Negative Hyatt Award Chart Changes

Last week (H-day as the cool kids call it – or just me) the dreaded negative Hyatt award chart changes day for the year hit. Hyatt rolls these award changes out at the end of every February like clockwork. The nice thing is that they give us a month's head start to go through all five stages of grief for some of our favorite hotel properties. After getting through all of those steps we usually have a few days left to panic book a ton of hotels that we have exactly an 11% chance of actually taking. You know, to feel like we are getting those stays for a deal and all at the “old price.” Even though it is really just the current price – we do love to fool ourselves after all. Don't question that 11% number either, it is proven science. While digging through the upcoming Hyatt award chart changes I noticed some interesting things I thought I would share.

This Is An Attack On The Low End

It seems like each year Hyatt focuses on a particular area with these changes. There is no doubt that everything gets thrown in with the kitchen sink too (hello Andaz Papagayo – Hyatt's award change punching bag every year), but there tends to be a focus lately.

Several years back there was a focus on beloved Category 4 properties. It looked like Hyatt went through and systematically increased every favorite option for a category 1-4 free night certificate. Then, over the last two years they focused on their all inclusive hotels. They doubled many nightly award rates in just two years during the process. A nasty trend as they continue to gobble up the AI competition each year. That was why I was not so excited about the Playa purchase. Because a lot of those hotels were with other loyalty programs, which means Hyatt will jack the prices into the stratosphere. Listen, Hyatt offers the best value for hotel points – by far – there is no doubt about it. Except … yes there is an except … except for all inclusive hotels. The sad thing is it didn't use to be that way, anything but really.

So, what was the focus this year? Mattress run properties and category 1 hotels. They sniped them like they were John Wick on a mission for someone kicking their dog. Some areas were hit worse than others, but it was noticeable.

What Happened To Hyatt Category 1 Hotels?

I was writing the Hyatt award chart changes article in real time as I was looking at each section of the chart. I don't normally do my write ups that way. Usually, I will look over the details of everything and then formulate what I want to say before spilling some serious digital ink. Occasionally, I will do it in real time so that you get my initial reactions as they unfold. Then I'll come back a little while later to flesh out my thoughts some more, like with this article. This time around the initial reaction and the fleshed out version were the same – Hyatt declared war on category 1 hotels.

This makes sense because they could take a big cut out of the bottom end of the program, effectively raising rates overall, without adding a new top tier category etc. This increases the overall value of things without it looking like anything bad happened. Add 3,000 – 5,000 to the top of something and people flip out. Remove it from the bottom of something on the other hand, and people pay less attention. The net result is the same, except people protest a lot less. It is actually pretty brilliant on Hyatt's part. This isn't to say category 1 hotels are gone, or going away forever, but they are being thinned. More so in the areas where they stick out a bit, like the United States and Europe. I wouldn't be surprised to see another wave of these hit again next year either.

United States Category 1's

The change to category 1 hotels was noticeable right from the start. As I scrolled the United States award chart I noticed a ton of category 1 hotels listed, especially the ones in Michigan. One of which is such a crap hole that there is no way that a Hyatt corporate person has stayed there and said, yup, this is undervalued.

I counted up the changes for the category 1 hotels in the US and came to a total of 22 going to category 2. Then I looked at the other way, to see if any dropped from a category 2 to a 1 to even it out. That did not happen. Not even once! How big of a change was this exactly? I decided to dig into the current award chart and find out.

Hyatt currently has 103 category 1 hotels in the US. By eliminating 22 of them on March 25th, they are essentially reducing their low end exposure by 21.4% in the United States. That is insane! To put it another way, 1 out of every 5 category 1 hotels is going up in price in the US.

What About Europe Category 1's?

The other area that this seemed prevalent was in Europe. Another area that has consistently higher cash prices like the United States. The amount of category 1 hotels was already pretty low in Europe, at only 18, and most of those were from Hyatt's Linder partnership & acquisition. Even so, that is 8 of the 18 available category 1 hotels in Europe going away, or a staggering 44.4%.

