Using Chase Ultimate Rewards for Disney World Stays in 2020

Even though Disney’s hotels at Disney World have been missing from the Chase Ultimate Rewards travel portal for nearly a year now, you can still use Chase Ultimate Rewards points to book stays at Disney World and get a few—and the most important—perks of staying at a Disney hotels. In this post, we explain the best ways to use Chase Ultimate Rewards points for your Disney World trip.

disney world hotels with chase points hotels.jpeg

About Chase Ultimate Rewards

We have a more complete guide to the Chase Ultimate Rewards program that covers the how and why of earning and using these points in much more detail. In this post, we’re focused mostly on using them (not earning them) for stays near Disney World (not for other purposes like international first class flights).

If you don’t know how to earn these points, you’ll want to spend more time on that guide before getting too far into this post. But basically, you can earn points either by signup bonuses (where you get, for example, 50,000 points for spending $3,000 within three months of opening a card) or just with your everyday spending on the cards.

Briefly, the following cards earn Chase Ultimate Rewards points:

  • The Chase Sapphire, Chase Sapphire Preferred, and Chase Sapphire Reserve

  • The Chase Freedom and Chase Freedom Unlimited

  • The Chase Ink Business Cash, Ink Business Unlimited, and Ink Business Preferred

If you only have the Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, Ink Cash or Unlimited, or Sapphire (not Preferred or Reserve) card, you’re going to be redeeming your points at 1 cent per point, usually in the form of a statement credit.

The real power comes if you have a Chase Sapphire Preferred or Reserve, or Ink Business Preferred card. With those cards, you can either:

  • use those points for more than 1 cent per points (either 1.25 or 1.5 cents) by logging onto the Chase Ultimate Rewards website and accessing the Chase Travel portal or

  • transfer those points to hotel chains and use them to book hotels through their loyalty programs

We’ll cover both of these options below, but first you need to know what hotels we’re targeting with these strategies.

Hotels This Post Targets

The tips we’re going to detail in this post can be used to book a ton of hotels near Walt Disney World. Lots of area hotels are available for booking through the travel portal. And several major hotel chains are transfer partners of Chase, allowing you to transfer points to them and book area hotels through their loyalty programs (this is usually not a great option, as we’ll see).

As we noted above, hotels owned and operated by Disney have disappeared from the Chase travel portal. That’s all around bad news, but there are some silver linings that we’ll address in this post in more detail:

  • Other hotels that get many Disney perks remain available for booking

  • Disney hotels are relatively expensive anyways, so many travelers aren’t at a loss without them

  • Technically you can still use Chase Ultimate Rewards points for Disney hotels, it just isn’t a great use

We’ll cover in the immediate next section the one way to book Disney hotels with Chase Ultimate Rewards points, but we want to focus here on the hotels that have access to special perks typically reserved for guests of Disney hotels. In particular, you’ll want to target:

Why these hotels? Traditionally guests at these hotels have gotten access to two very important perks—the 60-Day advance FastPass+ booking window and Extra Magic Hours. You can read more about both these perks in our guide to the perks of Disney hotels, but they’re helpful to have in visiting Disney World.

However, I want to highlight two key points before I move on. First, this list is always subject to revision. You should confirm the perks any hotel has by visiting its website or by contacting the hotel.

Second, you always want to mind whether there are any restrictions on getting these perks. Try and confirm that all guests—including those who book a hotel only through the Chase Travel Portal—will get these benefits. Sometimes they might be restricted, for example, just to guests who book a hotel+ticket package (which you may or may not be able to accomplish with Ultimate Rewards points).

Here’s a look at some screenshots from the Chase travel portal confirming a particular hotel would offer these perks if I booked a stay there (use the arrows to move between the two pics):

Now that we’ve covered what hotels we’ll be targeting, we’ll talk in a bit about the two strategies for booking them. First, I want to quickly cover how you’d use points to stay at Disney hotels.

