A new month, a new set of transfer bonuses. Let’s look at the current transfer bonuses for September 2026 and whether or not you should do it.

The good thing about earning miles and points in a bank’s currency is the flexibility it offers. You’ll generally find it’s preferred to keep miles in the bank until it comes time to redeem. At that point, you can transfer the miles to the best program to book the flight you want. What makes a program the best? It could be the price it charges, the ease of making the transaction, or the refundability if you need to change plans.

On top of that, these programs might also juice up rewards for members by increasing the transfer rate. And it could also change the calculus of which program is the best for the flight you want.

Let’s take a look at all current transfer bonuses in the month of September 2026.

Amex MR: 30% bonus to British Airways / Iberia / Aer Lingus Avios

Now through Sunday, September 27, 2026 you can earn an extra 30% for any American Express Membership Rewards points you transfer over to British Airways, Iberia, or Aer Lingus. This transfer bonus is built into the rate automatically, so you’ll see the improved 1:1.3 rate before transferring.

Should you take advantage?

We’ve seen this deal come up from time to time. While 30% isn’t a bad bonus to grab, we’ve seen as high as 40% in the past year or two.

Some of the sweet spots of the Avios program include:

• Short-haul flights with British Airways on any oneworld airline
• Off-peak business class between North America and Ireland with Aer Lingus
• Flying long-haul business class with Iberia or Finnair
• Decent pricing on Qatar Airways flights

The good news is that you can easily extend the validity of your Avios by transferring in new points to reset the timer. That makes us less opposed to transferring in without a plan, as this is one of the better bonuses if you can max it out. Just make sure they don’t expire.

Amex MR: 30% bonus to Hilton Honors

Now through Wednesday, October 14, you can earn an extra 30% for any American Express Membership Rewards points you transfer over to Hilton Honors points. This transfer bonus is built into the rate automatically, so you’ll see the improved 1:2.6 rate before transferring.

Should you take advantage?

The transfer rate from Membership Rewards to Hilton Honors is normally 1:2. We value Hilton points at a rather low 0.4 cents each. Those numbers mean you normally expect 0.8 cents of value from each American Express Membership Rewards points. This transfer bonus pushes the expectation up to about a cent each (1.04 cents).

Can you find opportunities where you get more value than 0.4 cents per Hilton Honors point? Yes, but it requires you to hit the arbitrary points cap on luxury hotels. On top of that, if you have Hilton elite status, you can get the fifth night free on points awards. In other words, you’ll likely need to spend hundreds of thousands of Hilton points before the perceived value increases above this threshold.

If you don’t already have a stash of Hilton points, you’re going to need to transfer a lot of Membership Rewards points (also in the hundreds of thousands range) to take full advantage. That’s a big commitment.

Recall that Hilton Honors points sales regularly happen and you can buy Hilton points during those sales at 0.5 cents each. You might end up thinking it’s better to buy Hilton points to save your Membership Rewards points for a different partner.

Bilt: Up to 100% bonus to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club

For one day only on Tuesday, September 1, 2026, when you transfer Bilt Points to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, you can earn up to a 100% bonus. This is Bilt’s “Rent Day” promotion and the transfer rate is broken out as follows based on your Bilt elite status:

• Blue members: 25% bonus
• Silver members: 35% bonus
• Gold members: 45% bonus
• Platinum members: 75% bonus
• Platinum members using $200 Bilt Cash boost: 100% bonus

Any member can spend $200 in Bilt Cash to move up one tier. Bonuses are capped at 150,000 Bilt Points.

Should you take advantage?

Virgin Atlantic has some pretty decent sweet spots, including:

• ANA First Class at an excellent price
• Excellent Air New Zealand business class pricing, if you can find the award space
• Great deals on Virgin Voyages
• Potential safari options with Virgin Red

A 45%, 75%, or 100% bonus represents excellent transfer rates. And Virgin points don’t expire, making it a promising safe harbor if you need to accrue points over time. That being said, they’ve devalued their points several times over the recent years and many don’t like the high fees that come with London travel.

If you have a need to travel on Virgin or its partners, go ahead and take advantage of this deal. We’d probably still hold off for a better deal for those looking to transfer prospectively. You never know what the next high transfer bonus there will be with Bilt.

Capital One: 30% bonus to IHG One

Now through Wednesday, September 30, you can earn an extra 30% for any Capital One miles you transfer over to Japan Airlines.

This transfer rate is hardcoded into the system, so when the points post in your applicable loyalty account, it will automatically include the bonus. The transfer rate is normally 2:1.5. With this bonus, the rate will improve to 2:1.95. That means you can almost consider this a 1:1 transfer rate during the promotional period.

Should you take advantage?

