can transfer your Bilt points to 12 airlines and 2 hotel brands. In my opinion, if you are paying high rent then the Bilt credit card is a no brainer. You can earn up to 50,000 points a year on rent payments. Used correctly, these points could get you a one way business class trip to Europe or a roundtrip economy. This could also get you 10 nights at a Category 1 Hyatt Place. Bilt also has a program where you can use your points towards a down payment when you purchase a home.
Bilt also has fun rent day challenges on the first of every month in their app. You can answer trivia questions and challenges to earn free Bilt Points. I don’t have the Bilt credit card but I have 850 Bilt Rewards points from participating in the challenges for 3 months.
You can find out more about Bilt Rewards and sign up for a free account here : https://www.biltrewards.com/card/referral/NBS1-4N89
4. Take advantage of Rakuten, airline and hotel shopping portals
There are many shopping portals where you can earn points and miles for the shopping you were doing to do anyway. All you do is open the website of the shopping portal first, then find the store you want to shop at and click through the link in the shopping portal to that store. It’s free to create an account and will only take a few minutes. The best website for earning points for travel is Rakuten. Rakuten is advertised as a cash back website, and it is. However, you can change your earnings preference in your settings to earn American Express Membership Rewards Points. This is the way to go if you really want to earn more points and miles for travel since it is much more lucrative than cash back. Keep in mind you do need to have an American Express Card that earns Membership Rewards Points in order to earn points instead of cash back with Rakuten. I have other articles about Rakuten that you can find by using the search option in the top of this page. Here is my Rakuten referral link. Currently new Rakuten users can earn $30 or 3000 points back after spending $30. https://www.rakuten.com/r/HOLLYC2147?eeid=28187
Most airlines also have their own shopping portal. Delta, American, United, Alaska, Jet Blue, Southwest and British Airways all have shopping portals. Wyndham Hotels and Chase Bank also have them. Wyndham has been known to have some really great offers occasionally. They have had 10,500 points for Blue Apron and 9x for Apple Store purchases. In 2022 I earned 18,000 points for $30 of dog food from Nom Nom! Wyndham may not have the nicest properties in the US, but they have some nicer international properties and you can also transfer Wyndham points to Vacasa and book a Vacation rental for 15,000 points a night. Rakuten and all of the airline shopping portals have shopping “plug in’s” that you install in your browser so every time you visit a store that is offered in the shopping portal then you will get a notification at the top of your screen asking if you would like to activate that shopping portal.
I typically shop through either Rakuten or the American Airlines shopping portal. In the picture below, I was starting to shop at Adidas. Since I have the Rakuten and American plug in’s, both notifications popped up on the screen. Rakuten typically tells you a % cash back , but if you have your settings set to earn MR points then 8% cash back is 8x points. I would rather have 8x MR points than 5x American Airlines points, so I will activate Rakuten. To find these “plug in’s” you can google Rakuten plug in or Delta Shopping plug in, etc.
5. Save most of your shopping until holiday weekends if possible
Obviously this isn’t possible for grocery shopping, but it can be for clothing shopping, a major home renovation or a new computer. Shopping portals are known to have elevated rates around almost every holiday. If it’s considered a bank holiday, there is a good chance rates will be elevated. Also sometimes Rakuten has higher rates if you shop through their app, so don’t forget to check there.
6. Charge everything you can to credit cards
Take the time to go through your bills to see what you can pay by credit card and get your bills set up on autopay. Look at your power, gas , cable, internet, car insurance, homeowners insurance, health insurance, security alarm service, cell phone bill, streaming services and your property tax bill. If you are having work done on your house, see if they will take a credit card. Same with the yard guy, or any other service you pay for. Get in the habit of charging everything to your credit card. Sometimes there might be a small fee to use a credit card so that is something to take into consideration. Sometimes it’s worth it to pay a 3% fee if you really need the points for an upcoming vacation or you are working on a credit card sign up bonus and you need to meet the minimum spend requirements.
7. Take advantage of dining portals
Most airlines and hotels have dining portals which are also free to join. These are similar to shopping portals but for eating out. Some of them are run by the same company, so if you sign up for multiple portals then you might be unenrolled from another one, so pick your favorite. If you live in large city you will typically have lots of restaurant options. Smaller towns may only have a handful of options. You link a credit card to your dining portal account and it will automatically track. Of course, use your card that offers the best rewards on dining.
8. Simply Miles
Simply Miles is a website that allows you to earn American Airlines Loyalty Points for shopping at certain stores. If your credit card isn’t in your Simply Miles profile you won’t earn the extra miles, so it’s best to go ahead and enter all of your Mastercards into your profile when you sign up. It’s no fun when you think you got a great deal and are going to earn lots of points only to find out you forgot to register that Mastercard. Keep in mind you have to activate the offers first. It’s also important to read the terms and conditions of each offer to see what purchases will count.
