Marriott Bonvoy Boundless Review: Free Night Award, Elite Status
The Bottom Line
4.0
The free night's stay each account anniversary more than makes up for the card's annual fee. The rewards and redemption options are grand, too.
Rates, fees and offers
Annual fee
$95
Rewards rate
2x-17x
Bonus offer
Earn 3 Free Night Awards (each night valued up to 50,000 points) after spending $3,000 on purchases in your first 3 months from account opening with the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card!
Intro APR
N/A
Ongoing APR
APR: 20.74%-27.74% Variable APR
Cash Advance APR: 29.49%, Variable
Penalty APR: Up to 29.99%
Balance transfer fee
Either $5 or 5% of the amount of each transfer, whichever is greater.
Foreign transaction fee
$0
More details from Chase
- Earn 3 Free Night Awards (each night valued up to 50,000 points) after qualifying purchases.
- Earn 3X points per $1 on the first $6,000 spent in combined purchases each year on grocery stores, gas stations, and dining.
- Earn 1 Elite Night Credit towards Elite Status for every $5,000 you spend.
- 1 Free Night Award (valued up to 35,000 points) every year after account anniversary.
- Earn up to 17X total points per $1 spent at thousands of hotels participating in Marriott Bonvoy® with the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Card.
- Receive 15 Elite Night Credits annually, automatic Silver Elite status, and path to Gold Status when you spend $35,000 on purchases each calendar year.
- No Foreign Transaction Fees. Your points don't expire as long as you make purchases on your card every 24 months.
- Member FDIC
Pros and Cons
Pros
Anniversary perk
High rewards rate
Automatic elite status
Cons
Has annual fee
Rewards have limited flexibility
Detailed Review
For travelers who stay at hotels often, the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card is worth every penny — even at $95 a year.
The card comes stacked with top-shelf benefits: a free hotel night once a year, automatic elite status and plentiful redemption options. For travelers who stay at Marriott's huge portfolio of properties more than once in a while, it's a fine pick.
Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card: Basics
Card type: Hotel.
Annual fee: $95.
Sign-up bonus: Earn 3 Free Night Awards (each night valued up to 50,000 points) after spending $3,000 on purchases in your first 3 months from account opening with the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card!
Ongoing rewards:
6 Marriott Bonvoy® points per $1 spent at participating Marriott Bonvoy hotels.
3 Marriott Bonvoy® points per $1 spent spent in combined purchases each year on grocery stores, gas stations and dining (up to $6,000 in combined purchases each year; 2 points per $1 spent thereafter).
2 Marriott Bonvoy® points per $1 spent on all other eligible purchases.
Rewards earned by using the credit card are in addition to points you earn as a member of the Marriott Bonvoy program.
NerdWallet values Marriott points at 0.9 cent each. This is drawn from real-world data, but it's not a maximized value. In other words, you should aim for award redemptions that offer 0.9 cent or more in value from your Marriott points.
Redemption options:
At Marriott hotels.
For flights or car rentals.
For travel by transferring points to multiple airline partners, usually at a 3:1 ratio (for every 3 Bonvoy points, you'll get 1 airline mile).
Foreign transaction fees: None.
Other benefits:
Free Night Award (valued up to 35,000 points) every year after account anniversary.
Automatic Silver Elite status and accelerated path to Gold status.
Earn 1 Elite Night Credit towards Elite Status for every $5,000 you spend.
How the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card compares to other Bonvoy cards
Compared to other Marriott Bonvoy cards, the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card's annual fee is on the lower end. But depending on what perks you'll use the most, it could be more lucrative than some of its higher-fee siblings. Most notably, the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card features an automatic Free Night Award after every cardholder anniversary. You'll only get a Free Night Award with the $250-annual-fee Marriott Bonvoy Bountiful™ Card and Marriott Bonvoy Bevy™ American Express® Card after you spend $15,000 in a year.
Here's how the cards compare:
Marriott Bonvoy Bold® Credit Card (from Chase, $0 annual fee) |
|
Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card (from Chase, $95 annual fee) |
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Marriott Bonvoy Bevy™ American Express® Card ($250 annual fee) |
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Marriott Bonvoy Bountiful™ Card (from Chase, $250 annual fee) |
|
Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant® American Express® Card ($650 annual fee) |
|
Compare to Other Cards
Benefits and Perks
Valuable ongoing rewards
In addition to the card's robust ongoing rewards, you can earn points for Marriott purchases just by being a Marriott Bonvoy member. You'll earn up to 10 points per dollar spent on qualifying charges, depending on the location. Combined with the 6 points per dollar earned with the card, that's up to 16 total points per dollar. With the Silver Elite status the card provides, you’ll also qualify for a 10% bonus on points earned through your Marriott membership. More on that later.
