Get a Free Night at a 5-Star Hotel With This Card's Limited-Time Sign-Up Bonus

The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card and Chase Sapphire Reserve® are excellent products, even without taking their welcome bonuses into consideration. Both offer valuable perks that can more than justify their annual fees for the right customers, and both are part of Chase's excellent rewards programs.

For a limited time, however, both cards are offering a welcome bonus of 75,000 bonus points that can be worth over $900 when redeemed for travel through Chase's Ultimate Rewards portal. Here's how to qualify for the bonuses, the key differences between the two cards to help decide which is best for you, and how you could use the bonus to book a five-star hotel stay for free.

A limited-time welcome offer worth $1,125 -- here's how to get it

Both the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card and Chase Sapphire Reserve® credit cards are currently offering identical limited-time welcome offers. The welcome offer for both cards is for 75,000 bonus points after spending $4,000 in the first 3 months.

Points are generally worth $0.01 each, with two big exceptions. They can be transferred to more than a dozen airline and hotel loyalty programs that partner with Chase, where the value can be far more depending on how you redeem them.

And they can be redeemed for travel purchases through Chase Ultimate Rewards at a valuation of $0.0125 per point for the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card or $0.015 for the Chase Sapphire Reserve®. The latter option makes the welcome bonus effectively worth $937.50 and $1,125, respectively, when used toward travel.

Chase Sapphire Preferred vs. Chase Sapphire Reserve

The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is a mid-tier travel credit card with a $95 annual fee, while the Chase Sapphire Reserve® is an ultra-premium card that costs $550 per year. As you might expect, there are some big differences in the features and benefits that come with them.

We'll start with the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card, which earns 5X points per $1 on travel booked through Chase Travel, 3X points per $1 on dining, online grocery orders, and select streaming services, 2X points per $1 on other travel purchases, and 1X point per $1 on everything else. It comes with a few other benefits, such as a free DoorDash DashPass subscription for at least a year, has travel and purchase protections, and offers a $50 statement credit toward a hotel stay once per year.

On the other hand, the Chase Sapphire Reserve® is a feature-packed credit card. For starters, it has more reward bonus categories, such as 10x points per $1 for hotels and car rentals booked through Chase Travel and 5x points per $1 on flights booked through the portal. It offers a $300 annual travel credit, a Priority Pass Select airport lounge network membership, reimbursement for a TSA PreCheck or Global Entry membership, and more.

While a $550 annual fee might sound like a lot to pay for a travel credit card, it effectively becomes $250 after you use the travel credit. And the airport lounge access can be worth far more than that for frequent travelers.

Can you really use the bonus for a five-star hotel stay?

The short answer is yes. While hotel prices can vary dramatically depending on the date you choose to book, there are plenty of five-star hotel options that fall within the value of the bonus, even in relatively expensive places.

For example, let's say I want to go to New York City this summer and stay at a five-star hotel in central Manhattan. Choosing a random Friday night in July shows a $796 nightly rate at the St. Regis New York and $676 at the Peninsula New York, and $820 at the Ritz-Carlton New York, Central Park. There are other five-star choices with nightly rates starting as low as $295. Depending on where you choose, the welcome bonus could even cover multiple nights at a five-star hotel.

Should you apply?

To be perfectly clear, we generally don't suggest applying for a credit card just to get the welcome bonus. But these are two top-tier credit cards even without considering the welcome bonus, so if the perks and benefits of either sound like a good value to you, the limited-time offer could make now a smart time to apply.