Another Interesting Note About Category 1 Hotels

One more thing I wanted to point about category 1 hotels in the US. I had an article idea a few months back, when I did the best category 1-4 free night certs article option, about best category 1 hotels in the US. My thinking was to try to find somewhere warm in the winter that I could park my parents cheap for a month and earn some elite nights. Then I thought maybe others would be interested too, right?

I did some searching, but that thought was crushed pretty quickly. Then I thought, let's focus on non Hyatt Place and Hyatt House options that are category 1 hotels. That is when I saw it, the Wild Palms Hotel. A category 1 that wasn't a Hyatt House or Hyatt Place AND was in a warmish area just outside of San Jose and San Francisco. A true gem! It didn't look like anything fancy, but had some old school California charm going for it. At least that is how it seemed in the pictures. I think only people in the area really noticed it, and they used it as a mattress run depot.

Well, that is one of the hotels that is getting an increase in March, so book it now! More than that though, it eliminated one of the few non Hyatt House or Place category 1's we had left. We are down to 5 in total now, and they are all Hyatt Regency Hotels:

• Hyatt Regency Wichita
• Hyatt Regency Lisle near Naperville
• The Hyatt Regency Schaumburg, Chicago
• Hyatt Regency Houston West
• Hyatt Regency Rochester

Slim pickings right there. If someone has a gem for me to park my parents in the winter, so I don't have to hear them complain, let me know. You will be my hero without a cape!

Other Notable Observations

Here are some other odds and ends that I noticed from the Hyatt award chart changes in 2025.

• The Hyatt Regency Orlando Airport going up while the other Regency locations in town staying the same is a strange choice. Still two great free night certificate options left in Orlando though.
• Most of my favorite category 4 certificate options in the US remained untouched, but a good chunk of the category 3 ones I mentioned are going up.
• Thompson Atlanta Buckhead will be a nice new addition to the list, even if I loathe the Atlanta area. Buckhead is one of the better neighborhoods in my opinion though.
• Dream South Beach could be another good option, but I need to dig into that more.
• Park Hyatt Doha will likely be a popular option for certs. Prepare for that to go back to a 5 again next year because of it.
• China is by far the cheapest place to live in Hyatt hotels long term.
• Japan got killed here, but it is the most popular destination in the world right now. I would say it should help with award space, but I doubt it.
• Baha Mar is tough to swallow at 30K a night. I don't care what the cash prices say.
• I love Vancouver, and the Hyatt Regency Vancouver is in a great location – but nothing there screams cat 4, much less cat 5.
• The Andaz Papagayo has completely jumped the shark. No one should pay cat 8 prices for that hotel – especially when it was a cat 4 for so long.
• While people were upset to see more category 4 hotels go to 5 (11 in total), it wasn't completely lopsided. There were 6 going from 5 to 4 as well. It could be argued that the overall quality is not quite similar between the ones going up and those coming down though.
• The category 7 free night certs were hit even harder. There were 6 hotels that went up to a category 8, and 0 that dropped from an 8 to a 7.

Negative Hyatt Award Chart Changes: ToP Thoughts

Even though these negative Hyatt award chart changes are a kick in the teeth, as they are every year, it is still the best hotel program out there. They still have an award chart, and have resisted going fully dynamic like others have. People acting like Hyatt is no longer worth it are just having a knee jerk reaction.

I will say that I don't like seeing the category 1 hotels getting targeted so blatantly. If something similar happens the next year or two, like it did with all inclusive resorts, that would be a big negative change for budget travelers. It would essentially drop the bottom off the award chart and create a big devaluation without it feeling like it.

I also think that free night certificates are becoming less and less valuable. It hasn't quite gotten to the point that I won't spend the $15,000 a year on the World of Hyatt card for one each year, but it is inching closer. That is something they need to be careful of. The credit cards create a lot of income for a business that is asset light. Selling their points is the main way they make money after all. If they continue to march popular hotels to category 5 then they need to add the ability to top off the certs. I think people would be okay with that trade off, and the spending would continue.