You'll also have plenty of opportunities to redeem those rewards. As of 2024, Marriott Bonvoy has over 8,000 hotels participating in its rewards program. The massive scale of this hotel network makes this card especially valuable for folks looking for plenty of redemption opportunities. Locations aren't limited to big cities, as is the case with some hotel brands.
Free anniversary night
This is perhaps the most valuable benefit on this card. Every year, the card gets you a free night award worth up to 35,000 points. That more than makes up for the annual fee of $95.
This free night expires after 12 months. If you travel less frequently but always stay at Marriott, this benefit alone might give you reason enough to get this card.
Automatic elite status
The Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card automatically comes with Silver Elite status. That status, which is one step up from basic membership, gets you some goodies, including:
Priority late checkout, based on availability.
10% bonus on Marriott points.
The 10% bonus on points applies to points earned through the hotel, not through your credit card. Say you spent $200 on a hotel stay and earned 2,000 base points through Marriott and 1,200 points through the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card. The 10% boost would add 200 points to the points earned through Marriott, so you’d earn 3,400 points in total.
With this card, you can also earn Gold Elite status if you spend $35,000 or more each account anniversary year. After this threshold is reached, your Gold Elite status will be in effect through Dec. 31 of the following year.
Cardholders will earn one elite night credit per $5,000 spent on purchases on the card. Marriott's metric for earning elite status, elite night credits are typically earned through hotel stays. The Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card automatically gives 15 elite night credits per year, along with automatic Silver Elite status. But the card gives another avenue to earn elevated status just through credit card spending.
Drawbacks and Considerations
Annual fee
The perks on the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card make it well worth its annual fee of $95. But if you can't picture going to Marriott properties often enough to use those benefits, a no-annual-fee general travel card might be your best bet.
Consider the $0-annual-fee Discover it® Miles. It earns 1.5 miles per dollar spent on all purchases. Miles are worth 1 cent apiece when used to cover travel purchases made on the card, including hotel stays. The card also includes a unique (and potentially quite lucrative) bonus offer for newcomers: "UNLIMITED BONUS: Unlimited Mile-for-Mile match for all new cardmembers—only from Discover. Discover gives you an unlimited match of all the Miles you’ve earned at the end of your first year. You could turn 35,000 Miles to 70,000 Miles. There’s no signing up, no minimum spending or maximum rewards. Just a Miles-for-Miles match."
Locked into the Bonvoy system
If you frequent several hotel brands, not just Marriott brands, a travel card that lets you transfer points to multiple loyalty programs might be a better fit.
Try the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card. It offers bonus rewards in several popular categories, including travel and dining. Those points can be transferred at a 1:1 ratio to several airlines and hotel loyalty programs, including Marriott. Like the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card, it doesn't charge foreign transaction fees. It also features a valuable sign-up bonus: Earn 60,000 bonus points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening. The annual fee is $95.
Check out other great offers on NerdWallet's roundup of the best credit cards.
How To Decide If It's Right For You
The Marriott Bonvoy Boundless® Credit Card isn't a good pick for people who are on a tight budget or don't travel much. If hotel rewards may not be a good fit, consider which credit card is best for your style. But it's a perfect fit for travelers who prefer Marriott or want to join a hotel loyalty program that offers abundant choice.
To view rates and fees of the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant® American Express® Card, see this page.
To view rates and fees of the Marriott Bonvoy Bevy™ American Express® Card, see this page.
Information related to the Marriott Bonvoy Bountiful™ Card has been collected by NerdWallet and has not been reviewed or provided by the issuer of this card.
This card earns bonus rewards in multiple popular spending categories, including travel and dining. Points are worth 1.25 cents apiece when redeemed for travel through Chase, or you can transfer them to more than a dozen airline and hotel programs, including Marriott.
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Methodology
NerdWallet reviews credit cards with an eye toward both the quantitative and qualitative features of a card. Quantitative features are those that boil down to dollars and cents, such as fees, interest rates, rewards (including earning rates and redemption values) and the cash value of benefits and perks. Qualitative factors are those that affect how easy or difficult it is for a typical cardholder to get good value from the card. They include such things as the ease of application, simplicity of the rewards structure, the likelihood of using certain features, and whether a card is well-suited to everyday use or is best reserved for specific purchases. Our star ratings serve as a general gauge of how each card compares with others in its class, but star ratings are intended to be just one consideration when a consumer is choosing a credit card. Learn how NerdWallet rates credit cards.