Using Chase Ultimate Rewards Points for Statement Credit

Generally, I don’t even like talking about statement credits as a redemption option because they’re such a bad option. But technically—technically—they’re the only way to book a Disney-operated hotel using Chase Ultimate Rewards points.

These points are worth 1 cent each when redeemed for a statement credit. That means a $750 stay at, say, All Star Movies would cost 75,000 points. You’d simply charge the stay to your card and then use 75,000 points for “Cash Back” in the form of a statement credit or a deposit into a Chase bank account.

disney world hotels with chase points cash back.png

And while it’s technically allowable, this redemption option makes almost no sense if you have the Chase Sapphire Preferred or Chase Sapphire Reserve. If you have one of those cards, you can always use the points for 1.25 cents or 1.5 cents each on flights or non-Disney hotels.

This basically means as long as you have any other travel to book—including flights for this trip—you don’t want to use your points for a statement credit.

So, yea, I get that if you wanted to book your Disney trip for free using points, getting 100,000 points on Chase cards (using signup bonuses, for example) gets you $1000 toward your hotel. But once you have those points, they’re worth $1,250 to $1,500 for most people, so don’t waste them on a statement credit.

Booking Disney World Hotels Through The Chase Travel Portal

Now, onto the other Disney World hotels (the ones not operated by Disney). The travel portal is the most direct way to use your Chase Ultimate Rewards points to book travel. Think of it like Hotels.com or Expedia (in fact, it’s now operated by Expedia), but you’ll be paying with the Chase Ultimate Rewards points you’ve earned on your credit card.

We’ll give a quick step-by-step about using the portal. Keep in mind they update the user interface every so often, so these screenshots may be out of date, but the basic process remains the same.

1. Access the Chase Travel Portal

Visit https://ultimaterewardspoints.chase.com. You will be asked to login to your Chase account. At the home page there are several ways to get to the travel portal, including in the top menu:

disney world hotels with chase points screenshot.png

2. Searching for Disney Hotels Through the Chase Travel Portal

Once you’re on the portal page, you’ll click “Hotels” and search from there. For Disney World hotels, you can use the location “Walt Disney World Resort” or even the city, Lake Buena Vista, FL.

3. Pick your Hotel and Room

As discussed above, you should know ahead of time which hotels you’re targeting. Besides checking the list, many of the hotels that get the key perks use some form of the purple logo. From there, the process looks mostly like every other time you’ve booked a hotel online.

chase travel portal results page.png

4. Confirmation and Payment

At the final page, you’ll be able to choose how many points you want to use vs. what share you want billed to your credit card. Remember, when shopping in the portal, Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Ink Business Preferred cardholders 1.25 cents per point, and Chase Sapphire Reserve cardholders get an awesome 1.5 cents per point.

chase travel portal payment page.png

5. Link Your Disney Reservation

I’ve never personally linked one of these reservations to my My Disney Experience account, but it’s an important step that you’ll need to accomplish. This will ensure you're able to take advantage of the 60-day Fastpass+ booking window that Disney guests get.

This tip applies when you book one of these hotels or any Disney hotel through any third party, not just Chase.

Booking Through Ultimate Rewards Partners

The alternative option is to book your hotel using points you transfer from Chase Ultimate Rewards to a hotel partner. Currently, Chase’s transfer partners in the hotel industry are: IHG, Hyatt, and Marriott.

IHG operates the Holiday Inn Orlando — Disney Springs Area. That hotel is one of the seven Disney Springs hotels that (as of publication) get access to the 60-day FastPass+ window and Extra Magic Hours. Don’t confuse this hotel with the
Holiday Inn Resort Orlando Lake Buena Vista.

Marriott operates the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin. These two hotels have access to the 60-day FastPass+ window and Extra Magic Hours (as of publication). They also have an exceptional location, just between Epcot and Hollywood Studios, near the Boardwalk area. We’ve covered how to book the Swan and Dolphin with Marriott points in a separate post.