The JAL Mileage Bank program has some sweet spots to know:

• Excellent business class pricing on JAL’s own flights
• Good-to-great pricing on JAL first class flights
• Great pricing on Emirates business class flights
• The program is the king of free stopovers

That said, JAL miles will expire after three years with no way to extend them. We don’t like ticking time bombs for proactive transfers. The other thing to consider is this bonus just gets the rate close to 1:1 for Capital One. However, Bilt transfers 1:1 to JAL by default. If you have Bilt points, we’d recommend not jumping on this bonus from Capital One.

Thus, our recommendation is only to take advantage if you have Capital One miles but no Bilt Points or Rove Miles, and you have plans to immediately use these JAL miles.

Chase UR: 20% bonus to Air Canada Aeroplan

Now through Wednesday, September 30, 2026, you can earn an extra 20% bonus for Chase Ultimate Rewards points transferred over to Air Canada Aeroplan.

Chase Aeroplan cardmembers transferring at least 50,000 points get an extra 10% bonus on top of the rate above, capped at 25,000 bonus points per calendar year. This is a permanent feature of the card and stacks with this promotion.

Should you take advantage?

There are several reasons to enjoy Air Canada Aeroplan miles:

• Europe for as little as 60,000 miles in business class
• Cheap business and first class flights between Asia and Oceania
• Excellent pricing on stopovers (5,000 miles)
• One of the best infant award ticketing rates (2,500 miles)

In North America, you have your choice between both United and Air Canada as your major Star Alliance programs. Between the two of them, Air Canada is a little more reliable for storing your miles and bang for your buck. Thus, a 20% transfer bonus is something we would pay attention to and it helps to get some extra miles on top.

Citi TY: 25% bonus to Leading Hotels of the World

Now through Saturday, September 19, 2026, you can transfer ThankYou Points over to Leading Hotels of the World (LHW) and get an extra 25% bonus. The transfer rate is hardcoded into Citi’s transfer rate, so you’ll see the 4:1 ratio before committing to the transfer.

Should you take advantage?

You might initially look at this transfer ratio and think it’s garbage. The normal rate is 5:1, which certainly looks atrocious at first glance. But where this excels is that each LHW point is worth a whopping 8.5 cents each based on our valuation. The normal transfer rate would give about 1.7 cents per TY Point, but this 25% bonus moves it up to a hair over 2.1 cents each.

Many of these hotels are on the more premium side, so don’t expect to find too many in one city. The program also varies the point price based on the cash price, so higher cash rates mean you’ll fork out more points. With those two things in mind, if you have an interest in getting great value from your Citi TY Points and want to stay in luxury hotels (like the Ritz Paris), this one is for you.

On the flip side, the standard rate at the start of 2026 from Citi to LHW was already at 4:1. This bonus just temporarily restores that transfer rate. If you didn’t already transfer back then, perhaps you’re not motivated to transfer now. I mean, would you like it when the grocery store raises prices on your favorite cereal by 20% and then offers a discount to get back to the old price?

Rove: 40% bonus to Copa ConnectMiles

Now through Wednesday September 30, 2026, you can earn an extra 40% for any Rove miles you transfer to Copa ConnectMiles. That means 1,000 Rove miles will become 1,400 Copa miles with this bonus in place.

Should you take advantage?

We haven’t talked about Copa ConnectMiles previously because, well, it was hard to get those miles in the U.S. Now that Rove Miles launched transfers to Copa, it’s suddenly giving us a reason to take a look at the program.

What are some sweet spots of their program? So far, we could only identify one.

• Business class awards from the U.S. to Panama comes in at 30,000 miles or 40,000 miles, depending on your origin. You could connect in Panama and head to Northern South America and pay either a 5,000 mile upcharge (on the 30k routes) or no upcharge (on the 40k routes). Some routes have lie-flat seats in business, though service is a little lacking. Economy rates are half the business class rates.

Access to allegedly decent Star Alliance award pricing, including expanded access to United that includes more than just saver rates. However, finding the award space is difficult.

We’re going to spend more time researching this one. Until we know more, we’d hesitate making prospective transfers. But it’s great that Rove is adding programs that makes it more unique.

A cautionary note

Before you go off and prospectively transfer your points, I feel the need to provide ample warning of going too hard. I’ve previously written about how you shouldn’t bother with transfer bonuses. The main gist of the post was that prospectively transferring your points without a firm plan to use those points can end up being a waste.

Additionally, do not do a “test transfer” of a small amount before sending over the full amount. If you do this, the second batch of points may enter the “void” and it might take a long time for it to appear in your account. That’s because sending over multiple batches might seem like sketchy behavior to the loyalty program that might look like fraud.

Happy hunting!

Suggested reading:

• Quick Hit: Earning Amex Resy Credits
• How to Emulate Hotel Elite Status
• Keep or Cancel: How to Handle Too Many Credit Cards