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Is the New Wyndham Rewards Earner Premier Card Worth Its Annual Fee?
Frequent Wyndham customers will get the most benefit from the chain's first premium credit card.
Elina Geller is a contributing NerdWallet travel writer specializing in airline and hotel loyalty programs and travel insurance. In 2019, Elina founded TheMissMiles, a travel rewards coaching business. Her work has been featured by Forbes and AwardWallet. She is a certified public accountant with degrees from the London School of Economics and Fordham University.
Erica Harrington is a contributing editor at NerdWallet. She has more than 20 years of copy-editing experience. Previously, she served as the copy chief at Forbes Advisor and NerdWallet. In addition to personal finance content, she has edited stories about business, city and state politics, arts and entertainment, and national and international affairs. Erica also has taught English as a second language at corporations in Santiago, Chile. She has produced white papers for the United Nations. She is based in Atlanta.
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The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card is Wyndham’s first premium credit card, and it comes with a $395 annual fee. It also comes with automatic Diamond status, elevated earning rates on Wyndham stays and everyday purchases, and more than $400 in value from various statement credits and travel perks.
Because many of the card’s most valuable features are tied to staying within the Wyndham ecosystem and using its credits, the card will make the most sense for travelers whose hotel preferences align with Wyndham’s portfolio.
Wyndham’s footprint includes economy hotels, extended-stay brands, all-inclusive resorts and Caesars Entertainment partner properties in Las Vegas. The company’s hotel mix skews heavily toward economy and midscale brands, which is worth keeping in mind when evaluating whether this card fits your travel habits.
Here's what else you need to know about this card and whether its annual fee is worth the cost.
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card comes with a generous welcome offer. New cardholders can earn 90,000 bonus points after spending $6,000 within the first 120 days and another 30,000 bonus points after spending $750 on Hotels by Wyndham within the first 180 days.
The two-part structure of the welcome offer is worth noting. While the first portion of the bonus can be earned through general spending, the second portion requires cardholders to spend money at Wyndham hotels. As a result, travelers who already stay at Wyndham hotels may find it easier to maximize the card’s full 120,000-point welcome offer.
Beyond the welcome bonus, cardholders receive automatic Wyndham elite status, a complimentary Wyndham Rewards Insider membership and National Emerald Club Executive status. The card also has no foreign transaction fees and includes hundreds of dollars in value through statement credits and other benefits.
Cardholders earn 8 points per $1 spent on Hotels by Wyndham purchases, 4 points per $1 spent on eligible Wyndham Vacation Club, dining, grocery and travel purchases and 1 point per $1 on all other eligible purchases. According to Wyndham, eligible travel purchases include gas, EV charging, airfare, car rentals, rideshare services, tolls and trains.
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card annual fee is worth it if you...
Use the card’s statement credits
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card includes various statement credits and other benefits. Up to $285 of those credits may be relatively easy to use:
$120 in meal delivery credits ($10 per month).
$100 in annual streaming credits for video, music and audio entertainment services.
$65 annual warehouse membership credit.
If you already use meal delivery services like UberEats and DoorDash, subscribe to streaming platforms and belong to a wholesale club, these benefits could help offset a significant portion of the card’s $395 annual fee.
The card also includes a $100 hotel credit. Cardholders receive a single $100 statement credit after spending $100 or more at specific brands, including Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, Wyndham Grand, Dolce Hotels and Resorts by Wyndham, Trademark Collection by Wyndham and Registry Collection Hotels. This credit could be relatively easy to use for travelers who stay at these brands. However, because it doesn’t apply across Wyndham’s entire portfolio, its usefulness will ultimately depend on where you typically stay.
Finally, cardholders receive up to a $120 TSA PreCheck or Global Entry application fee credit. While this can be a valuable perk, it’s available only once every four years, limiting its ongoing impact on the card’s annual value proposition.
If you frequently stay at Wyndham hotels, the Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card can be a powerful tool for earning points.
For example, if you book a $300 stay at a Wyndham hotel and pay with your credit card, you’d earn a total of 6,300 Wyndham points:
8 points per dollar spent on Hotels by Wyndham purchases with the card (2,400 points).
10 points per dollar spent as a Wyndham Rewards member (3,000 points).
A 30% bonus on base points earned as a Diamond elite with a Wyndham Rewards Insider membership (900 points).
In other words, you’d earn the equivalent of 21 Wyndham points per dollar spent on the stay, allowing your points balance to grow quickly.
Wyndham also uses a fixed award chart rather than dynamic pricing. Free nights start at 7,500 points per bedroom, per night, and there are only three award levels: 7,500, 15,000 and 30,000 points, depending on the property. That predictability can be appealing, particularly as many hotel loyalty programs have moved to dynamic award pricing.
Frequent Wyndham guests will also benefit from the card’s 30,000 anniversary bonus points, which are awarded each year after paying the annual fee. Based on NerdWallet’s valuation of Wyndham points at 0.7 cent each, those anniversary points are worth about $210.
Cardholders also receive a 25% discount on free night redemptions and those who stay five nights at Hotels by Wyndham each year receive a free night award worth 30,000 points. Together, these perks can provide meaningful value for frequent Wyndham guests.
Spend heavily on dining, groceries and travel
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card isn’t just rewarding for Wyndham stays. Cardholders also earn 4 points per dollar spent on eligible dining, grocery and travel purchases.
While other rewards cards may offer similar earning rates in some of these categories, the Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card stands out for travelers who specifically want to earn Wyndham points. The broad range of bonus categories gives cardholders multiple opportunities to build their Wyndham points balance, even when they’re not staying at a Wyndham property.
Use the Wyndham Rewards Insider membership
The card also includes a complimentary Wyndham Rewards Insider membership, which normally costs $95 per year. The subscription includes a variety of travel and lifestyle perks, including hotel, flight, car rental and cruise discounts, savings on theme parks and movie tickets, concierge services and Ticketmaster earning and redemption opportunities.
Insider members also have access to discounted rates, which Wyndham states are always lower than the standard Wyndham Rewards member rate for the same hotel and room type. The subscription also boosts accelerated earning rates on qualifying hotel nights. For example, Diamond members receive a 30% bonus on base points earned instead of the standard 20% bonus.
The value you’ll receive from the membership ultimately depends on how often you’ll use these benefits.
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card annual fee is not worth it if you…
Don’t stay at Wyndham hotels
The card’s best benefits are tied directly to the Wyndham ecosystem. The elevated earning rates on Wyndham stays, automatic Diamond status, discounted award nights, anniversary bonus points and annual free night benefit are all most valuable for travelers who often stay at Wyndham properties.
If you rarely stay at Wyndham hotels, it may be difficult to justify paying a $395 annual fee for benefits you won’t use regularly.
Won’t use the card’s credits
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card offers several credits that can help offset its annual fee, including meal delivery, streaming and warehouse membership credits.
However, these benefits provide the most value when they align with your existing spending habits. If you don’t already pay for these services or find yourself going out of your way to use the credits, the card’s effective cost could be much higher than its advertised annual fee.
The bottom line
The Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card isn’t trying to compete solely on premium travel benefits. Instead, it pairs everyday statement credits with perks designed to help frequent Wyndham guests earn and redeem points faster.
Whether the card is worth its $395 annual fee ultimately comes down to how often you expect to stay within Wyndham’s ecosystem.