As we discuss in that post, these hotels are a better use of Marriott points earned directly (like through signup bonuses on Marriott cards) than they are of using Marriott points transferred from Chase.

disney world hotels with chase points dolphin.jpeg

As far as I can tell, Hyatt does not operate any hotel with these perks. The Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress and Hyatt Place Orlando Lake Buena Vista are okay options without any good perks, but their redemption rates are usually worse than booking directly through the Chase travel portal.

If you’re considering making one of these bookings, you’ll want to remember two important things:

Make sure it makes sense to transfer points to the partner rather than using the Chase Travel Portal. It’s not uncommon that a hotel that would cost 50,000 transferred points only costs 20,000 ($250-$300) through the Chase Travel Portal.

Make sure booking with points will still get you the important perks. I’ve never heard of this being an issue, but the entire point of targeting these hotels is to get the 60-day FastPass+ window and Extra Magic Hours.

Because guides are often quickly out of date, for each of these chains (IHG and Marriott), I recommend Googling “how to book CHAIN hotels with points” for the latest.

Things to Keep In Mind

We’ll close out with a few questions you should think through before jumping into one of these bookings.

Is This Better Than Cash Back or Statement Credits?

Let’s say you want to book Hotel A and you find the following prices:

  • 50,000 points booking using Hotel A’s loyalty program

  • $450 or 30,000 points booking through Chase Travel Portal

  • $200 SALE! booking through Priceline

The best deal here is the $200 through Priceline. You really shouldn’t use 20,000 points for a $200 statement credit, but if you had to use points for this stay, 20,000 is less than 30,000 or 50,000. The point is that your Chase points are worth at least 1 cent each, so don’t spend them unless you’re getting at least 1 cent of value.

Is This A Good Use of Ultimate Rewards Points?

Even though its the best rate you can get through the travel portal, 1.5 cents is not an optimal redemption for Ultimate Reward points (we’ve gotten over 7 cents before), but that doesn't mean this isn't a good redemption for you.

Because of their transfer partners, Chase Ultimate Rewards points are quite valuable for booking premium travel experiences. If you're not planning to use the Ultimate Rewards points to redeem premium class flights or hotel stays, using them through the portal for travel is a next-best option.

Is This The Best Way To Book My Disney World Hotel?

It depends. There are lots of ways to get a good deal on a Disney World hotel. Don’t dump 40,000 points just because you have the points. Those points have value, and sometimes it’s going to be better to pay for a room without points.

Have you ever booked a Disney stay with Chase points?

All Your Other Disney World Planning Questions Answered

Don't be overwhelmed by Disney World planning! Take a second to check out our most important content and you'll not only be an expert, but you'll save big $$$ along the way.

Just starting out? Check out our Walt Disney World planning guide! If you're still picking dates, we've got everything you need to know about Disney World crowd calendars. For picking your hotel, check out our Walt Disney World hotels guide.

When it comes time to book we’ll help you find discount Disney World tickets. Decide whether you need a dining plan in our Complete Guide to Disney World Dining Plans! And don't forget to book those Disney World Advance Dining Reservations!

Don't forget to master your Disney World Lightning Lane Guide and Strategy a few months in advance. We'll keep you out of long lines so you can maximize the magical time in the parks! We've got park-specific guides as well: Magic Kingdom Lightning Lane Strategy, Epcot Lightning Lane Strategy, Animal Kingdom Lightning Lane Strategy, and Hollywood Studios Lightning Lane Strategy.

Know what to ride with our guides to: Magic Kingdom rides, Hollywood Studios rides, Epcot rides, and Animal Kingdom rides! Plus learn about the water parks with our guide to Blizzard Beach and our guide to Typhoon Lagoon! And for some some fun prep, check out our Ranking of Every Ride at Walt Disney World.

Finally, before you head out, be sure to check out our to-the-point packing list, 10 essentials you forget to pack for every Disney trip. And if you're interested in saving, there's no better list than our 53 Ways to Save on your Disney trip from start to finish.