You can also frequently double dip Simply Miles offers with Citibank Merchant offers. I recently earned 4374 AA Loyalty Points for purchasing a yearly subscription to Craftsy. I’m not crafty and have no interest in Craftsy other than for the points. There was also a Citi offer for 98% back so I paid $97 for the subscription and got a credit back to my Citibank card for $94. That means I got 4347 AA Points for $3! If you ever do a subscription deal, just make sure you stay on top of auto-renewals and cancel if you don’t want to renew.
Simply Miles can be very lucrative. They often offer thousands of miles for meal kit sign up’s and in 2021 they had an unbelievable deal of 240x for a charity donation. I donated $1000 and earned 240,000 American Airlines Loyalty Points! Some people donated $15,000 – $20,000!
Here is the link to sign up with Simply Miles:
9. Pay your taxes with a credit card
Currently there are 3 websites where you can pay your taxes by credit card. You do have to pay a fee so make sure it’s worth it. I personally use Pay1040 since they charge the lowest rate at 1.87%. I am typically always working on a new credit card sign up bonus and this helps me meet the minimum spend requirements to get the bonus. Here is a link to the IRS website with more information about paying by credit card. https://www.irs.gov/payments/pay-your-taxes-by-debit-or-credit-card
10. Register for every hotel promo
Even if you aren’t sure you will stay at that hotel chain during the promotion go ahead and register. You never know when your plans might change. Loyalty Lobby, https://loyaltylobby.com is a great resource for this.
11. Earn miles with rental cars
Most rental car companies allow you to earn airline miles or hotel points instead of earning points with the rental car company. If you don’t rent a car frequently then it probably makes more sense to earn hotel points or airline miles. You need to choose this option within your profile on the rental car website. Typically airline miles are more valuable than hotel points so I normally choose to earn airline miles. Of course, click through a shopping portal when you are booking that rental car also to earn more points and miles.
12. Other ways
Hilton and Delta partner with Lyft, Marriott with Uber/Uber Eats and Delta with Instacart, Ticketmaster, Turo and Starbucks. If you use any of these services, make sure you link your accounts so you can earn points and miles. If you stay at Airbnb’s you can earn miles on Delta, United, Qantas, ANA or British Airways. A simple google search should lead you to more information about this and how to link your accounts. Often there is a sign up bonus for linking your accounts so make sure to google that before you sign up. Currently Marriott is offering 3,000 points if you link your Marriott and Uber accounts. Delta is currently offering 2,000 miles if you link your Delta and Turo accounts and complete your first rental.
13. Cash Back Portals
Cash Back shopping portals are a great way to earn some extra cash and you can use the cash for travel. Cash Back Monitor, http://www.cashbackmonitor.com, is a website that monitors every shopping portal daily. It’s a good idea to look here first to see which shopping portal is offering the best rate the day you are going to shop. Some of the portals are cash back portals, which sometimes offer better rates than the other portals I mentioned. Some of the portals require $20 or $25 in earnings before they pay out, so it’s a good idea not to use too many portals because then you have a little money spread out in many portals. My favorite cash back portals are Rebates Me, Be Frugal, Max Rebates and Extrabux. I have never had trouble with a purchase tracking.
14. Cash Back Apps
Dosh, Payce, and Google Pay are card linked apps where you earn cash back when you spend at certain stores on a card registered in the app. Payce requires you to log in at the beginning of the month to activate all of your offers. Google Pay requires you to activate offers first. Using these 3 Apps you can also double dip with a shopping portal and earn cash back through the app and the shopping portal.
Paypal also has a page titled Deals that offers cash back. You do have to click on the deal within PayPal to activate the offer. You will have to pay with PayPal so keep in mind if you are trying to double dip with another offer it may not work since it will show up as a PayPal purchase. PayPal recently made updates to their deals so I am not entirely sure if you have to click through PayPal to redeem the offers of if just using the primary card that is linked to your PayPal account is sufficient.
Upside is a gas app that gives cash back for gas purchases. You also have to register your card within the app. If you google “upside promo codes” you can often find promo codes to get more discounts. You have to enter the promo code in your profile settings.
Lolli is a cash back app that has card linked offers that work in 2 ways. Some offers require you to activate them first by clicking on “activate”. I frequently use the 2% cash back Walmart offer when I shop in person, get gas, or get my prescriptions filled. They have other offers that you must click through Lolli before you shop to earn cash back. Here is my referral link to Lolli if you would like to sign up. New users get $5. https://lolli.com/share/dB6j84r4iJ
Fluz and Slide are 2 apps where you can purchase gift cards and receive a % cash back. Lets say you are shopping online at Petco. Once you have all of your items in your cart and have a total including taxes , you would go into the Fluz or Slide app and buy an exact value gift card and earn 5% back. The cash back % is different for every store. Keep in mind if you return any items you will receive a gift card back.
If you would like to sign up for Slide or Fluz my referral links are below. If you use my referral link for Slide you will get a $20 credit paid out as a $5 credit for each of your first 4 purchases If you use my Fluz referral link you get 3 vouchers for 35% back at a handful of stores.
Fluz – http://HOLLYCLIMBING5230DC00
Slide – https://slide.app.link/RFZEMEM4L4VSECS
I hope all of these suggestions help you earn tons more points and allow you to travel more , and of course, mostly free! 🙂
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